Hi All,
Well here in New England we are, or should be in research mode. The reason? A short season, limited hunting time, and limited hunting opportunities. We can all agree that going to the same old school yard is not going to get us the goodies that we want. Finding new areas to hunt is the way to achieve our goals, I think. A seasoned detectorist had told me that the best leads he gets are from elderly people in town. You know he is right. But truth be told, there is lots of very good info given, and lots of stories told. This hit home the other day as I read the post of the guy looking for a buried tractor... it's typical of the kinds of stories I hear. So how do you spend your valuable hunting time, how do you tell the wheat from the chaff?
Here is how I prioritize the time I get to hunt and whether the story gets my attention. It's very easy.... try to get answers to the Who, What, Where, Why, and How.
Where is important, but doesn't rank too high. If I were to hear a story about a cache of coins buried at a homestead.... I think I could handle that. I am pretty sure that I could tell where the old house is or was. But even if I couldn't, the sites in RI are usually small.... High chance I would be looking intently. The guy looking for the tractor has it narrowed down to 5-8 acres. Hmmm, I'm knocking point off here... 8 acres is lots of detecting on an old farm that maybe nothing interesting happened there. Hopefully your research tells you that there were revival meetings there. This can be the most fun for us because we can look at topography, hills, trees, rises in the land etc.
What is somewhat important. Many times you don't get a specific what.... you get hidden jewelry or old coins, of gold. The what really doesn't matter much because whatever the what is, it usually is worth something or we wouldn't be having this conversation, right?
Who can be critical folks. I'll take the tractor story again. The dad, son, and the hired hand knew exactly where this tractor was buried. Now here's where you need to think about the big picture. Is burying a tractor an unusual or normal behavior? Be critical here. It was pretty common for families to hide their money during the great depression. Also, there were no ATM's, credit cards, paypal, etc. so cash was much more common. I would never raise an eyebrow to learn a family stashed cash on their property.... it really wasn't that uncommon. It would appear that burying a tractor is very rare. I bring this up under who because my reasoning is that you would tell more people about the crazy time you had burying a tractor than burying cash. The guy who was hired to buried the tractor would probably tell lots of folks that story. Again the who question is critical. Everyone involved in a story, especial a family one, has had access to whatever your hearing (many times, but not always). Remember, metal detecting has been around for a relatively long time. There probably has been many family members that could have found this treasure too. Heck, if the guy is telling you the story, assume lots of people knew or know about it. Well, don't get discourage here either. Even if some people know about it, maybe they didn't believe it, maybe they don't have the detector, the time, or live out of state, maybe they screwed up the where, maybe they lacked the technique to recover the what. It's just something that you need to be aware of.
For me though, the first thing I ask is WHY. It just needs to pass the smell test here. Why would someone hire a person to bury a broken tractor? Here's where I get really concerned. I once heard a story about some robbers who would steal jewelry and other valuables and then hide them at a location in the woods. So I asked WHY. Why would these robbers go steal things, get away with it (i guess), and then risk going to the woods with the loot? Plus digging a hole to bury the stuff seems like another opportunity to get caught. The old guy said that they didn't want their wives to see. Does it pass the smell taste. Maybe, but seems really really really weird. There were 3 robbers. Why not split the loot? I guess it's possible. And this is a story that I went with. Yup, searched plenty of woods and found nothing but a few clad coins. The stranger the Why, the more newsworthy it should be. I read a story here about at very very rare unique tractor that was found buried in MN. Things like this folks make news. Before I go on a wild goosechase, it pays to make friends with the librarian. Microficsh is your friend. If you ask when the event happened to might be able to find a clipping on it.
I don't mean to discourage anyone out there from searching for the biggest greatest treasure ever. I don't want to say that a rare tractor couldn't be buried. But for those who do plenty of research... you should have so many ideas that you need to prioritize. These are some of the ways I drill down to what I think would be profitable outings.
To a wonderful 2011!
Well here in New England we are, or should be in research mode. The reason? A short season, limited hunting time, and limited hunting opportunities. We can all agree that going to the same old school yard is not going to get us the goodies that we want. Finding new areas to hunt is the way to achieve our goals, I think. A seasoned detectorist had told me that the best leads he gets are from elderly people in town. You know he is right. But truth be told, there is lots of very good info given, and lots of stories told. This hit home the other day as I read the post of the guy looking for a buried tractor... it's typical of the kinds of stories I hear. So how do you spend your valuable hunting time, how do you tell the wheat from the chaff?
Here is how I prioritize the time I get to hunt and whether the story gets my attention. It's very easy.... try to get answers to the Who, What, Where, Why, and How.
Where is important, but doesn't rank too high. If I were to hear a story about a cache of coins buried at a homestead.... I think I could handle that. I am pretty sure that I could tell where the old house is or was. But even if I couldn't, the sites in RI are usually small.... High chance I would be looking intently. The guy looking for the tractor has it narrowed down to 5-8 acres. Hmmm, I'm knocking point off here... 8 acres is lots of detecting on an old farm that maybe nothing interesting happened there. Hopefully your research tells you that there were revival meetings there. This can be the most fun for us because we can look at topography, hills, trees, rises in the land etc.
What is somewhat important. Many times you don't get a specific what.... you get hidden jewelry or old coins, of gold. The what really doesn't matter much because whatever the what is, it usually is worth something or we wouldn't be having this conversation, right?
Who can be critical folks. I'll take the tractor story again. The dad, son, and the hired hand knew exactly where this tractor was buried. Now here's where you need to think about the big picture. Is burying a tractor an unusual or normal behavior? Be critical here. It was pretty common for families to hide their money during the great depression. Also, there were no ATM's, credit cards, paypal, etc. so cash was much more common. I would never raise an eyebrow to learn a family stashed cash on their property.... it really wasn't that uncommon. It would appear that burying a tractor is very rare. I bring this up under who because my reasoning is that you would tell more people about the crazy time you had burying a tractor than burying cash. The guy who was hired to buried the tractor would probably tell lots of folks that story. Again the who question is critical. Everyone involved in a story, especial a family one, has had access to whatever your hearing (many times, but not always). Remember, metal detecting has been around for a relatively long time. There probably has been many family members that could have found this treasure too. Heck, if the guy is telling you the story, assume lots of people knew or know about it. Well, don't get discourage here either. Even if some people know about it, maybe they didn't believe it, maybe they don't have the detector, the time, or live out of state, maybe they screwed up the where, maybe they lacked the technique to recover the what. It's just something that you need to be aware of.
For me though, the first thing I ask is WHY. It just needs to pass the smell test here. Why would someone hire a person to bury a broken tractor? Here's where I get really concerned. I once heard a story about some robbers who would steal jewelry and other valuables and then hide them at a location in the woods. So I asked WHY. Why would these robbers go steal things, get away with it (i guess), and then risk going to the woods with the loot? Plus digging a hole to bury the stuff seems like another opportunity to get caught. The old guy said that they didn't want their wives to see. Does it pass the smell taste. Maybe, but seems really really really weird. There were 3 robbers. Why not split the loot? I guess it's possible. And this is a story that I went with. Yup, searched plenty of woods and found nothing but a few clad coins. The stranger the Why, the more newsworthy it should be. I read a story here about at very very rare unique tractor that was found buried in MN. Things like this folks make news. Before I go on a wild goosechase, it pays to make friends with the librarian. Microficsh is your friend. If you ask when the event happened to might be able to find a clipping on it.
I don't mean to discourage anyone out there from searching for the biggest greatest treasure ever. I don't want to say that a rare tractor couldn't be buried. But for those who do plenty of research... you should have so many ideas that you need to prioritize. These are some of the ways I drill down to what I think would be profitable outings.
To a wonderful 2011!
I remember that from a loooooong time ago.
That is an awesome story. I've got that old VHS tape layin' around here somewhere. I don't even know if they ever put it on DVD?
I doubt that it's on youtube, but that would be cool.
Happy Hunting!