J-Dawgs after Community Park

Dad and I went back to Community park for a little more detecting on the North side.  The area had a hill next to a children's play ground.  I saw a few spots where I could tell other metal detectorists had hunted.  Hunting was slow and mostly pennies near the play area.

I had a little more luck once I got into the open flat area a little further South.  The only good find of the night was this little silver ring.  It looks like it may have been homemade.  I see the melt spot on the bottom of the ring where the loop was joined.  It has no hallmark, but the metal detector tells me it is silver.

Last night I dug 3 signals that I would often ignore when I am coin shooting.  Each one had a VDI of 28 on my E-Trac, which is between a nickel and a penny.  Each target turned out to be a nickel with another coin, interesting.

Well, as you probably know it is not always about the finding.  I think of metal detecting like fishing.  Fishing does not mean catching, although it is usually more fun when you are catching.  Sometimes it is about the food afterwards.  Last night it was a loaded JDawg.

Back To Community Park with Dad

Since I had some good results at Community Park, Dad and I decided to go back and see what else we could find.  Here are our finds, including the screwdriver.  Mine are on the right and Dad's are on the left.

My best finds were a silver CTR ring and a silver Star of David pendant.  Also of note a 1956 wheat penny and a SWP Cover the World token/coin?  The token was smooth on the other side.  I could not find a similar token when I googled it.

Dad was wondering if his knee would work.  It did.

He managed to find more dimes and quarters than me, plus he found 2 rings and a trafalga token.

Community Park

I always have my eye out for good spots to metal detect that I have not searched before.  After dinner with my parents this past Friday night I decided to go take a quick look and see if there was much to find at Community Park.  I just kind of wondered around see what kind of signals I would see, stopping to dig all the quarters.

I ended up finding a couple silver rings.  Both sterling silver (925).  The "FOB" rings looks like a CTR ring for a foreign language.

Past Weeks Hunt Results

Saturday is usually my big day to go out and spend a few hours hunting, but I keep my metal detector in my car just in case I find a little time to hunt.  This past week I got a root canal.  After getting the filling in my tooth, I decided I better go hit Lion's Park, since it was so close.  The night before, I found myself on BYU campus and the next night I stopped by Orem Junior High for a quick hunt.  Here are my finds.

At Orem Junior High I found a small silver ring that was missing the larger setting.

At Lion's Park I found a small Arizona charm.  The little eyelet at the top was very fragile and broke off.

A watch, an old mechanical pencil, and a old remote shutter button were some of the other finds.

Night Hunt in Orem City Park

After hunting for relics last week, I decided that I need to do less discrimination in my normal hunting.  The evening of March 16th was a warm and I decide to do a night hunt in Orem City Park to try and broaden my possible targets.  The wrench was one of the targets that showed up more ferrous than what I normally dig.  The one that surprised me was the presidential dollar.  Dug a small button, a chunk of lead, and a small ring that looked pretty good in the dark.

It turned out to be junk when I got home and looked at it in the light.

You might be wondering why I go at night.  I go because I can, because the weather is good, and I have the time.

School Yard Hunt

 Back at Bonneville Elementary school for some late evening hunting.  It seems I am able to find stuff no matter how many times I have gone there.  Best find of the night was a unique pendant/charm. It has a hinged lid that locks shut.

 And it is made out of sterling silver, as you can see by the 925 hallmark on the bottom.

I also had a close call.  In 1938 was the last year that Indian Nickels were minted.  It was also the first year the Jefferson nickel was minted.  To bad that this was not an Indian/Buffalo nickel :(

Searching Old Camp Floyd

First of all don't confuse Old Camp Floyd with the Camp Floyd in Fairfield.  Old Camp Floyd was a camp site for Johnston's army where they camped for 2 months in the summer of 1858.  This camp is located on what is now private land, and I had the chance to hunt it with Duane Bylund, who talked with the land owner and got permission.  Duane is someone who knows a lot about Old Camp Floyd. He even wrote a book about it called "In Search of Johnston's Army."  You can check out his web site and see pictures of some of the stuff he found by clicking here.

Duane kept warning me that the area had been hunted out and about the only thing I could expect to find was some square nails.  I didn't care, finding square nails on historic ground would be good enough for me.

We spent most of our time hunting through a small section of cedar trees.  It was just like he said, there was nothing to be found but old square nails, but the cool thing was that these nails had been dropped over 150 years ago by Johnston's army.

Duane told me that back in the 90's when this area was being hunted hard with metal detectors, that the most common coin found in the area was the $1 gold pieces.  Each time I would get a non-ferrous (non iron) signal, I could imagine finding a gold coin.  A couple of the signals turn out to be modern lead bullets, a 20 gauge shotgun shell, and a 30-30 cartridge. The one non-ferrous signal that I believe came from Johnston's army was a little flat piece of lead that was less than a square inch with a small hole in the middle.

I also found an old piece of glass.  My best find of the night was an iron thimble.  The thimble was in rough shape, missing the tip.  Normally, I would chuck all this as junk, but to know that it has been here since 1858 makes it pretty cool.  Duane found a small pewter button (no picture).

Square Nails from Johnston's Army

Stagecoach Inn / Camp Floyd

My Dad and I decided to take a little drive to Fairfield Utah.  That is the location of the Stagecoach Inn.  It was the first stop for the stagecoach after Salt Lake City.  Fairfield was also a stop along the old pony express route. Camp Floyd was also located in Fairfield.  Camp Floyd was established by Johnston's army in July of 1858.  The same army that had come to that had come to Utah to quell the Mormon rebellion.

We did the self guided tour through the stagecoach in and the museum. It was interesting.

What does this have to do with metal detecting?  Nothing, other than I wish I could hunt these historic grounds.  Land settled in the 1850's is about as old as it gets here in Utah.

Silver Peace Ring

Dad and I got out for a while this past Saturday.  We hunted the North lawn of Orem Elementary School.  The lawn was fairly trashy, so I was just scanning for quarters and silver.  While we were hunting the  head custodian came out and scolded us for not getting his permission, but then he told us we could continue.  We noticed a couple other detectorists hunting around the baseball fields to the West.  I saw them dig lots of targets and wondered how they did, but never made it over to talk with them.

Best find of the day was a small peace ring made of silver (925).

Joseph Smith ring / 1968 Swiss 5 FR Coin

A late evening hunt to the local high school produced a couple interesting finds.  In the middle of the soccer field I found this Swiss coin "CONFOEDERATIO HELVETICA / 5 FR 1968".

 In the middle of the football field I found this silver "Joseph Smith" ring.  It is a replica of the ring that Joseph Smith used to wear and it has his signature inside.

Back to Bonneville

It seems like I have made 100 trips to the same soccer field at Bonneville Elementary School.  The first couple trips here consisted of picking up quarters and some silver rings.

The soccer field is my close-to-home hunting area where I go when I only have a little bit of time.  I have made a couple of those quick trips in the past week.  I have been trying to work it slower to see if I can pick up any gold jewelry (it hasn't worked, yet). 

I did find one small .925 sterling silver ring, a 1950 wheat penny, a couple 12 gauge shotgun shells, some buttons, a cut dime, some junk pendants, some modern clad coinage, and the basic junk.

Quick Hunt at Lion's Park

We went hunting at Lion's park in Provo again February 25th.  It is one of the few local spots I have been able to find some silver coins.  I keep going back to the same spot looking for older coins. I did manage to find a 1953 wheat back penny.

Not sure what the thing is between the "L" and the key.  I thought it was a ring at first, but it is awful bulky. We had to cut our trip short because Mom was sick and the Dell computer repairman was coming over.

Local High School Produces Silver Ring

 Another hunt I made this past February was to the local high school.  This was a night time hunt with a headlamp.  The weather was mild. One of the rings I found was sterling, the other was junk.  The junk ring looked like the kind made out of the handle of some silverware.

Early Season Hunt in Orem City Park

I did an early hunt in Orem City park back in February. Nothing spectacular, but a couple items of notice: a Canadian dime and 2 Sacajawea dollars.