Quest for 100 Indians

goes4ever

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I wrote this article for Ohio Metal Detecting magazine and thought I'd share it here with you all! This is about my quest for digging 100 indian pennies in 2010 !!

Early in 2010 I set some detecting goals. One of those goals was to dig 75 Indian pennies. I successfully hit that goal on Oct 1st 2010. At that time, and with encouragement from other members on some of the detecting forums I post on, I decided to go for 100 Indians. A lot of hours and a lot of patience was put forth and I reached my 100th IHC on Nov. 13th 2010.

I started out Nov. 13th with a total of 92 IHC and I had no idea what the day held for me. Kyle (Nooberz) drove over to meet me for an early saturday morning hunt. It was 8am and just too early to knock on doors, so I took Kyle to a field I had only hunted one time for less than 2 hours. I had recovered 2 IHC on my first trip there, a 1875 and 1896, so I knew this place held potential. Kyle had never dug an IHC before this day and wanted one real bad, little did he know what the day held for the both of us! The first good signal I got that morning was a Large Cent, that got the blood pumping for both of us!

Kyle yells I think I got a coin, so I hurried over to see that he had just dug his very first IHC ever, he was on cloud nine. I continued to hunt and then got a perfect indian signal it was a semi key date 1868, taking me to 93. It wasn't 2 minutes and Kyle said he just dug his second coin and it was a semi key date 1867 IHC, this site was really paying off nicely. I ended up finding one more IHC in the field taking me to 94, and Kyle dug 5 more taking him to 7 IHC for the day! Not bad for a guy who had never found a single IHC before.

It was about 11 am so we broke to go get a bite to eat, from there we stopped at a farm house and secured permission to hunt their yard. The first good coin signal I got was an indian signal and it turned out to be a 3 IHC spill, #95, 96, 97.....getting close! I stood up walked five feet and got yet another good IHC signal, this time it was 2 IHC in the hole...#98, 99......so close to 100 I could taste it!

I continued to hunt for 2 more hours and no indians to be found, I wanted one so bad to hit my goal, but in the meantime I had found 4 wheats, 2 silver rosies, a merc, and a barber dime. I was so excited about finding that 100th IHC I didn't even realize I just hit a silver dime trifecta. I also found 2 walking liberty half dollars making this an exceptional day, but still that last IHC was nowhere to be found. I wandered around the side yard and right beside a small tree I finally got a deep IHC signal, could this be it? I dug a nice big plug and there it was..... a 1900 IHC, perfect shape, taking me to my 100th IHC of the year, and my 8th indian of the day. Kyle found one IHC here and that also took him to 8 IHC that day. He also dug a nice 10 wheat penny spill, that was a fun recovery. Between the two of us we recovered 16 IHC for the day. It was possibly my best detecting day ever and definitely in the top 3 best detecting days.

I primarily hunt 100+ year old farms, so the chance of digging Indians is high, it seems most farms are good for 2-3 Indians, and some a lot more! I had some exceptional good hunts that produced multiple Indians, my best was 8 IHC at an 1885 house in town, and my other 8 IHC day was the day I just described above. I had two days where I dug 5, and two days where I dug 4. The remaining hunts netted 3 or less IHC. I had 92 hunts this year that produced at least one keeper valid enough for a picture for posting and 52 of those hunts I found at least one IHC.

Last year with my Minelab X-70 I found 57 IHC, and I knew with the etrac I got this spring it would be even better. A lot of IHC give bouncy iffy signals, and the etrac is amazing at finding deep coins, coins that beside or even underneath iron. I don't think I would have even come close to meeting this goal without my etrac. It is by far the best detector I have used.

For those of you that use etracs and may have not dug an IHC yet, you may be curious just where they register on the etrac. Majority of the ones I found, I'd say 85% hit around 8 to 12 on the FE side and 32 to 36 on the CO side, so whenever I got a deep 08-36 I almost KNEW it was an IHC before I even dug it. BUT don't always count on an IHC to come in perfectly at the numbers I mentioned. I know of at least 4 I found this season that came in at a very low 01-31, a few were 04 to 06-30. I pretty much stick to a rule, when hunting an old farm or field. And that is IF time allows I dig almost everything repeatable above iron that is 5 inches or deeper. This method has produced a lot of good finds and of course I dig a fair amount of junk, BUT no hunter can say he digs all good targets w/o digging junk, it is just part of the game.

As far as the breakdown by year of the 103 IHC's I found, here is what I was able to recover.

1860-1
1861-1
1863-1
1865-2
1868-1 semi key date
1873-1 semi key date
1874-2
1875-3
1876-1 semi key date
1878-1 semi key date lowest mintage of all that I found (5.8 mil)
1881-2
1882-1
1883-3
1884-3
1885-1
1887-4
1889-2
1890-6
1892-1
1893-1
1894-1
1895-2
1896-5
1897-3
1898-3
1899-4
1900-4
1901-7
1902-6
1903-3
1904-8
1905-5
1906-7
1907-6
1909-1 semi key date

It has been a great season for me and I want to thank you all for taking time to read my story about hitting my goal of 100 IHC pennies for 2010. The IHC is my favorite coin to find and puts a smile on my face every time I am able to dig one!
 

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Fantastic story! I'd be interested to hear your other totals for the year. :)
 
Fantastic story! I'd be interested to hear your other totals for the year. :)
here ya go!
2010 Totals:
==============================
102 silver coins
103 Indian Pennies
460 wheat pennies
2 Large Cents
6 V nickels
12 Buffalo Nickels
1874, 1870 Shield nickels
21 tokens
9 rings (1939 class ring 14k)
 
Sweeettt!!... I just got a X-terra 705 do you recall what those little Indians read on the VDI?

Dave

well I use an etrac, I have an x-70 as well but used an etrac all of 2010, in my story above it tells about where they registered:For those of you that use etracs and may have not dug an IHC yet, you may be curious just where they register on the etrac. Majority of the ones I found, I'd say 85% hit around 8 to 12 on the FE side and 32 to 36 on the CO side, so whenever I got a deep 08-36 I almost KNEW it was an IHC before I even dug it. BUT don't always count on an IHC to come in perfectly at the numbers I mentioned. I know of at least 4 I found this season that came in at a very low 01-31, a few were 04 to 06-30.
 
Fantastic total and some of the most beautiful Indians I have ever seen. The variety of colors on them is like the rainbow, simply awesome. Glad I was there when a few of them were dug and thanks again so much for taking me to a place where I got two firsts, Indian Head and Barber Dime, I will never forget that day or your kindness in making it possible!

 
that was a great day Tony, it was MY GOAL that day to help YOU find an indian! And you did! Made my day to be able to help a friend out
 
Great story and I love the closeup of all the indians. They are in great shape. Thanks.

The only indian I ever found rang as a 10-29/30. It was thinner than a normal indian. It could have been dropped that way, but I think the soil did it to the coin. The soil I have dug in so far is harsh on coppers and nickels. In my limited experience with the E-trac (since late Nov) it seems like the conductivity number will drop when a coin loses thickness. I've seen the same happen with wheats.
 
that was a great day Tony, it was MY GOAL that day to help YOU find an indian! And you did! Made my day to be able to help a friend out

I've too, have found out how much fun it is when hunting with someone else. At least someone who has the passion for MD'ing as I do. Everyone shares in the finds that way.

NebTrac
 
What a beautiful collection of Indian Head Cents you've recovered for 2010, goes4ever! So many of them are in great condition. I love the way you used the old map as a backdrop. I makes my mouth water just looking at it! :D
Nick
 
you guys are way too kind.............:D here is a couple more pics....
 

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