6/30 Report - One Dollar Gold US Coin, Map, FHQ

One Dollar US Gold Coin Found. Of course there are things other than Spanish Galleon treasures to be found on the Treasure Coast beaches. People still go to the beach and have for many years. This coin seems to be in nice condition.

This might be a good time to remind you about my friend Dave that had a whole jar full of 1600s cobs stolen from the trunk of his car while at Jupiter beach back a number of years ago. Who knows what rarities he had in there? Maybe a Lima star. That was sufficient warning for me and I think it should be for you too. Keep your finds in a bank safe deposit box.

1670 Spanish Colonial Map of Florida. Recently I recommended hunting the old Treasure Coast inlet sites. I found a map online that might give you an idea of where the inlets were in the 1600s. As I've mentioned, in the past the inlets opened and closed and moved from time to time. This map will give you an idea of how the peninsula of Florida was viewed centuries ago. You can see the areas that were explored and mapped. If you look at that map, you will see the Jupiter Inlet, St. Lucie inlet, the Indian River Inlet. Here is the address to see that map.

http://fcit.usf.edu/FLORIDA/maps/1600/m053900.htm

Florida Historical Quarterly. You might want to browse this web site. You can read back issues. Here is the address.

http://palmm.fcla.edu/FHQ/index.shtml

Big Find. Mary Hannaby, 57, who had been metal detecting fields and beaches for seven years when she found a 600 year old piece of a gold religious item in England that is said to be worth $400,000. Here is the address for the entire story.

http://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2009/06/25/Woman-finds-treasure-with-metal-detector/UPI-87501245952502/

Another Story. An 88 year old woman lost her wedding ring. She, of course, was very upset. A sheriff noticed the elderly couple hunting for the ring and gave them a business card for a "detectorist." They contacted the detectorist and he found the ring in ten minutes The story says that the detectorist gave the lady the ring in return for his $50 service fee. I don't know how you feel about that story, but even though I don't know all the details, my first reaction is, "Come on guy. You have to charge an 88 year old lady for ten the ten minutes you spent to find her wedding ring?" I know. He used his time and skill to provide a service. But what is that fifty dollars going to do for him?

Maybe I'm giving him a bad rap. And there might be circumstances that completely justify his fee, but it just seems to me that he could have received more pleasure by being generous and simply enjoying the good deed. Maybe he tried to refuse the fee. I don't even know. But one thing I do know is that there is wealth that leads to poverty, and there is poverty that leads to wealth. An internal attitude of poverty and pettiness will not lead to any type of real wealth. I'll leave it at that for now.

Often I am asked, what is the most valuable thing I ever found. The fact is that I don't have any idea.

Value. Is the value of an object simply the amount of money you can get someone to pay you for the object? That is true, but only in a purely economic sense. But that is not how I look at it. I think the most valuable thing I ever found was the keys of an elderly couple that I by met years ago by chance on a remote beach in the Florida Panhandle. I arrived as they were coming back over the walkway to the parking lot. They had more than they could carry and I helped them carry something to the car before I got my detector out. That was a bit unusual. I don't know why I did that. No one else was anywhere around.

When they got back to the car, they couldn't find their keys. Lucky I was there. It was a very remote and isolated beach, and it was in the days before cell phones. I followed their tracks in the sand and went to where they had been on the beach and quickly found the keys. As I recall they didn't make much of a deal of me finding the keys, but my memory might have failed me on that. Maybe they were a bit stunned. Anyhow, as I think back, that was probably my most valuable find.

The seas are a little rougher today, but nothing that will have much of an effect. The wind is still from the west and there is not anything in the forecast to change my "1" rating. Watch out for the thunder storms and stay cool.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/29 Report - Mystery Object, Button Links, Education, Bible

Carved 18th Century Soldier Art? The item in the photo was found along with other lead items such as musket balls that date to the late 1700s. It was found just a few yards from where the button that I showed yesterday was found. At first I thought it was a finial or something because of the hole (on the front side as shown in the photo) and the decorative markings. You have to look closely to see all the lines carved into the object. The photo does not show them very well. It seems that some people think it was just some artwork carved by a bored soldier with nothing much to do. Someone thought it was a carving of a miniature cannon. It was found just below where there was a canon implacement, which seems to me to make that a distinct possibility, even though I don't think a canon would have that much decorative carving. What do you think?


Unbelievable Crazy Wild New Metal Detector. There is now a metal detector that you wear as sandals. They are supposed to be stealthy, I guess. I really would like to know how they work, but I'm not going to buy them. They cost $60, which isn't much for a detector, but how could they be any good for that price? I just can't take this seriously. It's more humorous than anything to me. To see a photo and the story, go to the following.

http://dvice.com/archives/2009/06/metal-detector.php

Button Links. Yesterday I posted a picture of a dug British Military button from the 1700s. I also showed some of the information that I found about that button. Finding items is fun by itself, but you can learn a lot and increase your enjoyment by starting a collection and then researching your items. It really makes the find special when you can trace the history of the people that were involved and develop realistic scenarios that could have led to item ending up where it was found. If you become a collector, you will undoubtedly learn a lot about the items in your collection.

Coins and buttons are only two of the many types of collections that you might try. If you choose buttons, you should take a look at some of the great online resources such as the following web site on antique military buttons.

http://www.antiquebuttoncollecting.com/Antique_Military_Buttons.html

In the last blog I gave you a web site specific to British Military buttons. You can access it by using the following address.

http://books.google.com/books?id=L3kuAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA116&lpg=PA116&dq=76th+British+foot+infantry+button&source=bl&ots=3_7jpNgIFw&sig=j5DvkA43q5PaNCtc5o1SGYMwl20&hl=en&ei=UKJGStCOLIPUNaK7wKwC&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1

Educational Value of Hunting. As an educator who wrote a college text book,I can tell you that treasure hunting is one of the most educational activities that you can participate in. You can learn about numismatics, geology, oceanography, electronics, history, archaeology, anthropology, economics, metallurgy, mathematics, languages and all kinds of subjects. I highly recommend involving your children in the activity and taking it beyond the hunt. It can give them a personal point of contact with the past and illustrate the practical application of the various disciplines to them. Educators and professionals that demonize treasure hunting alienate the public rather than involving the public as supporters and partners in their quest for truth. That is self-defeating. Innate human curiosity can not and should not be squelched. That natural curiosity and interest is the basis for all scientific endeavor and progress.

1500 year old Bible An old Bible is expected to bring in one million dollars at Sotheby's auction. I just thought that was interesting. Old books and papers can be very valuable. See the following for the whole story.

http://www.forbes.com/2009/06/26/ancient-bible-auction-lifestyle-collecting-bible-codex.html

Treasure Coast winds are coming out of the west this morning and the seas are calm. That makes good conditions for getting out a little further at low tide if you are a beach hunter, and it makes it easier to work the shallow water. With the heat these days, I would recommend checking out the water. But remember, you can't go in with a metal detector around the leased wrecks. I've given the coordinates for most of those before. You'll find a summary of rules and regulations on water hunting around wrecks back in the June 2 post.

Have fun and learn something.
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/27 & 28 Report. Old British Military Button & Beach Movement

British 76th Foot Military Button. This found pewter button is described in the Emilio Collection of Military Buttons. The button reads "HINDOOSTAN PENINSULA." I think you can make out the elephant. Some history of the 76th is provided in the Emelio reference. The description can be seen at the following address. You might find this a useful reference for researching buttons.

http://books.google.com/books?id=L3kuAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA116&lpg=PA116&dq=76th+British+foot+infantry+button&source=bl&ots=3_7jpNgIFw&sig=j5DvkA43q5PaNCtc5o1SGYMwl20&hl=en&ei=UKJGStCOLIPUNaK7wKwC&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1

I found much of the history of the 76th online and according to what I've found, the 76th was at the location where the button was found in 1778. Pretty neat.

Olive Jar Stopper Question. One of this blog's readers has found what appear to be ceramic olive jar stoppers. Has anyone ever heard of this before. They were found at various spots on the Forida east coast including some of the local shipwreck beaches. If anyone can answer that question or point us to the information, please let me know.

What is the best beach? That question is much like the question,"Which is the best movie theatre." One theatre might be nice, but if they don't have good movies that week, it doesn't much matter. So it depends.

Beaches change. Constantly. Sometimes quickly and sometimes ever so slowly. But they are always chaning.

I don't care how many coins a beach has produced in the past, a beach that is not known for producing any coins, might give up the best finds on a particular day. For best results, don't be like a rat in a maze that keeps going back to where he found cheese in the past.

Although our well-known and heavily detected beaches might continue to produce on a regular basis over time, they most heavily detected beaches might not produce the biggest finds. Some of the best finds that I know about have come from some of the less detected beaches.

Would you rather pick up a few half reales or one gold coin? Or a few silver coins or one big gold crucifix. The easy pickings are not always the best.

A beach that has recently eroded is almost always better than a beach that has recently been built up with sand deposited by southeast winds. I don't care if nothing has ever been found on the eroded beach, that is where I would go.

Any beach on the Treasure Coast is a good spot to detect. Too few people take the time to learn the ins-and-outs of some of the less detected beaches. The heavily detected beaches, in my opinion, are much less likely to produce that olive jar filled with coins. I'm not saying it is impossible, but someone hiding a cache of coins is likely to go a little ways from the main camp, and if it was buried on a heavily detected beach, there is a good chance that it has already been found.

I know that some people run to one or two or maybe three spots all the time and seldom explore anything else. In my opinion that is a big mistake. Again, some of the best finds that I know about came from out-of-the-way seldom detected places. And if you are not willing to explore new areas, you are missing out on a lot of the fun of detecting, not to mention the finds.

I've mentioned in the past that the inlets are a bit like wreck magnets. I've also mentioned that the old inlets have moved at different times and are not currently where they used to be. Thirdly, I've previously mentioned that wrecks and coins are often found south of the existing inlets. The reason for that is that the inlet cuts off the flow of sand to the area south of the inlet. The north side of the inlets, on the other hand, usually catch the sand from the north currents, and they continue to build up over time, keeping any heavy old objects deeply covered. It is not that the wreck debris lies south of the inlet.

If you want to find new areas where you can find something besides what other people have just missed, one thing you might try is to locate the old inlets and explore some of those areas. Caches were often buried close to old inlets. Read any of a variety of old books on treasure sites, and I think you will see what I am saying.

Movement of sand is the key to successful beach detecting. It is more complex than it sounds though. I know a number of general principles, but there are things that happen that I do not understand. In other words, I am sometimes surprised by where I find things. I try to learn from that.

In general, waves and currents sift objects. Heavy things will generally separate from lighter things, just like they do in a gold pan. Objects will be deposited according to weight and other factors. Weight, or density, are not the only factors. Shape, surface area and surface adhesion are some other factors that determine how things are deposited.

You need to understand some of that to identify where precious metals will be deposited and where lighter junk will be deposited. A flat thin sheet of a heavy metal will be moved differently than a perfectly round lump of the same metal. A piece of metal with sand and shells attached will move differently than a piece of similar weight and shape.

You learn about things like that through observation. I'll leave it at that for now.

Cape Cod Detector Alert. We're not getting much action locally, but up in the Cape Cod areas homes are being swept away. Its not a good idea to build too close to the ocean and I feel bad for the owners. You can see pictures of houses actually falling into the sea if you go to the following news story.

http://news.aol.com/article/chatham-beach-cottages/545790?icid=main|htmlws-main|dl1|link3|http%3A%2F%2Fnews.aol.com%2Farticle%2Fchatham-beach-cottages%2F545790

My local beach conditions rating is still a 1. If you don't know about my rating system, I described it yesterday, I think it was.

Well, that's it for now.

Happy hunting and researching.
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/26 Report - Gold, History, and Beach Rating System

Gold Conquistador.I don't know if this is a conquistador or if it represents some other type of medieval character holding a flag and wearing a medallion. What do you think it represents? It is at least 18K as determined by acid test and was found on one of our local beaches.


Hunting Conditions. There have been a lot of new readers of this blog lately, and I've received a lot of emails. From the emails I could tell that many of the new readers don't really know a lot about this blog. And that is not the reader's fault. Lately Treasure Coast beach conditions have been so stale, that I haven't spent much time even talking about that. We just haven't had any significant changes in beach hunting conditions for the last few weeks, and so I haven't even bothered to give my beach rating, which by the way, has been a "1" for a number of weeks now.

Beach conditions can change rapidly, and one of the things I do in this blog,is attempt to keep people up to date on the current beach conditions as it relates to finding older coins. We are now firmly entrenched in a summer pattern with calm seas prevailing and what we refer to as sanded-in beaches. In the fall, winter and spring, things change so much that I often give daily updates on the beach conditions. That simply hasn't been necessary lately, because, like I said, not much has changed for a number of weeks. When we get some waves to stir things up a bit, I will be sure to give frequent beach conditions ratings.

I use a five point scale to rate the beach hunting conditions. A rating of one indicates the poorest conditions for finding older coins on our Treasure Coast beaches. A "2" rating indicates that there may be a few spots on the treasure coast where something might be found, but the chances are still slim, and the good spots are scattered and very few. A "3" rating indicates, that there has been some erosion or wave action that could very well have put older coins or other similar items within detector range on the beach. Under level 3 conditions, if you had all the time in the world to search every spot on the Treasure Coast beaches, you would likely come up with something good and old eventually. A "4" rating indicates cuts and wave action, and that the chances of finding an old coin or similar item is very good. I said, very good, not certain. And a "5" rating indicates massive sand removal and wave action resulting in deep cuts that extend sometimes for hundreds of yards in some areas and extend back closer towards the dunes. That usually only happens when we have a good storm or something.

When I do give a condition report or update, I often do NOT mention specific spots or beaches, for a variety of reasons. One reason is that I can't be everywhere, and when I've seen some of the beaches, I've undoubtedly also missed some, so I can only comment in general terms. I also don't want everyone to run to one beach when there is a distinct possibility that there is a better beach somewhere else that I missed. While the Treasure Coast beaches are cutting, there will usually be more than one beach that is cutting, but not all of them. Therefore, I'll usually give you an indication of general conditions,and let you go from there. When we have a one or five rating, you will generally find that all the beaches are either poor or good. You'll find the beaches more inconsistent when we are experiencing less extreme conditions. You might find one beach heavily cut, and another to be no good at all.

Conditions do change rapidly. In the past year, I've seen times when productive cuts lasted no more than a few hours. That typically happens when a front passes through and the winds come from the north and erode the beach, and then shift around and fill the cut back in as the front passes on.

For a number of weeks now, we've had a lot of south and southeast winds which tends to pile the sand up on the beach. We are in a typical summer pattern. It will take a decent storm or something to move all of the sand that has built up on the front of our beaches. Good hunting spots are few and far between, but it is not impossible to find a good spot that produces something, it just generally takes a lot more time and effort when there is anything to be found. I always suggest two things when beach conditions are poor; 1. doing a lot of scouting, and 2. being creative, or what I sometimes call, hunting outside the box. It is worth being out there and observing what is going on. You might find some clues that will be useful later, and you might just get one of those Gomer Pyle "Surprise, Surprise" moments.

Well, I think I've explained my beach rating system. We'll just have to wait for something to change the overall poor conditions that we've been facing for a while now. Again, it can happen quickly, so be prepared and be alert. I will give an update whenever something significant changes. In the mean time, I'm maintaining my "1" rating until further notice. Oh, while we wait for conditions to change,to hunt modern items, one thing you might do is hunt other types of materials, like glass, pottery, and fossils, for example. Another alternative is to hunt sites other than our beaches.

Florida History Reference Book. One informative digital book that you might want to look at is The History of Florida From the Time of Juan Ponce.... by George Fairbanks. One of the chapters that I think is especially interesting is the chapter dealing with the Ribaut's shipwreck. Among other things the chapter mentions how ships were sometimes deposited on the beach and left dry when the tides receded. If you want to take a look at that chapter, or any of the other parts of the book, you can start at the following address.

http://books.google.com/books?id=gVMVAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA121&dq=hidden+treasure+florida&as_brr=1&ie=ISO-8859-1&output=html

There is a lot to talk about. I'll have to pick up where I left off in the next post.

Happy Hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/25 Report - Super Scoop and Old Bottle

T-Rex and Mini-Mouse. Acutally Mini is not as small as she looks. She is stainless steel and you can get a good idea of her size by noticing the penny that is in the bottom of the round scoop. Mini has one problem. Her handle is plain wimpy. If I used Mini more I would definitely replace that handle with something much sturdier, as I have done with another very similar stainless steel scoop that I use most of the time(Mickey). I put Mini in the picture primarily so you could get an idea of the size of T-Rex, who also has about thirty feet of heavy PVC handle that can be added or removed one section at a time.

Obviously I don't carry T-Rex around when metal detecting. T-Rex is used for special situations. T-Rex comes in handy for scooping and sifting mud or sand when large amounts need to be sifted, sometimes from depth, and regular detect-and-dig operations are not the most feasible.


Old Blob Top Bottle. This old bottle was found near an old steamboat landing in the Treasure Coast area. Yesterday I mentioned Gary's clay pipes being found in the mud of a stream, and I am following up on that topic today with another example. I especially enjoy this type of bottle, because it gives so much information. Henry Muhler, whose name is embossed on the bottle, according to what I have been able to find out, was a generic bottler. The Brooklyn street address is also given on the bottle, and my research shows that the address still exists, although I don't know about the original building. I once heard from someone who knew where the address is, but they didn't tell me if the original building was still there. I imagine not. The bottle has the date of 1889 on the other side.

Reference Links. I have Steven Singer's Shipwrecks of Florida in my treasure links list. That will give you a limited preview, which you might find useful. Check out that and the other treasure links that I have listed at the left side of this page.

Way Off the Treasure Coast. The June 24, 2009 WorldNetDaily says that the much sought after Ark of the Covenant will soon be unveiled. There have been reports in the past that ground penetrating radar showed a void where one hunter said he actually saw the Ark of Covenant hidden in a tunnel. To see the recent story, go to the following address.

http://worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=102119

Nobody told me they found that $370,000 ring that was lost in Daytona yet. If you want to see the original article about that, you'll find the address back about two posts.

The waves along the East coast picked up just a touch but not enough to do much more than pile more sand on beach. We'll just have to wait a little longer for a little storm.

I have some more coins and other finds to show you in the future.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/24 Report - Clay Pipes, Reference Help, and more

Clay Pipes. These date back three or four hundred years. They were found by Gary D. who hunted bottles before he got into metal detecting. The whole pipes shown here were found in river mud.

There are some pretty good hints in what I just told you in those few short sentences.


Here are some other pipe bowls. Notice the variety of designs.

All waterways are good potential hunting spots. Settlements were located around waterways and the waterways were the highways of previous centuries.

Gary is very successful detectorist, and I wouldn't be surprised if what he learned while hunting bottles helped him learn some important things about erosion and how things are moved and exposed by the forces of nature. If you go back a few posts, you'll see a photo of the almost new Rolex that he found not long ago.

1600s Pottery Jug. Yesterday I posted a photo of an old jug and asked for information concerning its date and identity. I found a picture of a jug that is fairly similar to that one. It was was dated to the early 1600s. If anyone has found anything closer, I'd sure like to see it.

Here is the site where you can see that jug and others. http://www.preservationvirginia.org/rediscovery/page.php?page_id=77

Dictionary of Dates. I'm always looking for helpful reference works. Here is one that I've found useful. It is Haydn's Dictionary of Dates. Among other things, you can find the dates of various wrecks. You can use this digital book as an electronic database. The section on wrecks begins on page 755. If you want to take a look, go to the following address.

http://books.google.com/books?id=Kil72tKqDo0C&pg=PA755&ie=ISO-8859-1&output=html

Oxidized silver. If you've found a lot of silver in the ocean or other waterways, you probably wished that silver didn't oxidize. Well, did you know that oxidized silver jewelry is now in style. In fact, they are using various methods of artificially oxidizing silver. One involves using a boiled egg. For more information on the process, go to the following web addresses.

http://www.home-jewelry-business-success-tips.com/oxidize-sterling-silver.html

http://www.mapsofworld.com/referrals/metals/silver/oxidized-silver.html

As you can see the beach isn't looking too good. There is a lot of sand piled up on the front. This same spot looked about the same nearly three weeks ago. Not much has changed. You can see the old sand behind the front dune. It will probably take some pretty good action to move all of that new sand.

If you found that $370,000 ring that was lost off the Daytona Main Street pier, congratulations! If you didn't hear about that ring, I posted a link to the story in yesterday's blog.

I have a report on another recently lost ring, but I don't have the details yet.

Happy hunting.
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/23 Report - $370,000 Ring Lost - Amelia Research & Recovery and more.

Old Jug. The pottery jug in the photo has been conserved as you can tell. Unfortunately, it bears no markings and I don't know its age or identity. It is approximately 13.5 inches high. Any ideas or information on that item would be appreciated.

Amelia Research & Recovery. I got an email from one of the guys from Amelia Research & Recovery LLC. They are up in the Melbourne area right now waiting on permit work. I've posted a few photos of the Polly-L in the past. AR&R has a web site that you might want to check out. One of the neat things is a map which shows their current location. The home page can be found at ameliaresearch.com.

$370,000 Ring Lost.A valuable ring with a large orange diamond valued at 370 thousand dollars was recently lost in the waters just off the Main Street Pier in Daytona Beach. For the entire story, go to the following address.

http://weblogs.sun-sentinel.com/news/specials/weirdflorida/blog/2009/04/fortunehunter_alert_370k_ring.html

Dating Bottles. Quite a variety of old bottles, jars, jugs and related items have been found around the Treasure Coast. They include anything from the Olive Jars and fragments found on the Spanish wreck sites, to Coca Cola bottles that can be worth hundreds of dollars. I've mentioned before that my interest in old bottles began after hurricane Andrew when I was hunting silver coins and noticed a number of old bottles in the surf. They were evidently uncovered by the hurricane.

A day or two ago, I received an email asking about the age and identity of an interesting bottle that was found on the Treasure Coast in the Vero area. The finders took it to McClarty where they were told that it looked "authentic." I can't tell enough from the photo to tell its age or anything, but it has a wax seal at the top and a note or something inside. Again, I wasn't able to tell much from the photo. I might have more on that in the future when more information is available. Here is the young archaeologist JT with his find. Treasure hunting is a fun and very educational activity for young people.



There are some nice webs sites that will help determine the age and identify of old bottles. One good one is www.sha.org. To go directly to the section on dating, use this address. It is rather extensive and detailed.

http://www.sha.org/bottle/dating.htm

As you know, beach conditions haven't changed for quite some time and there is no change in the immediate forecast. Watch out for the thunder storms. There is a lot of lightening this morning. Eventually a storm will come along. We'll just have to stay alert.

I have a lot more, but I'll have to keep it for tomorrow.

Have fun and learn something.
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/22 Report. Rip Currents - Carlos II & Philip V Escudo Designs

Rip Currents. Over two hundred swimmers were rescued from rip currents this last weekend on Florida beaches around Volusia County. Rip currents can be dangerous. I shouldn't have to remind you of that. But rip currents also create good spots for water hunting. Don't even think about hunting those areas when the rip currents are beyond your skill and experience level. But after the currents are gone, you will often find areas where the sand and light material has been swept away, and where you can find coins and heavier things that were exposed or left behind. If you don't have a salvage ship equipped with blowers, you just have to let nature move the sand for you. Rip currents will do that on occasion, as will a variety of other natural events.

Sometimes when the sand is removed by the currents, and you have a good producing bottom to work on, you might find it difficult to use a scoop of any sort. The sand can leave the bottom nearly as hard packed as a paved driveway. Rocks will settle in and the cracks will be tightly packed with sand. That can make it virtually impossible to work with any type of scoop. An alternate technique that works well, is fanning the hole. I often use what I call foot-fanning. Just quickly fan over the target with your foot, which will lift the sand and smaller rocks, leaving a nice hole and perhaps popping your target right out. When foot-fanning, it is a good idea to use some sort of foot wear, because rocks or worse things can cause injury. A fishing lure can lodge itself in your foot as you fan it out of the hole. It has happened - believe me.

There is nothing encouraging in the weather forecast yet. It looks like we'll have calm seas on the Treasure Coast for the coming week. Things can change quickly though. We will have some storms this summer.

I haven't been on the local beaches for a few days, because I was up north, and that is why I missed posting for a couple of days.

If you missed the past couple of posts, I talked about a couple of beaches where treasure coins are found that are not as well known as the more popular treasure beaches.

Escudo designs. At the beginning of this blog, I have illustrations of reverse designs that you will find on some Mexican minted escudos that are commonly found on 1715 wrecks. The different designs can help you distinguish between escudos minted under Carlos II and Philip V.

The first illustration shows a reverse design that indicates that the escudo was minted under Carlos II, and therefore dated from 1690 - 1700. The second illustration shows the design found on the reverse of Philip V escudos, and therefore dated from 1700 - 1746.

Both show a cross of Jerusalem, or also called a "cross potent." Around the cross is a stylized "quatre-foil" or "tressure." They also would show the legend, "REX.HIPANIARVM.ET.INDIARVM. On smaller denominations, some elements may not be as detailed. Learning to identify these differences, will help you to narrow down the date to some extent even when the date is not visible.

That is all for now. I'll have some more tips and photos of finds for you soon.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/20 Report - Vero Beach and Treasure Videos

Half-reale.The photo shows a rather typical Mexican-minted half-reale that might be found on any of our 1715 beaches. This one shows part of the Philip monogram. You can see the top of the P and S with the V in between and part of the crown.

Vero Beach Treasure Site. I ran across an article by Doug Kelly describing his detecting experiences on the Treasure Coast. He mentioned that he has been most successful at finding treasure coins on the beach around the Holiday Inn at Vero Beach. As far as I know, that is one of the good spots on the Treasure Coast that is not as heavily detected as the some of the major coin beaches. I know that old Spanish coins have been found just feet from the old concrete walk directly in front of the hotel, much of which washed away in a storm at least twenty years ago. I remember huge slabs of the property in front of the hotel falling into the ocean and disappearing. Of course the beach has been replenished several times since that.

In his article, Doug tells about finding coins in the Vero area. I've mentioned the Vero Holiday Inn beach in a past blog. You can read Doug's article by going to the following.

http://www.visitflorida.com/articles/floridas-shoreline-treasures

Also, under his article is an article about the McLarty Museum that you might also want to read while you are there.

I don't think there is any beach on the Treasue Coast that should be over looked. I know there are some spots that produce on a regular basis,while others have produced very little, yet almost any spot might produce something at right time. That is especially true when you consider the wide variety of types of things that can be found.

Most recently I've been impressed with how many spots produce fossils. I've seen fossils on the beach from south St. Lucie County through north Indian River County, and I don't target fossils, but I do find them interesting. I generally just see them while detecting.

There is a lot to be found on the Treasure Coast and it is not a bad idea to spread out and check some of the areas that you might not have ever hunted before. If you do that, I'm sure it will eventually lead to new discoveries and newly identified hot spots. And don't neglect promising spots that are not on the ocean beach.

Treasure YouTube Videos. There are a bunch of Treasure Coast related treasure hunting videos on YouTube. If you want to take a look, here is a place to start.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N0PeWupaKKE

Also notice the related videos list to the right of that screen which shows a number of videos that feature various Treasue Coast salvors.

I talked about Melbourne yesterday. Treasurelore.com, which I have in my Treasure Link List, mentions thirteen chests of treasure found by near Cocoa by crews building a new road. Once again, almost anyplace around the Treasure Coast might yield some nice old treasure.

Once again, there is nothing in the weather to take notice of. I'm sure we'll get some nice little storms before long.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/18 Report - Melbourne Florida Treasure Beaches & Button Info

Treasure on Melbourne Beach. Someone asked me about Spanish shipwreck coin finds on the Melbourne beaches. As you might know, there have been some rather large caches of silver coins found in Melbourne, especially after the hurricanes eroded the dunes. The level of personal information I have about finds at Melbourne is severely limited though, which is why I have not talked about it before. Melbourne is one of the areas in the state that I have not personally detected.

One place that I've heard of Spanish coins being found on the Melbourne area beaches is Aquarina Beach. It's nearly 11 miles south of 192. 1715 fleet era coins are reportedly found in front of the Aquarina complex and to the north.

Edward Perry IV, Parks Services Specialist at McLarty Treasure Museum, tells about finding his first treasure coin at Melbourne. There are a number of clues in his story, including mention of black sand, and of course, his coin was found after the 2004 hurricanes. You might remember that I mentioned black sand a few posts ago when I talked about coin lines. Ed's coin was a Mexican minted eight-reale apparently from the 1715 fleet. You can see photos and more of the story at the following address.

http://www.atocha1622.com/edperry.htmfte

Black sand is often a good sign even though it gives some detectors a little trouble.

Also,shells are often a good sign. The reason that is often given for that is that is when the ocean currents are piling shells on the beach, they might also be bringing up other small articles.

Military Button Info. I'm glad to report that I got some very helpful information on the button photo that I posted yesterday. Instead of the back reading "FRANCE," the backmark actually reads "ORANGE." After looking at the letters again with that knowledge in mind, I would say that is right. Bigcypresshunter in an email told me, "It was common to use this description to promote the gilting in the late 1700's- early 1800's I believe." That fits very well with what I've read of the history of the area where it was found and the other finds made in the area and confirms what I thought about the likely age. It's great to get that kind of help and information over the internet.

I don't see anything that would change beach conditions for the next seven days.

Could you imagine crossing the ocean in a ship like the one shown in the photo. Simply unbelievable!

Some day I'll have to talk more about water hunting. It seems to me that the chances of finding gold increase dramatically when you get in the water. Gold is heavy and it takes a lot for it to get washed up on the beach. I also think the surface of gold, which doesn't easily adhere to sand or other materials, also keeps it from washing up as easily.

Enjoy your day.
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/17 Report - French Military Button, OMEX, Blue Water Ventures

18th or 19th Century Gilt Military Button Found. It seems to say "France" although I am not absolutely certain of all of the letters. The other side is nearly flat and has no detail. It was found in an area with early British military buttons and military artifacts. It looked to me like a battle had taken place there. I would like any information anyone might be able to provide on this button concerning age or possible Identity. It is about 5/8 inch in diameter.

Blue Water Ventures. You might remember that not too long ago I saw the Virgalona working off of John Brooks Park. The Virgalona is operated by Blue Water Ventures, who has a nice web site. You can see the site at the following address.

http://www.bwvkw.com/News/Virgalona_Rebirth.aspx

Most of the information on the site concerns operations in the Keys, but they have a number of things of interest. There are sections on coins, artifacts, a shield they are trying to identify, new finds, and shipwreck maps and drawings. So you might want to check it out.

Odyssey Marine. The courts ruled that a ship found by Odyssey Marine (OMEX)is the Mercedes and is owned by Spain and that Odyssey would send the recovered coins to Spain. As I asked in a previous post,why would the treasure belong to Spain when it was stolen from South America. Well, I found out that now Peru is claiming the treasure too. If the courts rule against Odyssey, it will only encourage companies like Odyssey, which possess the skill, resources and technology to do this type of work,to leave the artifacts on the ocean floor to be destroyed by time, fishing trawlers,etc. I can not see how claimants who have no direct connection with the artifacts, let alone ownership, can claim artifacts which they have, for hundreds of years, shown no interest in recovering and have not done a thing to recover. Here is the address where you can learn more.

http://en.mercopress.com/2009/06/06/peru-joins-odysseyspain-dispute-over-recovered-sunken-treasure

Archaeological Sites Found by Using Google Earth. Google Earth was recently used to discover historic sites in a remote part of war-torn Afghanistan. I've recommended the use of digital tools such as Google Earth before. You can look for new detecting sites the same way. To learn more about Google Earth was used to discover the sites in Afghanistan, go to the following address.

http://www.eculturalresources.com/news/1066.html

Even though the beaches have been sanded-in, I've been having a lot of fun out there lately. It looks like we'll be having smooth seas for the coming week. It is a nice time to get in the water. There are still a few beach finds being made. It does take some creativity though. It is a great time to do some scouting about.

When you go out, make sure to not get over heated.

Let me know if you have any ideas on the button or any other hints, tips or reports.

Have fun,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/16 Report - Modern Jewelry for the Summer

New Rolex Watch Found with Metal Detector. I often focus on the shipwreck treasure beaches of the Treasure Coast, but I do cover other things. Sometimes you can't help but finding modern stuff. And who would complain? And then there are the times when you might just decide to go for the modern gold, especially when the treasure beaches aren't cooperating. Generally speaking, in my opinion, the beach and surf hunter can probably do just as good or better financially on a regular basis by stalking the modern gold. This Rolex was found by Gary D. I held onto the photo for a little while and just decided this was a good day to post it. I don't have a topic schedule or anything. I just talk about whatever is on my mind on a particular day. Oh, Gary tells me the Rolex was so new that the protective transparent plastic was still on the face. That's nice.

I've listed some of the good beaches for going after modern gold before. This might be a good time to look for modern gold, because even though some of the tourists are gone,a lot of swimmers are hitting the beaches to beat the heat.

To do really well with the modern jewelry finds, many of the same skills that you would use on other types of hunting are helpful. I'll list a few. 1. Know how to read the beaches. 2. Learn how the particular beach works - how the sand moves, etc. 3. Hunting with minimum discrimination. 4. Timing. 5. Know where the most people have gone over the longest period of time with the best items. That is just a quick simple list off the top of my head.

Time on task is very important - no hunt, no find. You can always learn something while you are out there too.

Some beaches have an accumulation of jewelry, but they just don't produce the high value finds. You won't find too many genuine Rolex watches on the causeways of Fort Pierce or Sebastian. Go to the upper scale places for the more upper scale finds. I know one beach that will almost always produce gold, but the gold will be like 10K instead of 14K or 18K and few diamonds or things of more value. Again, if you want the high value stuff, you have to go where people have or have had high value stuff.

People think that some areas are all hunted out. Areas are seldom if ever hunted out, and you can always find some good spots where no one else hunts. I was always surprised that some of my favorite spots, which were near major metropolitan areas where there was a lot of detectorists, were never hunted by anyone else. Most everybody was working the same old spots. I never saw one other hunter on some of my favorite beaches in over ten years of hunting. You can have some good spots all to yourself if you are willing to explore and not follow the crowd.

Some of the better areas will always produce, even when the beaches are sanded in, simply because of the sheer number of people that are continually at the beach. You can be be successful on a regular basis if you put in your time, continue to learn, and continue to explore new areas and techniques.

One other thing I would recommend, and I've referred to this before, is to develop your eye-balling skills. You might be surprised what you can find visually. I've written a few magazine articles on that topic. I once found a watch while driving. I thought I saw it on the road, drove up to it, opened the door and picked it up without even getting out of the car. Another example would be when I went to the beach one morning, parked, got out of the car, and saw a nice gold chain laying on the pavement in a puddle in front of the car. So keep your eyes open.

Oh, and of course you can find modern jewelry on many of our treasure beaches. People still go there.

I don't want to give the idea that the treasure coast beaches won't turn up anything these days. They will. It is a little harder, though, while we have the sanded-in summer conditions. Still there are ways to be productive with the shipwreck finds. In the past, I've mentioned some ways to work with the sanded-in conditions, so I won't go over that again today. Basically, expand your hunting skills and knowledge base, explore and hunt outside the box.

I hope you are using the treasure link list to the right of this blog. I've recently added some sites that I think are absolutely great. I'll have more of those for you in the future. I'd like to hear from others that have photos of finds, reports from different localities, or other tips or information.

I don't think anyone has solved the last coded message. If anyone is still working on that, let me know.

Nothing new to report concerning the Treasure Coast beach conditions yet. I'm still watching for any signs of a coming Northeaster.

There are all kinds of things out there just waiting to be found.

Have fun,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/15 Report - Mel Fisher Days and Man Meets Meterorite

Key West celebrates Mel Fisher Days on the 24th Anniversary of the discovery of the Atocha. To read more about that, visit the following address.

http://media.fla-keys.com/article_display.cfm?article_id=3927

Treasure hits teenager. The chances are 1 in 100 million, but it happens. A teenager was recently hit by a meteorite while on his way to school.

Some months ago I wrote about how some treasure hunters make big bucks hunting meteorites. Well, this treasure found it's person. To me, that is an interesting way to look at it.

Have you ever felt that a particular find was meant for you? It certainly feels special when you are the first person to hold an item that has remained hidden for hundreds of years. I've often felt that there was something mysterious about how treasure and hunter come together. I remember the time that I only had about fifteen minutes to hunt one day. I felt compelled to go anyhow, even though I had to travel to the site, and then return without much time to hunt. I stepped in the water and in minutes, if not seconds, quickly found one of my better finds. I also think of the times that I've walked along the beach without a signal, and then get that happy feeling. Bang! Right after the happy feeling, I get that good signal.

Those who have that eternal optimism, have an inner sense of inevitability that allows them to persevere until the moment of discovery finally comes. Others quit before it ever happens. They never heard the siren song. They never tuned into the music of treasure that you can audibly hear when the wind whistles through the holes in the detector's rod like the sound of a flute beckoning.

Maybe when you are hunting, you'll hear the call. Enjoy the music with all of its variations. It will help you to persevere and lead you to that crescendo where treasure meets hunter.

In my last post, I displayed an illustration of one variation of a Mexican eight escudo shield. Today my illustration is of the other (cross) side of a Bogota minted escudo. There are about nine major variations of the shield side of Bogota escudos that I am aware of. The other side shows fewer variations. The illustration shows the two major variations that I am aware of. On the left is the design of the earlier period, and on the right, the later design. You can tell a lot about a cob at first glance if you are familiar with the various designs. As you know, the date is often not visible, but in this case, you can tell something about the escudo's date by recognizing these two major variations.

Concerning beach conditions. Now it looks like we won't even be getting even a small increase in seas this week. That is ok with me, even though I'd rather see a northeaster blow the sand off the beaches. In the mean time, jump in the water, look around and see what the near shore conditions look like. Take the opportunity to do a little scouting around, and if you're in one of the areas where you can freely detect, enjoy yourself. There should be a lot of swimmers out there losing stuff, and the old stuff is still down there if you can find the right spot.

We'll just have to keep watching for the first storm of the season to roll in. Hopefully it will just stir up the beach.

Let me know which things you find useful. To some extent, I can direct the focus towards what you want to see.

I have some other finds to show in the near future.

Have fun,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/14 Report - Mexican Eight Escudos 1714/GRAT error

Rare Variety of Mexico-minted 1714 Eight Escudo. Goldcobs.com is a great site for studying gold cob varieties and errors. The photos are great, as are the descriptions. You'll find many die errors described. In some cases, a nice history of the coin is given, sometimes including previous auction results and sometimes even the wreck site that the cob came from. I've already listed that web site in my link list at the left of this blog.

On Mexico-minted 1714 eight escudos, the date is often found above the upper left corner of the shield. On some varieties, though, "GRAT" is found where the date would otherwise be. In that case, if the cob is well centered, you might be lucky enough to find the date on the reverse (cross side) of the cob. There are some, though, that have "GRAT" stamped over the date.

You can see an illustration of the shield for that cob variation above. This error creates one of the rarest of the 1714 escudo varieties. Again, some cobs show "GRAT" in that position, some "1714" and the error variety shows a combination of both. To see a photo of that error, go to the following address. www.goldcobs.mexico2.html

There are many more fine examples of different varieties and errors on that web site.

The beaches haven't changed much for quite a while. The seas will be just a little rougher later in the weak. Nothing very significant though. The water is very nice - calm with good visibility. And on the beach, I am still seeing sea glass, fossils and other non-metallic targets. There are still a few scattered metallic targets out there. The rain eroded areas have pretty much dried up. Watch for storms to develop.

Have fun, and enjoy your research time.
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/13 Report - Religious Medal (Guadalupe) and fossils

Silver Our Lady of Guadalupe Medal.Beach conditions are not ideal, but you can still find things - metallic and non-metallic. Some of my recent finds are thousands of years old. I'll show you the old ones in just a minute. The Our Lady of Guadalupe medal is nothing very special, but it did bring up an interesting point. When I first found it, I immediately thought it couldn't be very old, simply because I didn't think Guadalupe was a famous shrine that long ago. I found out that that was wrong. I was right that this particular medal is not old enough to be an old Spanish shipwreck artifact, but my reasoning was wrong. Similar medals were being made hundreds of year ago.

In fact, the story of Our Lady of Guadalupe goes back to 1531 when an Aztec by the name of Juan Diego (obviously renamed)was on his way to mass outside of Mexico city and a vision of what he determined was the Virgin Mary spoke to him in the local language of Nahuatl. To make a long and fascinating story short, miracles followed and Guadalupe became a world renowned shrine.

My medal, besides having marks such as the .925 that indicates that it is of more recent origin,also on the back has the Mayan calendar. That to me seemed a strange combination. But if you read the story, you'll understand why the combination of conflicting cultural symbols exists on the same medal. The main point that I wanted to make is that many items that are common today were also common centuries ago in the same or at least a very similar form, so you often have to look at other details to get a good idea of an items origin and identity. Even though there were similar religious medals made centuries ago in silver and using a very similar style of image, there are a number of things on this particular medal that clearly indicates that it is of more recent origin.

Some of the things I found the other day are nonmetallic, and as I mentioned, even much older than Diego's vision. Here is a picture of what I call collateral finds - things that I was not targeting, but just happened to find along the way.In the photo, you will see sea glass and a couple of fossils. I think the fossils are teeth from an ancestor of our modern horses. I could easily be wrong about that, so feel free to correct me if I am wrong. I do know they are fossilized teeth. I am not so sure about the identity.

With all of the news about the Vero Beach find of the 1300 year old bone with a picture of a mastodon carved on it, I suspect more people will become aware of Florida Fossils. There is certainly nothing wrong with keeping your eyes open while detecting. You can quickly scan a lot more area visually than you can with your detector. I figure, as long as you are out there, you might as well pick up non-metallic things as well as metallic. Some, like these fossils, may be thousands of years old.

As I always say, when the conditions aren't good for hunting one thing, it is good for hunting something else. Lately besides the non-metallic items,the water has been very inviting. It is time to hunt outside the box.

If you want to learn more about fossils, you can visit the Florida Museum of Natural History fossil web site. Here is the address.

http://www.fossil-treasures-of-florida.com/

I also want to remind you of the great site that I recently mentioned that gives a lot of good information on Spanish Colonial artifacts. Like I said, I'll probably get around to adding that one to my treasure links. Here it is again.

http://www.artifacts.org/default.htm

Even though we are sanded in for the time being, there are some high pressure zones out there, and by next Friday, we'll actually see the seas picking up a bit. Not much, but a bit. Keep watching for tropical storms. They can change things in a hurry.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/12 Report - Salvage Work, Beach Conditions, Cob Shield

Salvage ship Endeavor working the Nieves gold fields just off John Brooks Park near Fort Pierce.The Endeavor, is now working the gold fields about 100 yards off of John Brooks Park and Ye Olde Penny Hole. A couple of weeks ago, I saw the Virgalona at about the same spot. Good luck guys.

Talk about being sanded-in! Look at that beach. That is the type of beach that makes for good hunting for shells,fossils and sea glass. Not exactly what we are looking for. It's going to take some wave action to move all of that sand.


There is something brewing out there. Later next week the seas will actually be increasing a little. Probably not enough, but still, this is the time of year when the tropics can get active. We'll have to watch those high pressure areas.


Yesterday I posted a picture of a Mexican minted 2-reale from one of the 1715 beaches. Here is an illustration of a shield similar to the one on that cob. The fleur-de-lis in the center of this shield is an easy way to quickly distinguish between Philip V and Carlos cobs of the 1715 fleet. The Philip cobs have the shield showing the fleur-de-lis in the center. I plan to show more shield variations in the future, including one with a transitional mint error that you might want to watch for.

I recently discovered a great web site that provides a lot of information and photographs of Spanish Colonial military artifacts, especially buttons and uniform related objects. They also show some weaponry, including among other things musket parts and flints, and other great stuff that any Treasure Coast detectorists will find interesting. Here is the address.

http://www.artifacts.org/default.htm

That's all for now.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/11/09 Report - Discrimination Test and Cobs

Yesterday I talked a bit about my investigation of using discrimination mode on the Minelab Excalibur and the possibility of iron items masking good targets. I didn't get into all the detail and won't today, but I do want to give you some of the more important findings. Yesterday I mentioned that a rusted bolt laying on top of a silver cob, masked the cob. In the small photo you see the 2-reale, the piece of rusted iron, and the rusted bolt that I used in my tests. To simplify, I'm only going to consider those three objects in my discussion today.

Here is one thing that is important. In discrimination mode, at the minimum discrimination setting, the Minelab Excalibur masked the bolt, and it masked the 2-reale when the bolt was on top of the 2-reale. But not only did it mask the 2-reale when sitting on top of it, it also masked the 2-reale when it was moved a number of inches to one side of the reale. That to me is important to know.

On the other hand at the minium discrimination setting, the smaller flat piece of iron did not mask the two-reale when the iron was on top of the reale. But when the iron was moved over to one side a few inches, the flat piece of iron gave the low tone signal indicating iron and also the good signal. However if you were moving quickly and not listening carfully, you could easily hear the iron signal and confuse it with, or simply miss, the good signal from the reale.

This test was conducted in the same location and using the same detector and same settings as those described in my 5/28/2009 air-test post.

There are two good reasons that I don't like to use any (I said ANY) discrimination unless absolutely necessary. For one thing, there are many iron items that I don't want to miss, either because they are themselves articles of interest(ie. a spike), or they tell me something about what took place at that area at some earlier time. Nails and things can be significant indicators. If you use all metals mode, or what is called pinpoint mode on the Excalibur, you won't miss iron objects. And when you remove iron objects, you just might find that underneath, or close by, there is a good target of another sort. In my opinion, when you can possibly tolerate it, it is better to simply detect without any type of discriminatio and remove all the junk that you can.

Also I should mention that with many detectors you can learn to identify iron objects when using an all metals mode. Identification of iron objects can be facilitated by sweeping first one direction and then sweeping at a 90 degree angle. In one direction the signal will be relatively steady but in the other direction the signal will be discontinuous (something like boing boing). It's hard to explain, but try it on an iron nail and you will learn to identify the distinct sounds.

On June 9th there was a Fox News article about the beginning of the salvage season along the Treasure Coast. It talked about some of the local salvage efforts. To read the article go to the following address.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,364383,00.html

I added the Spanish coins database that I mentioned a couple of posts ago to the treasure links database on the main page of this blog. I'm not sure if I'll leave it there or not.

The first photo shows a Mexican minted two-reale found on one of the 1715 beaches. You can see some of the shield on the coin. In the photo the coin is leaning about 30 degrees to the left. You can see the "2" indicating the denominatin rather clearly to the right of the shield.

I've been talking about inflation and prices. In the 1977 Real Eight auction that I mentioned yesterday, a 5 lb., 2.25 oz. gold bar that was neatly marked, sold for $10700. That is just a little under $131 per ounce, if my arithmetic is correct. Wouldn't you like to be able to buy a nice gold treasure bar at the same price today?

In the future I might talk more about the various shields used on cobs, and an interesting transitional mint error found on some of the Bogata escudos.

We just have the same old flat seas. We'll just have to keep watching for a storm or something to pop up. It can happen quickly. So keep watching.

Happy hunting.
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

Excalibur Discrimination Test & Real Eight Company Auction

Minelab Excalibur II Tests. In my 5/28/09 post, I did an air test on the Minelab Excalibur II using some small silver cobs as the targets. You can see the result of those tests by going back to that post. Just the other day, I investigated the effects of discrimination using the same detector. In general terms, I found that when a piece of rusted iron (weighing 8.3 grams) from an old anchor covered the silver cobs, the iron did not diminish the target response to the silver cobs (one was 8 grams and the other 2.8 grams)very much at all when the Excalibur was in discrimination mode and the discrimination setting was low. I was surprised by how small the effect was. However, when a fairly large rusted iron bolt was on top of the cobs, the iron was discriminated out, but the silver was not detected. What I wanted to see is how much the discrimination mode would obscure good targets when iron was present. In general, I found that small iron had virtually no effect and was easily discriminated out, but that larger pieces of iron would completely mask good targets. You might recall from my 5/28 post that I also found that a discrimination setting of 15, which I consider very high, also severely diminished the detector's response to cobs of this size. I actually did a more detailed study than what I am giving you here, but I wanted to replicate the experiment before giving you all the details. I plan to do that in the near future.

Real Eight Company Auction. Years ago, 1977 to be exact, the Real Eight Company auctioned off a number of their finds from the 1715 Plate Fleet that were recovered on the Treasure Coast. In a recent post I advised keeping your precious metals and fine coin finds because of inflation. Well since 1977 up until the present time, we haven't seen the kind of national debt that we are seeing now, and yet you can see how well 1715 Fleet coins have done. In 1977 a very nice 1714 Mexican minted 8 escudo of 26.87 grams,partially dated on the reverse (unusual) sold at auction for $1500. That's all! And that was the highest priced gold coin in the auction. The average estimated value for eight escudos in that auction was only $800 - $1300. Of course, our US dollars were generally worth more in those days, but that is what I am talking about. I'll bring more 1715 coin auction results in the future.

When I started this blog, I didn't know much more than what a blog is. I started it on AOL, and shortly after I just got started, AOL did away with their free storage space, so I had to move on as quickly as I could. I moved to blogspot and that seems to have been a good choice. I've been learning more about what makes an effective blog, and you might have noticed, made some changes to the layout, especially the main title and post titles. I'll probably be making some more small changes. I hope it doesn't cause any confusion, although I think it already did.

I don't really care for my Treasureguide name, but as I said, I had to make some quick changes and that is what popped into my head at the time. I guess it is serving the purpose.

I got an email from a person that indicates that what I last said about coin lines on the beach, holds for beaches far away from the Treasure Coast. That makes sense. The same general forces of nature work on the beaches no matter where they are. Nonetheless, it is good to get confirmation and to know that my hints hold true for beaches beyond the Treasure Coast. In fact, most of what I learned about coin lines and similar things related to erosion, was learned on the South Florida beaches. While Treasure Coast beaches are very different in some ways from South Florida beaches,the general way that erosion and deposition works is about the same.

As you know we haven't had any significant changes in beach condition for quite some time. I've given a number of hints for hunting in these sanded-in conditions. I hope you found them useful. Of course we are in hurricane season, and a storm can come up very quickly, so you need to keep watching.

The photo today shows a copper pitcher that I found in the ocean. It is sitting on my finger tip. It took me a long time to see it in the sand after it was detected. I don't have any idea of age or identity.

Well, that's all for today.

Have fun,
TreasureGuide@comcast.nt

6/8 Treasure Coast Beach Detecting Report - Researching Coins

This .999 Isle of Man silver Crown was found on one of our Treasure Coast beaches. In surprisingly good condition too. I don't have any idea how it got there. You never know what you might find. I'll talk more about web sites for researching coins (Spanish and US) in just a minute.

It doesn't look like there will be any change in beach conditions this week. The seas will remain calm. You might choose to do some water hunting, explore some new places, or as long as we have these nice daily thunder showers, hunt the areas where rain erosion is at work. When exploring new beaches, watch for lighter materials that indicate historic activity at the location. Look for bricks, pottery, glass, iron, sheet metal etc. Also look for coin lines. There are still some out there, as I showed yesterday.

Don't do one thing that I did the other day. After walking a long ways and seeing what I set out to see, I decided to do some detecting. When I turned on my detector, I found that the battery was too low to do anything. If I had followed my own advice and tested and tuned my detector as soon as I hit the beach I would have saved some frustration. Of course, it is also a good idea to check your detector before leaving home. If I hadn't decided to do a lot of eye-balling that day, I would have been very disappointed. The eye-balling did pay off. I found some nice items and saw some things that pointed me to some future detecting spots.

Unless you really need the money now, I would hold onto any precious metals or fine coins. The dollar has steadily been losing value over the past month, and I just don't see how we can possibly avoid inflation while we are increasing the debt and printing so much new money. Just the act of printing money comprises a redistribution of wealth because it makes the money that is currently held worth less and then the new money is sent elsewhere. That in effect, is taking wealth away from some people and giving it to others.

Russia now holds more Euros in its reserves than dollars, and China who holds much of out debt is buying US assets, commodities in general, and accumulating large amounts of gold reserves. Therefore, the US dollars that you hold are bound, in my opinion, to continue losing value.

Florida United Numismatists, Inc., is hosting the 3rd Annual Summer FUN Convention in West Palm Beach, Florida. The convention opens to the public at 10:00 A.M., July 9th and will run through 5:00 P.M., Saturday, July 11th. Numismatic dealers from around the country will converge on the Palm Beach County Convention Center to buy, sell and appraise coins, paper currency, tokens, medals and other items. If you have any coins to sell, or if you want coins appraised, this is a great opportunity, and it is right here in our own back yard.

Check out this address to learn more.

http://uscoinfacts.com/coin-shows/details/21-summer-fun-convention-2009.html

Here is a reference that will help you identify Spanish coins from 1050 AD up to the present. They are organized by king and date. You will have to scroll down a bit to find those minted during the era of the treasure ships. The site will give you pictures and other details needed to identify a given coin. It is in the Spanish language but if you know a couple of words you will be able to get along. Ceca, for example, is mint. Here is the address.

http://www.fuenterrebollo.com/faqs-numismatica/menu2.html

If you want to know the value of a common US coin, you might want to check the Heritage Auction Gallery website. They have links to a variety of coin value references as well as a lot of other things of interest to the coin collector. Here is the address.

http://coins.ha.com/common/auction/prices.php

Odyssey Marine stock (OMEX) is now trading below $2.00 a share largely because
a federal magistrate ruled that the treasure recovered from the "Black Swan," belongs to the government of Spain. Although I wouldn't go so far as to recommend it, it probably wouldn't be a bad time to buy the stock and then sell it on a bounce. It seems to me that if Spain owned the treasure, they should have made some effort to regain their property rather than waiting for someone else to do all the work. If they get that treasure, they should have to pay a fair price for it to cover the expertise, work and risk endured by OMEX. Furthermore, I can't see how if the treasure is said to belong to Spain, why it wouldn't rather belong to the peoples of Central and South America who owned the treasure before Spain stole it.

I still haven't heard from anyone that cracked the last code. Anyone trying?

Well, there is lots to do.

Have fun.
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/7 Treasure Coast Beach Detecting Report - reading a beach

Here is one of our local Treasure Coast beaches. I wanted to get a big piece of the beach in the photo because I wanted to try to show you something.

First, you can't see the water's edge in this picture, but at the front of the beach is a fairly steep and large pile of very shelly sand. The sand and shells have been piling up for some time on this beach front and has been steadily moving back to cover more of what would typically be the flat dry sand of the middle beach. In this photo, you will see a faint shell line beyond this new sand that shows approximately how far the new sand has gone back towards the dune in recent days. There is a narrow dry area of only a few feet of older sand, then after that, you can see a flat slope of about 25 degrees with some black sand on it. Above that slope is another area of dry sand that has not been touched by the ocean for quite a while. Then at the bottom of the dunes is whatever has been washed out of the dunes by recent rains. You might remember that I recently talked quite a bit about rain erosion on dunes and these dunes provide a good example.

On this beach there was a narrow line of older coins that ran for about a hundred yards. The area where the coins were found was only about three feet wide (east to west or front to back). You could detect that beach all day and not hit a coin, but if you found the line, you could dig quite a few coins in a pretty short time.

Where do you think the coin line was? Can you tell by looking at the beach? And where would you detect? I'll tell you, or should I say show you, in just a second where the coin line was, but first take a look at the top photo and see if you can tell where it was.

OK. In the photo below, I highlighted the approximate area where the coin line was found. The coin line was on the flat packed slopping sand area.

There is more distance from the hard-packed slope than shows in the photo. I don't know how well the black sand shows up on the slope, but it was very apparent in real life.

One thing you can do to improve your success rate is learn to read the beach to quickly identify the most productive spots. This is just one example.

Another good place to look on a beach like this would be at the foot of the dunes in case anything good got washed out by the recent rains or previously when the waves hit the dunes.

You can walk to almost any old beach that isn't detected much and find a good spot to detect. This is a beach where there are very few beach goers, yet there was a good line of coins that was sifted and deposited the last time the waves were up near the dunes. On an out-of-the-way beach like this, a coin line can last a good while before someone works it. It is far enough out of the way that there is a good chance any coin line will probably last until mother nature changes the shape of the beach agian.

These summer days when the regular hot spots are not producing is very a good time to explore new areas and learn more about other beaches. After you learn the ins and outs of a particular beach, you can look at it and pretty much tell whether it is worth spending some time and where to detect.

It is well worth studying new areas of the beach. While the beach is building up is a good time to explore new spots, look for clues to the history and learn how to mine it.

Before I quit today, I'll show you one more photo. This one shows a very good example of erosion cause by rain run-off.

You can see how older stuff would wash out of the dunes. My point is that there are other sources of erosion besides the tides and waves. Old things will occasionally wash out of the dunes, especially when you have thunder storms passing through as has been the case lately. You don't have to dig in the dunes, and in fact you are not allowed to, so don't.

What I was trying to do today is give you some idea of how you can learn to read a beach, and secondly, let you know that when the main hot spots are not producing, if you hunt outside the box, you will still be able to find productive spots.

Again, these are especially good times to be out exploring and getting to know some new beaches. It will pay off doubly when general beach conditions improve. You won't have to depend upon the same spots that everyone else is hitting.

Happy Hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

Historic Artifact Recently Found on Treasure Coast

13000 year old human artifact found on Treasure Coast. “The oldest, most spectacular and rare work of art in the Americas,” is what Professor Purdy of the University of Florida called a recent find on the Treasure Coast. The find that I am talking about is a bone with a picture of a mastodon carved or etched on it,which appears to date back to the last ice age. It was found in Indian River county by amateur fossil hunter James Kennedy near Vero Beach. The bone artifact, showing what an ancient hunter evidently saw around 13000 years ago, is truly significant and ranks with the most important archaeological discoveries of all time. To see the entire article on the TCPalm site, go to the following address.


http://www.tcpalm.com/news/2009/jun/05/bone-appears-to-date-human-presence-in-treasure/

I've occasionally talked about fossils lately, because you can find them on the beach when the beaches are sanded-in and shells and other similar materials are being piled up on the beaches. If you want to find something really old, keep your eyes open. I've personally seen fossils all the way along our Treasure Coast beaches. The conditions may not be great right now for finding those shipwreck coins on the beach,but it is a very good time to find other types of things, like ceramics or fossils. And you can do it while swinging your detector. I've seen a couple of fossils on the beach just this week. One appeared to be a Dugong bone, which is a mammal similar to the manatee, that hasn't lived in Florida waters for quite a while.

While talking about non-metallic finds, not long ago there was a great cache of Spanish beads found in Georgia. An article that was written by National Geographic provides some great photos of different types of early Spanish beads that came from this cache and that you can look fow while detecting. You might find a few of them among the shells and sand. To read more about the cache,go to the following address.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/04/photogalleries/beads-spanish-empire/

I know that early Spanish beads like these have been found on the Treasure Coast beaches. Sometimes they are made of gold, but because of their small size can be easily missed by a metal detector.

As I've mentioned before, when the beaches are sanded-in, besides ceramics and fossils, it is also a good time to find old sheet metal objects of various metals, like copper, silver, or other metals. Not only are these objects interesting as artifacts, but they also reveal good areas to hunt for coins and other artifacts when the beaches do finally erode. Here are a few examples of shipwreck beach finds that are being found now. The archaeologist at the Fisher museum thought the item at the upper left might be a part of some type of frame.



And of course, you can find items like that shown in the photo at the top of the page. People are going to the beach during these hot summer days and losing things.

If you look at the Ft. Pierce or Sebastian surf web sites that I have attached to this blog, you will see under Seasonal Data, that June, July and August are traditionally the slowest months for waves, and we don't see anything that will cause erosion in this weeks forecast, but of course we are in the hurricane season, so keep watching for approaching storms.

Nobody has let me know that they've decoded the last coded message yet.

Well, I think that is all for today.

No hunt - no find.
Get out there, have some fun, and learn something.

TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/5 Treasure Coast Beach Detecting Report - figa

Figa found. A figa (also higa, or higas) is a carved amulet of a clenched fist commonly used in Spain and Spanish America as a charm meant to protect a person from the evil eye. This one appears to be carved of ivory and has a silver mounting for hanging on a chain or something.

Yesterday I gave you an address for the Florida Museum of Natural History ceramics database. The database had pictures of porcelain that were very similar to pieces found on Treasure Coast beaches and very much like the photo that I showed yesterday. On the home page of the museum site, you might have seen an example of a figa that was excavated "from a Menéndez-period trash pit at the Fountain of Youth Park site (ca. 1565-1570)." Of the example shown on that site, they say, "the earliest figa so far excavated in the United States, was carved from bone, and then polished with a black pigment, presumably to make it appear like jet." Their example was made from carved bone and is 2.2 cm long. The one shown in the photo today is about twice as long, probably carved of ivory, and I would guess, not as old. To see the museum example, go to the following address.

http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/histarch/featuredObject.htm

Some time ago I posted a picture of a silver ring shaped like an eye that was also meant to ward of the evil eye. Seems like the evil eye was quite a concern.

I just found an article on this type of charm on the IMAC site. It says that the charm was especially used by Spanish seamen. it has a lot of other detail, and it also has a picture of an ivory one very much like the one in the photo.

Here is the address for that article.

http://www.imacdigest.com/2000rep/p163-168.html

Also, lower down on that page, they were talking about unfinished jewelry that was found. They show a plain sheet of gold and say it seems that there was a jeweler on board the Nieves. It reminds me very much of the plain rectangular sheet of silver that I showed not long ago.

We've been seeing sanded-in conditions on the Treasure Coast for some time now. The sand just keeps piling up. As I keep mentioning, there are still things to be found, especially those made of lighter materials like the figa shown today, or sheet metal having a large surface area relative to weight.

Looking ahead, we will be looking for summer storms to create some cuts. The prediction for this hurricane season is for calmer than normal, with 11 named storms and 5 hurricanes. Some storms can actually create more erosion than some hurricanes, if the storm just sits off the coast and churns for a while. Anyhow, we'll be watching for those strong northeast winds and waves to churn up the ocean and the treasure beaches.

I havent' heard that anyone has cracked the last code yet. It is a little more difficult than the previous two. It shouldn't be too hard though, because there is one thing that should give it away. Here is the coded message again.

TPM EOK SJP CFP TSC LGN OSK DBP EBT AMC RHG CJV YCG GJP NJP GXK TIQ

The Virgalona was working at the Nieves site, but I didn't see it yesterday, it might have moved on.

My advice right now would be to take a walk to an out-of-the-way place where you might find a good hard packed spot just above the high tide line, or find a nice spot to water hunt. Or, check the sanded in places for less dense materials like I've been talking about. You can find some good spots that are not so heavily hunted. And become more aware of other types of targets besides cobs.

I think I'll leave it at that today.

Good hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/4 Treasure Coast Beach Detecting Report

Holy Cow! As Erkel used to say, "Did I do that?" I don't think so, but it is a real coincidence. One day I mention that I wouldn't recommend Odyssey Marine Explorations stock and it loses nearly half of its value in the next morning trading. If I have that kind of influence, and I can't believe that I do, I am in the wrong business. I should be on CNBC. Back to reality,there must be something else going on. Maybe a new suit from Spain or something. Anyhow if you wanted to own some of that stock for the fun of it, you could get it cheap this morning.

I went out hunting this morning. Seems like I walked about two miles to a spot that I wanted to take a look at, and to my surprise, out in the middle of nowhere, there was a definite coin line. The tides have been high and moving sand onto the beach, but just above the last high tide line,I found a nice hard packed slope with plenty of black sand which contained a number of older coins. I was surprised that with all of the detectorists around that it is still so easy to find a coin line. Like I always say, there is always something to be found. Admittedly I walked a ways to get to that spot, but I was still surprised that I was evidently the first to hit that line.

Accumulating Evidence and Mining Meaning. It is nice to find something of age or value. But that is not the end of the story, only the beginning. When you find something that has been lost on a beach for years or even hundreds of years, or in the case of fossils, maybe millions of years, there is the joy of discovery. In the metal detecting hobby, people especially like to find things having intrinsic value like coins or gold, and one of the questions that is often asked is, "How much is it worth." Of course the answer to that question is often not simple. In a purely economic and practical sense, an item is worth what someone will pay for it. But if you look at the joy that a find brings, you can quickly see that there are other ways of measuring value.

Some people like to find old things. Others like to find flashy things of gold,no matter what the age. Some people like to find cast metal toys, others fossils or shells. It varies widely. Different people have different interests, and value to a particular individual is a very subjective and personal thing. What interests one person may or may not interest another.

Many times I hear people talk about being the first person to hold something in their hand. A gold nugget or gem that has never seen the light of day, brings joy to the person that has gone through long and hard effort to find it. Others talk of being the first to hold a Spanish piece-of-eight since it was lost hundreds of years ago.

There is something about the simple act of discovery - uncovering something that has been lost or hidden. The joy of discovery is not too far removed from a child's game of peek-a-boo or hide-and-seek. There is a basic joy in discovery. You can't fight it, and it can't be suppressed.

The physical discovery of an item is only the beginning. Many are deceived by the idea that the intrinsic value of a discovered item is the end. Items that hold virtually no intrinsic value, can provide other types of value.

I occasionally visit one beach that is not known as a wreck site. It is not known for ship wreck coins or artifacts, yet things have shown up there over the years - first a piece of old black glass, then a piece of blue and white porcelain, and then a small piece of sheet copper. Each item provides new evidence to what went on there or somewhere nearby. The beach continually changes and the the ocean shifts items around so that they often are not found where they were last dropped. That only makes the mystery a bit more compelling. How did the item get there? Where did it come from? Are the different items related at all? Those types of questions add to the mystery and the drive for discovery.

One of my main points today is that the initial physical discovery of an item is only the very first step. The item becomes evidence. It points to a bigger story yet to be unraveled. The item's meaning and significance is only revealed over time.

I am often amazed at how finds become more significant over time. If you are interested in learning more about an object, you will continue to discover things about that item over time. It is like rediscovering the item again when you discover some new important information about the item. Some questions will be answered in your mind and other new questions raised. The discovery continues long after the item was discovered. The item will slowly reveal more of its story, and it will reveal more of a bigger story. You go from the joy of physical discovery to the joy of meaning and significance.

I once found a piece of what I believe could be Kang Hsi (various spellings) porcelain, or at least a very similar type of porcelain. Long after the initial discovery of that one piece of porcelain, just last night in fact, I found, or should I say stumbled upon, an example in a database that looks like it might be the same pattern. If it is not, it certainly is close. That piece of porcelain is becoming more and more meaningful to me as its true identity and possible significance is revealed. The discovery takes place over and over again. First the physical discovery, and then the discovery of meaning and significance.

I've listed a number of links to sites where you can find photos of recovered items. I've listed links to the Mel Fisher database, and the Sedwick auction catalog, but last night I looked at another database - the Florida Museum of Natural History ceramics database. You can find it at the following address. when you get to the home page select Digital Collections and then the ceramics database.

Here is the address for the home page. http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/histarch/default.htm

If you look through the database you will find the picture that very much looks like the piece of porcelain in the photo at the top of this post. The example in the database came from Mexico city and was manufactured in the mid 1700s. The evidence is building and the story is unfolding.

Here is the address of the example referred to.

http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/histarch/gallery_types/individual_display.asp?PhotoID=2538

If you look at that example and then the photo, I think you will see that they are very similar.

I hope you can see how pieces are being added to the puzzle and this particular beach that is not known for ship wreck artifacts seems to have a lot to say. At least that is my opinion. I'll keep investigating.

I need to end now, but I'll be back with more in the near future.

Have fun.
Treasureguide@comcast.net