I've had great luck hunting the woods around rivers, creeks, and any water source for that matter. A dried up swamp might have been a pond or small lake 100 years ago or more. People were drawn to water to water their horses, drink themselves, wash their clothes, take a bath, and take a swim on a hot day. A friend has been water hunting a local river lately and doing well. Mercs, rosies, a large cent, and wheats. I keep expecting him to find some rings or even big silver like halfs or dollars. That will come in time, I'm sure. I'd like to join him but I don't trust slipping because my machine isn't water proof. That's one of the reasons why I want an AT Pro as a backup unit. I feel comfortable wading belly button deep with my GT chest mounted at beaches, but in a river there are slippery bed rock and bolders and such that could easily cause me to fall. I know, because the river he's been hunting I've often waded on hot summer days fishing for smallmouth bass.
He's finding that the coins will settle in cracks in the bedrock like gold nuggets will, along with in even just slightly lower spots than the surrounding bedrock. Find a spot where the bedrock is flat and smooth and the first crack or even slight depression downstream from it will often hold coins. Try to find deeper areas where people could swim, like even waste deep water or so even, and then look for a good current coming out of that hole and a shallower area. If you are in water that has deep mucky mud at the bottom don't bother with it. Chances are any goodies are 3 feet deep or more in that stuff because it lacks enough current to wash away the muck. You want the hard bedrock or gravel areas. Often he's finding 5 to 20 sinkers in one spot were they all rolled and sat. That's a key to a potential coin being there, as they are heavy like coins and will find the same resting places. Often he removes 5 to 20 sinkers before starting to find the older coins sitting under them in these cracks or slight depressions. You'll get a nack for where the coins will sit and start zeroing in on those spots while not wasting your time on others.
If you've got a hand held pinpointer you can put it in a ziplock bag with the air burped out of it to help. He has a waterproof vibraprobe but it's not nearly as good as the Pro Pointer. Don't waste your time with a sand scoop. Too hard in most rivers/streams to use, if not impossible. Instead, carry a screwdriver with you to pry in cracks and fish stuff out, and when you can use your hands just be careful of fishing lures or broken glass. You've got to have a soft touch when feeling around under the water.
