Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.
I distinctly remember watching Monday Night Football maybe thirty years ago when Howard Cosell commented to Dandy Don, "You have a tremendous grasp of the obvious." It was meant as a humorous insult, but it strikes me now as something of a complement. Advances in understanding are often made painfully slowly and often involve gaining a deeper appreciation of what was hiding in plain sight all along. |
| Seagrape Trail As It Looked Last Saturday |
Were you ever metal detecting when a surprise wave hit you and almost knocked you off your feet? It has happened to me numerous times over the years. In fact I remember once actually getting knocked off my feet. Inspiration can come with a sudden rush too.
I've talked a lot about the importance of what I call cuts. If you looked at some of the beaches that were eroded last week, you might not have noticed any cuts, but there were cuts. Those cuts were very high though. The face of the dunes was cut. At the bottom of the dunes you could see a layer of black sand over a layer of the old orangish sand exposed in some locations.
It is not often that we get a surf of over ten feet, but that happened on the Treasure Coast in both January and February. And shipwreck treasures were found both times.
On the 22nd the high tide was bouncing off of the dunes, and the water was rushing with good force back down the slope carrying sand and other materials with it. You can see from the photo above where probably two feet or more of sand was removed. Old wooden posts that were previously buried were exposed, and stairs were left hanging two feet off the ground.
If you take a volume of sand two feet deep by maybe thirty by fifty yards, that is a volume of 3000 cubic yards of material being classified. That can easily happen in one six hour tidal period, and that is undoubtedly a small part of what actually happened on the beaches that day.
So what is it about cuts that makes them so significant to the beach detectorists? I mentioned it above. When the water hits the face of a cut, or dune, the water rushes back down the hill with a lot of force. If you get caught in it, you can feel how strong the flow is. There are times when it can knock you off your feet. That is obviously strong enough to carry sand - and other materials with it.
Yesterday I talked about the amount of water velocity required to suspend different kinds of particles and objects, and the amount of force required to transport those objects. When the force decreases below the amount required to transport objects, they drop out and settle.
My main point today is that even though there weren't any obvious cuts on the slope of the beach last Saturday, there were cuts to the dunes at the top of the beach, and at high tide the water was bouncing off the face of the dunes and flowing down the slope, carrying sand and other objects until the flow slowed enough to drop whatever objects were being carried.
If you look at the photo above, the yellow line runs parallel to the beach. There is something of a momentary dead spot. The incoming water hits the water rushing back down the slope there. But that is only momentary, as the next wave is already on the way.
Obviously that area will move as the tide comes in and goes out. It proceeds up the hill towards the dunes during the incoming tide and then recedes down the slope and out as the tide recedes.
The red line shows how much sand has been removed from under the steps.
Compare these two photos.
It is always handy to have more than the most recent photo. Old photos give you a base line. You can compare different times and see what is happening.
If I know a beach is especially high, for example, then I know it will take more weather and erosion to make it productive.
The fluctuation on a beach is seldom two feet or more over a wide area. Down at Turtle Trail, when the sand is low you can see a foot or so of the blue bags, but when the sand is high they are covered again. There are posts down there that also appear and disappear.
Notice the foot of the dunes and the slope right in front of the dunes in the last photo.
Thanks to DJ for those photos.
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Silver Finger Rings From the 1715 Fleet.
One of the most experienced Treasure Coast salvage divers said that no silver rings have been found on 1715 Fleet wrecks. That is something that has interested me for a number of years, especially because of how commonly old silver rings are found on the wreck beaches.
I know of three examples of documented silver rings that have been correctly or incorrectly attributed to the 1715 Fleet. That is such a small number that even if they are all correctly attributed, they are undoubtedly personal property rather than cargo.
Below are those I have seen listed as being from the 1715 Fleet.
1. In Artifacts of the Spanish Colonies of Florida and the Caribbean, 1500-1800, Vol. 2: Portable Personal Possessions, by Kathleen Deagan, a silver Claddagh ring shown on page 126 is attributed to the 1715 Fleet.
2. In the Winter Beach Salvage Camp, by Doubglas R. Armstrong (2012 revision), on page 52 a gold plated silver ring is attributed to the 1715 Fleet.
3. And just this year, VeroNews reported that West Bay Trading Company certified a silver ring found by Jeff Emlet on a Vero area beach as being from the 1715 Fleet. See my 2/6/20 post, https://treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com/2020/02/2620-report-first-silver-ring-beach.html, for more information about that.
Without some type of specific markings and historical documentation, I do not know how you could tell that an isolated ring find would be from a particular fleet or wreck rather than from some other source, including, for example, contemporary salvage efforts.
In any case, I'd like to keep a list of silver rings attributed to the 1715 Fleet. If you know of any others, I'd like to add them to my list. Please be specific about the source of information.
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Despite the most recent cold front, we're supposed to have nothing higher than a two or three foot surf for the next week.
Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net
