Where to Detect?
Metal detecting is not only very fun to do, but it can easily be very profitable. Finding just one gold piece or any rare coin can easily pay for the cost of the metal detector – if you get to be that fortunate, it takes patience, historical research and persistence! When it comes to finding the correct locations to start sweeping the terrain with your new detector, there are some places that I call 'hot spots', or the best places.
Riverbanks - Ponds - Lakes - Fishing Holes: These locations are true treasure hunting top spots. The Riverbank is a huge area that can provide an age of detecting. River banks once used as ferry crossings often had covered bridges with toll stations. The local old folks may be able to tell you where the nearby fishing and old swimming spots were in their day. People loose valuables in all sorts of scenarios. Going back even earlier in the years, people would take their clothes to the riverbanks to wash them in the water. The same goes for old farm ponds; many were used as a favourite summer time swimming spot or picnic area. The banks and shores of rivers, ponds, streams, lakes etc, are great locations for coins, jewellery, trinkets and more.
Schools: IF you can get permission, these are reasonable places to find modern coinage, or older if the school dates back a while. Towns and rural areas have at least one or more schools, most with large playing fields. Schools that are currently open during school season are a great place to find modern coins and even a few clad coins, also numerous trinkets, die cast cars, and cheaper jewellery items can easily be found on modern school grounds. Obviously you are faced here with the moral dilemma of handing in anything of real value to give the owner a chance to retrieve their lost item. You may have difficulty convincing a school to let you onsite - unless you can get them interested in what you may find that may be of value to the schools history?
Old Industrial Sites: If you are as fortunate as I am, then you live in a town - near to a rural or country area - that keeps a lot of their old listed buildings. In my town, there are many old mill buildings that stand as monuments to the past – often just the boiler house chimney and some of the outbuildings are left, surrounded by semi derelict unused land. Just imagine the wonderful finds these old grounds may be hiding. Generations of workers from the late 1700’s onwards plodding to and from work? Many fascinating relics can be unearthed in such spots. Mind the safety issues in industrial sites however – there are safety concerns to be factored here.
Churches: Searching the land a church is on is another possibility - you never know what you may find. A lot of churches are very old, going back to Saxon times and before. Even many of the modern ones are like schools, they are built on the grounds where old ones once stood. Churches were often the first buildings built in many towns. Right here where I live are numerous churches, and one was built in the early 1700's. Church buildings not only housed people on Sundays but, most where wedding sites, reception halls, dance halls, dinner sites, ice cream social locations, group meeting spots and much more. Keyword here though, permission, permission, permission! It doesn’t do to go digging round graveyards, not without asking first anyhow!
Woods: The woods can be awesome for metal detecting if one knows what to look for. Look for old paths, those are great places to detect along. Old paths in the woods served as shortcuts to open fields for farmers to get their equipment through, or for cattle to follow and more. Before we covered the country with roads and motorways, the only way of travelling between settlements would be to travel old highways and byways – unavoidably going through forested areas, before we chopped most of them down. Do some research on the history of your local area, look at old boundary maps from the middle ages – see where the old roads may still be in surviving forested areas. Surely a detectorists dream? That’s if you can navigate a metal detector through the undergrowth, there is always a downside!
Riverbanks - Ponds - Lakes - Fishing Holes: These locations are true treasure hunting top spots. The Riverbank is a huge area that can provide an age of detecting. River banks once used as ferry crossings often had covered bridges with toll stations. The local old folks may be able to tell you where the nearby fishing and old swimming spots were in their day. People loose valuables in all sorts of scenarios. Going back even earlier in the years, people would take their clothes to the riverbanks to wash them in the water. The same goes for old farm ponds; many were used as a favourite summer time swimming spot or picnic area. The banks and shores of rivers, ponds, streams, lakes etc, are great locations for coins, jewellery, trinkets and more.
Schools: IF you can get permission, these are reasonable places to find modern coinage, or older if the school dates back a while. Towns and rural areas have at least one or more schools, most with large playing fields. Schools that are currently open during school season are a great place to find modern coins and even a few clad coins, also numerous trinkets, die cast cars, and cheaper jewellery items can easily be found on modern school grounds. Obviously you are faced here with the moral dilemma of handing in anything of real value to give the owner a chance to retrieve their lost item. You may have difficulty convincing a school to let you onsite - unless you can get them interested in what you may find that may be of value to the schools history?
Old Industrial Sites: If you are as fortunate as I am, then you live in a town - near to a rural or country area - that keeps a lot of their old listed buildings. In my town, there are many old mill buildings that stand as monuments to the past – often just the boiler house chimney and some of the outbuildings are left, surrounded by semi derelict unused land. Just imagine the wonderful finds these old grounds may be hiding. Generations of workers from the late 1700’s onwards plodding to and from work? Many fascinating relics can be unearthed in such spots. Mind the safety issues in industrial sites however – there are safety concerns to be factored here.
Churches: Searching the land a church is on is another possibility - you never know what you may find. A lot of churches are very old, going back to Saxon times and before. Even many of the modern ones are like schools, they are built on the grounds where old ones once stood. Churches were often the first buildings built in many towns. Right here where I live are numerous churches, and one was built in the early 1700's. Church buildings not only housed people on Sundays but, most where wedding sites, reception halls, dance halls, dinner sites, ice cream social locations, group meeting spots and much more. Keyword here though, permission, permission, permission! It doesn’t do to go digging round graveyards, not without asking first anyhow!
Woods: The woods can be awesome for metal detecting if one knows what to look for. Look for old paths, those are great places to detect along. Old paths in the woods served as shortcuts to open fields for farmers to get their equipment through, or for cattle to follow and more. Before we covered the country with roads and motorways, the only way of travelling between settlements would be to travel old highways and byways – unavoidably going through forested areas, before we chopped most of them down. Do some research on the history of your local area, look at old boundary maps from the middle ages – see where the old roads may still be in surviving forested areas. Surely a detectorists dream? That’s if you can navigate a metal detector through the undergrowth, there is always a downside!
Another rare but great metal detecting site that can often be found in the woods is old stone foundations and old stone chimneys, each has the potential for some interesting coinage or dare i say it, a roman gold coin? Remember at one time this old stone foundation or fireplace may have been part of a family’s home, with kids playing, parties and numerous outdoor activites.
Concert Venues: I don’t care much for the likes of Glastonbury (the festival) myself, but imagine what must get left behind by all those people over so many days? Let’s face it; they are not exactly equipped with a full set of faculties for the duration of events! Many things get lost, and detectorists find them! There are so many outdoors public events held in large parks, fields, beaches etc, during the summer in this country. A person could plan a detecting trip around these events – searching historical sites for your real finds and using these public events in a few spair hours to search for lost change etc. That’s your petrol money paid for anyhow.Some other great Metal Detecting sites are - Parks, Beaches, Old sports Fields, Playgrounds, Fairgrounds, Camping Sites, Fortifications, Castles, Battlefields, Old Picnic Spots. In the UK, we have our pick and ten thousand years of extremely varied history to boot. The main problem is accessibility, as practically all land is owned, and not every farmer wants people digging up his land. Make sure that you have permission to search and dig in any location you are going to do your detecting at.
