Many detectorists keep score by counting the number of silver coins they find in a year. Primarily being a coinshooter (a detectorist who looks for coins), silver coins are what I tend to seek most of the time. Not too easy, but also not impossible to find at the sites I search most frequently, they provide an attainable challenge. The trouble (for me) with keeping count of my silver finds is the the feeling of being "stuck" when I'm one away from a milestone number.
I still remember all too clearly being out on a cold, wet, snowy late December day in 2009, desperately searching for silver coin 300 for the year. It wasn't meant to be, so that spectacular year ended with 299 silver coins. But I still feel like I fell short of the mark.
The past two weeks I've been stuck at 49 silver coins. Factoring in the limited amount of time I've spent detecting this year, that's a quite good number. Last weekend's detecting trips were frustrating as I watched my friend Dave dig four modern silver coins, and then the next day a shield nickel and an 1875 Seated dime while I couldn't seem to get my detector over an old coin of any kind.
While running errands two days this week, I stopped by two well searched old spots for brief hunts. These sites have produced for me in the past, and as good as I think I am, it's never hunted out. Yesterday I dug a wheat cent and a dateless buffalo nickel, not bad for a quick stop, but the curse of 49 held. Today I had another short window in the afternoon and stopped at a park that has been very good to me over the years. I hadn't been there detecting in at least two years.
A very slow start with a zinc Lincoln cent, a bottle cap, a key, another bottle cap, another key... and then a nice shallow high tone signal on the E-Trac. I saw a circular silver edge and immediately thought I had another bottle cap, but just as quickly realized a bottle cap would not have given me a high tone signal. I look again, flip it over and Charles Barber's head of Liberty confirmsI've found a silver half! Camera comes out for the necessary picture in the dirt before I pick it up. No longer stuck, the curse lifted for now, silver coin #50 for 2015 is a really decent 1903-S Barber half dollar.
I still remember all too clearly being out on a cold, wet, snowy late December day in 2009, desperately searching for silver coin 300 for the year. It wasn't meant to be, so that spectacular year ended with 299 silver coins. But I still feel like I fell short of the mark.
The past two weeks I've been stuck at 49 silver coins. Factoring in the limited amount of time I've spent detecting this year, that's a quite good number. Last weekend's detecting trips were frustrating as I watched my friend Dave dig four modern silver coins, and then the next day a shield nickel and an 1875 Seated dime while I couldn't seem to get my detector over an old coin of any kind.
While running errands two days this week, I stopped by two well searched old spots for brief hunts. These sites have produced for me in the past, and as good as I think I am, it's never hunted out. Yesterday I dug a wheat cent and a dateless buffalo nickel, not bad for a quick stop, but the curse of 49 held. Today I had another short window in the afternoon and stopped at a park that has been very good to me over the years. I hadn't been there detecting in at least two years.
A very slow start with a zinc Lincoln cent, a bottle cap, a key, another bottle cap, another key... and then a nice shallow high tone signal on the E-Trac. I saw a circular silver edge and immediately thought I had another bottle cap, but just as quickly realized a bottle cap would not have given me a high tone signal. I look again, flip it over and Charles Barber's head of Liberty confirmsI've found a silver half! Camera comes out for the necessary picture in the dirt before I pick it up. No longer stuck, the curse lifted for now, silver coin #50 for 2015 is a really decent 1903-S Barber half dollar.
RSS Feed
