z118
11-27-2010, 09:23 PM
Over the past few years when I have made trips back to New England to visit family I have when possible taken the detectors and gone over my grandmother's yard. She has lived in her house since the 40's and raised three children there. I believe the house dates back to the early 1900's. It has a large yard and is in a decent sized city with plenty of history to it. It always seemed like it would be a great place to detect. Sadly however, it is the hardest place I have ever hunted. The Tracker was funky here for sure. The Sov would always null on every swing in this yard, even with the sensitivity as low as it would go. I spite of this, I have managed in previous hunts to find 14 wheat pennies as well as some older misc junk, but never any silver. My father alleged I would not find any - he said they were to poor when he was a kid to loose dimes or quarters.
At any rate, I was interested to see how the Etrac would run in this spot. I was back home for the holiday and had a chance to give it a go. It did not run much better than the Sov. I set the sensitivy to auto and it still nulled on every swing. I adjusted to auto -1 and it was still pretty bad. The only way to avoid constant nulling was to move the coil at an impossibly slow rate. And all targets with any depth whatsoever would give jumpy, wonky tones and numbers. Regardless, I still kept at it for a while, pulling quite a bit of iron bits and misc junk. I got a few more of those odd shaped items you see in the pic; I'm not sure what they are but I've pulled a dozen or so from this yard. I dug an old lighter too, along with a nice marble from the same hole. Finally, I got my first convincing sounding coin tone, and low and behold out pops a silver dime. I was a bit dissappointed to find it was a '62 Rosie, but I'm still pretty pleased. It was the only coin I found in about an hour of swinging. My father and his sisters would have been in their teens in 1962, so it's possible one of them dropped this very coin... but of course there's no way to know for sure. I know a Rosie is no great shakes but I was pleased with myself for getting it under such rough conditions and as it came from my grandmother's yard it has more value than the usual silver dime to me!
I'm hoping to get out tomorrow but for the life of me I have no idea what kind of hunting to do... tot lots, dirt for clad, or dirt for silver.
Anyway... happy hunting!
At any rate, I was interested to see how the Etrac would run in this spot. I was back home for the holiday and had a chance to give it a go. It did not run much better than the Sov. I set the sensitivy to auto and it still nulled on every swing. I adjusted to auto -1 and it was still pretty bad. The only way to avoid constant nulling was to move the coil at an impossibly slow rate. And all targets with any depth whatsoever would give jumpy, wonky tones and numbers. Regardless, I still kept at it for a while, pulling quite a bit of iron bits and misc junk. I got a few more of those odd shaped items you see in the pic; I'm not sure what they are but I've pulled a dozen or so from this yard. I dug an old lighter too, along with a nice marble from the same hole. Finally, I got my first convincing sounding coin tone, and low and behold out pops a silver dime. I was a bit dissappointed to find it was a '62 Rosie, but I'm still pretty pleased. It was the only coin I found in about an hour of swinging. My father and his sisters would have been in their teens in 1962, so it's possible one of them dropped this very coin... but of course there's no way to know for sure. I know a Rosie is no great shakes but I was pleased with myself for getting it under such rough conditions and as it came from my grandmother's yard it has more value than the usual silver dime to me!
I'm hoping to get out tomorrow but for the life of me I have no idea what kind of hunting to do... tot lots, dirt for clad, or dirt for silver.
Anyway... happy hunting!