Church Yard Hunt

[stewartlittle]

Well,this past weekend I went to S.Ga. to visit family and went to my uncles church.He donated the land to it and there use to be an old house there,that he move to some more land he owns.Anyway,he showed where it use to sit and I hunted where I thought the yard would have been.
I tried AM at first and there was just too much trash for me to deal with so I put it on preset # 3.The first thing I found was a eyelash brush/bottle,it had an aluminum cap.Then found bits and pieces of foil and some stuff I dug & dug but didn't find anything even thought it was showing 2-4 inches deep.After about 1/2 and hour of not finding something of value and having gnats flying around my face,I called it quits and went fishing.

That was the first time I went MDingin a long time and I guess it's like deer hunting (I dont't hunt),you got to be into it to enjoy it.I'll enjoy it alot more if I start finding good stuff.
I might go to some local parks soon,maybe I find some money or a ring.

 

[TURNMASTER]

Give it a little more time in the field. Half an hour isn't enough time to sweep much ground. If it was me I would run in pattern 1 and go over the site again fairly slow. However I think you are correct it is not always much fun if you are not digging coins. 1 day this summer I dug for 4 hours and only found a single wheat penny. That worked well though in eliminating a small chunk of a five acre, 3 home site. The last time I was there I did not find much, but I did find some clad. That clad told me that I was starting to hit in the area where people lost their change. So I'm OK with not finding much one day because I know there is going to be days that produce. Just like fishing.

There will be days I just don't have the where with all to take my time and go slow. I prospect on those days. Find the Honey Hole so to speak. That is kinda my take on it being a rookie.

Patience
Jeff

 

[Goes4ever]

half hour? there are times I go an hour or more w/o a decent signal. Detecting takes patience. A LOT of it too! Good luck, but give it some time, don't be in a big hurry

 

[Beale]

Ditto to what Goes4ever said. Even though I hunt mostly public spots, many days I will not bring home much. Heck to me it is all fun. I work 8 hours a day indoors and many days do not even see outside. I just like the time out and the fun. The finds are a bonus, Beale.

 

[CampCache]

The biggest thing is to slow down. Walk at a snail's pace and swing low to the ground at a moderate pace. That church yard might be your best producing site ever. We have a church yard that produces a good amount of change but the yard is trashy. The church was established in the early 1890's. The first time we hit it we pulled over $30.00 worth of change from the yard. Some really old but the majority of it was clad. Over time I will go back to the church when I learn something new about my machine that will help me in the trash.
I have been hunting in all metal mode with 99 tones here lately. Today I tried all metal and just two tones. I dug everything that was a high tone and never looked at the screen except for setting the machine. I am trying to go by what the tone says instead of the screen and it's working great. Within two hours I had pulled around about 25 coins from the ground and very little trash. I had several whispers that I left in the ground since I didn't have a digger large enough to dig them.

The thing about metal detecting is that you are going to have to work for your finds. You will have to dig trash and you will have to spend time on the machine.
Good luck!

 

[stewartlittle]

Last year I could get out there and stay for an hour and it not bother.Part of my aggravation could have been shooing the gnats from my face,they'd fly in my ears,eyes and nose.Then I went fishing where an breeze kept the gnats away,I fished for an hour and caught 1 baby bass and almost hated to leave.
Won't be back down there till Christmas,if I even go then.

The church is about 20 years old,but the house that was there was close 100 years old.

 

[Mtnmn]

Don't know if you were using your 6" DD coil or not, but in an apparent high trash area like what you were detecting in, the 6" coil would have did a lot better job of separating targets. If your detector was falsing a lot, then chances are you also had your sensitivity set too high. A lower sensitivity setting will eliminate almost all chirping and falsing. Pattern one is usually plenty good enough for most metal detecting areas. Also it is important to properly noise cancel and ground balance your machine before trying to set the sensitivity to the area you are hunting and personally I don't like to use tracking if hitting on too many targets each swing. If you don't have a pinpointer, using a good quality pinpointer will help find those really small targets that are so hard to find using just your eyes. Finally the area you were searching may have have been searched many times over the years, not leaving much in the way of good targets left to find.

 

[Mtnmn]

What I've found best to keep the gnats and anything that bites away is using a very fine mesh head net. They'll fit over your cap or hat and don't cost much either and work great while fishing too. A thin camo hunting mask works good , but are a little warmer. I only use these when the bugs are unbearable...

 

[stewartlittle]

What I've found best to keep the gnats and anything that bites away is using a very fine mesh head net. They'll fit over your cap or hat and don't cost much either and work great while fishing too. A thin camo hunting mask works good , but are a little warmer. I only use these when the bugs are unbearable...

I live in N. GA. and gnat aint a problem,but the mesh head net sounds like fine idea,that'd be a good thing to keep in the detector bag.

I have the 6'' DD and have used it and it does make a difference,but I forgot I even had it.