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March 2020 highlights & testing out an Explorer II

ToySoldier

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Kentucky
March was a wierd month for me and everybody else. A large part of my metal detecting time was spent on a new permission I've been working for over a year to get. Hundreds of acres and nearly a dozen old home sites in the woods and farm fields. An entire day was spent traveling to it and scouting sites with the property owner so I could mark them with GPS and find them again. I've been back twice with my detectors but it's not turning up much in the way of coins. (The owner agreed to let me bring a hunting buddy and he found an 1800s V nickel.) So far, mostly just relics I've agreed to give to the family that owns it because it was their ancestors who lived in those old home sites. None of those finds are pictured here, but I'll post more about that permission some other time.

The rest of my detecting time was spent in my backyard and on some old permissions learning a Minelab Explorer II I bought used at the beginning of the month. I just posted about my experience so far here:

https://metaldetectingforum.com/showpost.php?p=3209547&postcount=13

Below are are the shiny goodies from March plus a couple of my favorite relic items. After I took the photo I realized everything pictured was found with the Explorer II.

That quarter was still 1" in the bottom of the hole when the pinpointer was 1" below the surface. It was an awesome dig.

I've found a few pocket watches over the years, but they've always just been the case. This time I found the case and the guts, but no face or glass. Getting closer, I guess! It wasn't very deep and a good reminder to not assume every screaming shallow high tone signal is a crushed can.

The perfume still has the liquid inside. Depending on how old you are I'm guessing it smells like your mom or grandma did in 1950. Definitely different from the perfumes popular today.
 

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Good report. And I would add that .... if you're not familiar with the tooty-fluty-sick-geese sounds of the Explorer II, then one good way to allow the "lights to go on", is to hook up with a proficient user. Have him flag some deep suspected high conductors. Trade off flagged signals. Watch the way he tries to isolate. Listen to what he's honing in on.

At least for deep-turf strategy. Maybe not quite so important in relicky spots, where you're simply going after any conductive target anyhow.
 
Good report. And I would add that .... if you're not familiar with the tooty-fluty-sick-geese sounds of the Explorer II, then one good way to allow the "lights to go on", is to hook up with a proficient user. Have him flag some deep suspected high conductors. Trade off flagged signals. Watch the way he tries to isolate. Listen to what he's honing in on.

At least for deep-turf strategy. Maybe not quite so important in relicky spots, where you're simply going after any conductive target anyhow.

Thanks. IDXMonster's Explorer videos were helpful, and I had watched those before and after I bought mine. I didn't use the Explorer much on that big farm permission. I had it with me and ran it some around the remaining modern house to snag some coins.

The flute-y, musical, ascending high tone is pretty unmistakable, and confirmed with a very low ferrous - very high conductive VDI is a definite sign of good things to come. I have to remember to trust the detector and spend time covering ground thoroughly rather than chasing and digging every squeak.
 
A very fine report on your activities soldier for the month of March. Next time you hunt the farm site take some pictures of the relics before you return them. Wishing in hindsight I had done so on past experiences. From the looks of your finds you are doing very well with the Explorer now in your arsenal. IDX does make some fantastic educational videos, at least in my eyes. Congrats on the Silver's, the Sterling and all the rest. Most of all the sharing of your learning experience with your new detector. Trapper
 
A very fine report on your activities soldier for the month of March. Next time you hunt the farm site take some pictures of the relics before you return them. Wishing in hindsight I had done so on past experiences. From the looks of your finds you are doing very well with the Explorer now in your arsenal. IDX does make some fantastic educational videos, at least in my eyes. Congrats on the Silver's, the Sterling and all the rest. Most of all the sharing of your learning experience with your new detector. Trapper

Thanks! I still have the relics. They need cleaned up and documented/photographed before I return them. I have GPS locations where each item was found and will give them that map, too.

I was happy my buddy found a good coin to take home--his first V nickel.
We're both turning over the relics and the property owners said we can keep any coins. Unfortunately, we're learning that several generations of this family either learned how to kept their purse strings tight or they didn't have any pennies to lose.

On hunts like this a lot of the fun is in the adventure, but I still feel bad if I invite somebody out and they don't score at least one thing worth getting excited about. In fact, he also found some morel mushrooms under a huge old shade tree deep in the woods next to one of the homesites that is barely still standing. That might have been the highlight of the day. Just an hour before we were trekking through the woods and talking about how this is prime morel season and how cool it be to find one.

I'm going to hunt the place maybe two more times. It's four hours round trip and requires a lot of walking. That's a lot of effort to not find much shiny stuff or old copper, but it's a well-timed permission. It's easy to keep our distance on a few hundred acres, it's far better than sitting inside, any door knocking is off the table, and it's just a beautiful place to spend some time while so many other people are worrying about far worse/important things.
 
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