5/11/20 Report - One Of The Most Amazing Finds by A Lone Detectorist - A Riveting POV Story. Ambergris To Arrowheads: Miscellaneous Finds.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

The Beginning of a Huge Find.

See LifeDaily article (link below).

What Mike had stumbled across was a complete chariot that had been buried there. It was not an uncommon tradition at a certain time in history to do so but finding a site like that was exceptionally rare...

“My first find was a Celtic horse harness junction piece,” Mike informed reporters. “When I found it my friends said I would never top it, but the next day I went back and found the rest.” There was more...

Much more.

More of Mike's Find.

See LifeDaily link below for more.

And More.

Here is the link for a very long detailed account of this unbelievable metal detecting experience.

https://www.lifedaily.com/story/man-finds-old-buried-chain-his-gut-then-tells-him-to-keep-pulling/

Any detectorist will enjoy this good long read.  It is unlike the academic articles that I've been posting lately and gives a detectorist POV story.


This is the kind of find they fantasize about finding on Oak Island.

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JamminJack went out on a rainy day and was glad he did because he found this Marion point.

Marion Point Find.

Photo and find by JamminJack

He said he wanted to remind people that you can make finds if you go out.  Persistence pays off.

Rainy days can be good for eye-balling.  So can windy days.

From arrowheads to ambergris.

Tim M. said his wife found a 134 gram ball of ambergris near Hermans Bay.

I once posted about a boy finding $60,000 worth of ambergris.  It is valuable and used in perfume.

A boy found $60,000 worth of what of what on the beach? Ambergris. What's that?

Whale vomit or whale poop. Seems they can't make up there mind exactly what ambergris is. But who would want to smell that? It seems a lot of people do.

Just an unusual story about a boy that finds $60,000 worth of the stuff on a beach.

http://cosmiclog.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/08/29/13552161-boy-finds-a-bonanza-in-whale-vomit?lite

After writing the above, I ran across this article. Seems they wrote it up something like I did.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2012/08/120830-ambergris-charlie-naysmith-whale-vomit-science/


I took a walk yesterday and found this glass stopper along with a couple common bottles.  I'm always glad to find glass stoppers because I have plenty of bottles that are missing their stoppers.

Glass Stopper Find.

Like JamminJack I'd like to remind you that if you really want to find something, you need to spend time searching.  And there is always someplace to hunt and something to find.


This morning I took a look at a few South Hutchinson Island beaches.

Here is what I saw a Frederick Douglass Beach.

Frederick Douglass Beach Monday Morning Just After Low Tide.

Frederick Douglass Beaches had some small cuts at the high tide line this morning.  The cuts to the South were two to three feet high.  The slope was mushy.  You can see the seaweed.

Frederick Douglass Beach Monday Morning Just After Low Tide.

I looked at two other South Hutshinson Island beaches this morning.  They were similar but had even smaller cuts than Frederick Douglass.

The lower beach was very convex.

West Palm Beach beaches are scheduled to open next Monday.

Martin County beaches are open, but only to residents of Martin County.



The wind increased this morning and is coming from the north.  The surf is running around three feet, but is expected to increase up to four to seven feet Thursday.

Keep looking,
Treasureguide@comcast.net

5/6/20 Report - Pre-Columbian Beer Keg. Victoria Cross Analysis. Stolen Treasure Dug Up.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

Pre-Columbian Beer Keg Found in Mexico.

Source: MexicoNewsDaily.com (See link below.)

Below is a bit of the story of the jar shown above.

Naturally the archaeologists decided to check their assumptions and as soon as they began digging beneath the surface, they discovered that a 10-square-meter section of the new museum site was unusually rich in artifacts. Within a few months they unearthed bowls, jewelry, figurines, six burials, five ovens and six big urns, one of them a meter high by a meter wide...

It is interesting to note that the big jar found in 2008 weighs about 100 kilos empty, so that when it was full of liquid it must have weighed around 200 kilos (441 pounds).

“It may seem surprising,” Esparza told me, “but it appears that jars of this size were commonly used in those days and every home may have had not just one, but two or three jars this size. I should mention, by the way, that in our excavations we have normally found these pots all in pieces, not well preserved like our big jar, which we found 85% intact.”...

Here is the link for the rest of the story.

https://mexiconewsdaily.com/mexicolife/after-12-years-a-giant-pre-hispanic-jar-tells-its-story/

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The Victoria Cross (VC) is the highest and most prestigious award of the British honours system. It is awarded for valour "in the presence of the enemy" to members of the British Armed Forces.

Victoria Cross
Source: TheGuardian.com (See link below.)

There was some question if they were made from the cascabels of captured guns.  That was investigated and here is the answer.


“While it’s unlikely that even the earliest medals came from the ordnance captured at Sevastopol, it is clear that most of the VCs awarded since the first world war have plausibly been sourced from the cascabels of captured guns – an important and symbolic fact for those who have received the honour in recognition of their bravery,” Marriott said.
Here is the link for more about that.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/may/03/show-your-mettle-victoria-cross-not-made-of-captured-russian-guns-after-all


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A Mexican drug lord's property seized and sold at auction.

The auction, held at the Los Pinos cultural complex, also offered 77 cars, five airplanes, five homes and 107 lots of jewelry, among other seized goods. In total, more than 130 million pesos, around US $5.3 million, was collected...

He is estimated to have amassed a fortune of around US $25 billion by transporting drugs, mostly cocaine, from Colombia and Mexico to the United States, often using his fleet of jets, which is how he earned his nickname...

https://mexiconewsdaily.com/news/ex-drug-lords-mansion-goes-for-49-million-pesos/

While all of the focus is on Covid, the death and devastation of drugs continues.

I've found bales on Treasure Coast beaches in the past.  I'm sure others have too.

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Every once in a while you dig up something and wonder how it got there.  Sometimes you know, or at least have a good idea, and sometimes you can only imagine.

Some things were buried by the rightful owner, but sometimes thieves bury stolen goods.  Unless you are looking for a known treasure, you might not know which it is.

Here is a story I ran across about stolen goods that were buried.

Huge Stash of Stolen Goods Uncovered Long after Prolific Thief Is Apprehended

Los Angeles: On Feb. 25, 2008, LAPD Burglary Special Section detectives received a map leading to stolen goods buried in the ground near the 118 Freeway at White Oak Avenue. The unearthed treasure may be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars and is yet another chapter in the arrest and conviction of Roberto Caveda...

Recently, the case resurfaced with the discovery of the buried treasure, based on information Caveda relayed through his attorney. To safeguard it, Caveda stuffed it into a plastic pipe and placed it in the ground on a 118 Freeway right-of-way. As before, when detectives sorted through the stolen material, they discovered a lot of jewelry...

Here is that link.

http://www.lapdonline.org/february_2008/news_view/37637

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Looks like we're going to get some bigger surf before long.

Surf Predictions

Source: MagicSeaWeed.com.

Happy hunting,
Treasureguide@comcast.net

5/22/19 Report - Pirates and Buried Treasure by Jack Beater. Metal Detecting A Frank Hudson Site. Mining Your Time.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

Buried Treasure Books.

When I was looking for one of the Frank Hudson books for some reason the other day, I found some other "treasure" books that I had forgotten about.  One is by Jack Beater, who lived in the Fort Myers area, and wrote a book entitled Pirates and Buried Treasure, which was published in 1959.

Jack was a veteran of WW I and moved to Florida in 1920.  Stories of pirates and treasure fascinated him, so he started talking to every old timer or anyone who could tell him more about that.  I was given a copy of his book many years ago by someone who knew him.

Pirates and Buried Treasure is an entertaining easy read that also provides good information.  It focuses primarily on the West Coast of Florida and the Keys.  It talks about Gasparilla, Juan Gomez, Captiva, Charles Gibbs, Anne Bonny, Captain Rackam, Henri Caesar, Key Largo, Tarpon Springs, Useppa, Charlotte Harbor, Carla Pelau, and Estero Bay, Fort Myers Beach and others.   Of course, some of those places you can no longer metal detect.

Concerning Hudson's books, Bill P. detected one of the sites mentioned, and found the book to be accurate.

Here is what Bill said.

An old detecting friend and I hunted a location that Hudson mentioned in that book (I believe) on the gulf coast many years ago. He gave many details about this area that were actually fairly accurate. We hunted the area several times over a couple years and turned up some pretty cool items. The area had been hunted by Hudson and there were uncovered holes everywhere. There were a lot of indian artifacts too. Among the items we found were a broken, rusty end of bar shot that was fired from a cannon with the hopes of taking out the rigging of another ship. I found a Spanish, milled half reale that was holed, and dated 1784. That was cool. We also found what we believed to be a human bone...creepy to say the least. The most interesting thing that happened was, in between trips there someone else was apparently hunting there too. We found a freshly dug hole approximately 2 feet deep and in the bottom of the you could see where roots had grown around something square shaped around 2 feet square!. Disappointing for us but still exciting that someone actual found a box of......who knows. The worst part was the little black salt-marsh mosquitoes. Who knows what is still there? Bill 

Thanks Bill.  Fun times.

That reminds me of one time in the eighties, I think it was, I was in Tampa on a business trip and remember a construction project on the beach that unearthed a bunch of gold coins.  I remember taking my Aquanaut in its grey hard case with me on the plane.

If you go through Hudson's books, one thing you'll notice is several buried treasures around every inlet.  There might be an exception, but I don't think so.  It is important to remember that some of the inlets have moved.

If you combine the treasures in the Hudson and Beater books with those reported in various other sources, you'll notice that there are few coastal areas without sunken or buried treasure somewhere nearby.  Just those that I'm familiar with are numerous, extending from Key West all the way up the coast.  

This is the first I really looked at those books for many years.  When I first read them, I saw them very differently.  Each X marked a dream that could happen - if I hit it.

I look at things very differently now.   Now it seems to me more like, treasure is all around, so I don't wonder so much where the treasure is - instead I wonder what treasure is in the area where I stand.

Think of it.  You can start out in a place like Frederick Douglas, walk north to John Brooks, and a little more to the old picked over wreck near the Fort Pierce Jetty, then north to Pepper Park, and then past the Fort Capron payroll area, continue on to the Sandy Point Wreck and Rio Mar, and Turtle Trail, and Seagrape Trail, and Wabasso, Golden Sands and Treasure Shores and Ambersands, etc. etc.  And I am sure there are treasures in between of one kind or another.   There are wrecks along our coast that are less known and less hunted, yet very interesting.  And there are artifacts of various ages on the beach, and fossils and sea glass, not to mention the native American artifacts and the shiny things that are being lost daily.

I can look out my front window and see the spot where I picked up an inscribed Native American pot shard laying on the surface after a storm, and where I go walking to pick up old bottles and other things.   And not far from my back door is an area where workers in the early 20th century drank after work and discarded their bottles.  There is treasure all over the place.  That is how it seems to me now.

My goals changed over the years and decades too.   I've told before about how when I started metal detecting I tried to find as many coins as I could.  After I progressed some, I targeted gold and quit counting the coins.  That wasn't the end of the changes, but I'll skip over the rest.

Not too long ago I used the term alchemy in one of my post titles.  Poorly defined, alchemy attempts to turn base metals in to gold.  For me today it is more about mining or transforming the moment.

Through aging and a variety of other circumstances, I now see time and life as the most precious commodity.  Digging up gold is really nice, but the important thing is extracting the treasure from the moment in which I stand.  That can be done by digging up something good, but it can also be done without digging up anything.  The treasure is not so much in the gold, but what you bring to it.

For example, treasure hunting with the wrong attitude can leave you worse off, whether you find anything or not.  There was a time when I'd go out hunting with a very specific goal, and if I didn't find anything good I'd come back in a very bad mood.  I let it ruin the moment.  Likewise, making a good find can be poorly handled in a variety of ways.  You've probably heard of lotto winners who destroyed themselves and their families.

Life is precious.  Every moment is precious.  You can make of it what you will.

The moment, like gold, is there to be mined.  Mine it.

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Some of the salvage boats have been taking advantage of the small surf, but later today the surf will increase and we will have a couple days of bigger surf.

Source: MagicSeaWeed.com

Make your moments count,

TreasureGuide@comcast.net

8/27/18 Report - Fake or Real: How To Tell. 14-Year-Old Detectorist Makes Exciting Find. Coastal Erosion Uncovers Historic Cemetery.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

Fake or escudo - that is the question.  Can you tell the difference?  Test yourself and improve your skill.

Fake or Escudo?

If you metal detect much, chances are you'll find a fake treasure coin sooner or later.  In fact there is a good chance you'll find several of them.  They aren't all that rare.

It's always disappointing when you look in your scoop and see that hoped for glint of gold, but then find out it isn't gold at all.  Sometimes the realization and disappointment comes quickly, but if you are new to the game, it might take a long time before you realize that you have a fake.

 If you are experienced, you'll learn identify most fakes quickly.  Others might not be so easy.

If you are looking at a photo, you are at a disadvantage.  You can't pick up the item, feel the weight or turn it over and look at it from different angles.

If you look at enough genuine coins, many fakes will just not look right at first glance.  But what are the tell-tale signs?

Many fakes will have a mold seam.  Look at the edge of the coin to see if there is a mold seam.

The details of a coin made in a mold will generally have a less "sharp" look.  The metal may not flow into fill the small details or corners.  That gives a different look than a coin struck with a die.

Weight is another tell-tale sign.  Most fake coins are lighter than they should be because they are made of a metal other than silver or gold.

If you've looked at enough sea water seasoned silver or enough gold coins, you'll be able to identify many fakes at first glance.

If you've looked at enough gold, when you look at electroplated fake gold coins, they will often look too hard or glassy.  They'll be too reflective.  Real gold is fairly soft and doesn't reflect light as much as most electroplated fakes.

A silver coin that has been on the beach or in the water for many years will show obvious signs of corrosion.  If you pick up a really old silver coin on the beach that looks like it just came out of the mint, you have reason to be suspicious.

Time and corrosion can complicate the task by removing surface detail.  Corrosion and encrustation can hide the actual surface of both fake and real coins.

Of course there are tests you can use.  I've talked before about using a magnet to test a coin.  You can also weigh the coin to see if it is the right weight.  One great thing you can do these days, is take the coin to a pawn shop or jewelry store to be tested.  They have good testing equipment these days.

By the way, the coin shown above is a fake.  It is much easier to tell that in person.  It is one of those coins sold as a souvenir.

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A 14-year-old Danish boy doing research for a history class found the wreckage of a German World War II plane with the remains of the pilot in the cockpit.

Daniel Kristiansen and his father, Klaus, discovered what's believed to be a Messerschmitt fighter plane buried in a field on their farm near Birkelse in northern Denmark...

Here is the link if you want to read more about that.
https://www.cnn.com/2017/03/08/europe/denmark-wwii-plane-trnd/index.html

Good research can lead to good finds.

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They can’t speak, but human remains unearthed from a Fortress of Louisbourg cemetery continue to provide clues to as to what life was like in the French outpost in the 1700s.

Threatened by sea rise and coastal erosion, the burial grounds at Rochefort Point are the focal point of an ongoing partnership between Parks Canada and a team of students led by University of New Brunswick bioarchaeologist Dr. Amy Scott...
And here is that link.

http://www.capebretonpost.com/news/local/fortress-of-louisbourg-dig-unearths-human-history-235242/

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No storms or anything of note.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

8/18/18 Report - 260,00 Coins Buried in a Large Pot. Vintage or Antique Snuff Box Currency Album.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

260,000 Coins Buried in a Jar.
Source: See link below.

The treasure was buried 6.5 feet (2 meters) below ground and was likely placed there to save the samurai's riches, as it was a troubled period in Japan's history. Over the course of the 15th century, civil war broke out as the Muromachi shogunate was under attack. This was a period where the Emperor was relatively weak, with military dictators known as shoguns leading the country...

For now, 70 of the coins have been examined. These coins were looped on a string and include 19 different coins from China and different areas of Japan. It's thought that all of the coins—which have holes in the center—would have been strung together on a rope before being added to the jar. Based on the coins looked at so far, researchers believe the jar would have been buried at some point after the second half of the 15th century...

Here is the link for more about that.

https://mymodernmet.com/japan-medieval-coin-discovery/ 

Thanks to SuperRick for that link.

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Yesterday I mentioned that sometimes containers are as nice as the coins or whatever else you might find in them.  Here is one of that appears to have some age to it.

Vintage or Antique Snuff Box.

The handle of flip has some nice engraving that reads "La Bretonne."  That refers to Britanny.

It appears to be handmade and has some mother of pearl inlay.

Same Box Opened.

The box appears to be carved from a single piece of wood.

I found similar boxes on ebay that were listed for $75 to $90.

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Here is a handy item that I recently purchased.  It is called a currency album.

It is a good way to store your silver certificates or collectible paper money.

It has clear plastic holders inside that makes it easy to view your bills without having to remove  them.

Really good way to store collectible bills.

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Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

11/23/17 - Another Kind of Treasure Coast Treasure: Fossils. Easter Island Stones. Sampling. Happy Thanksgiving!

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

Vintage Post Card OriginallyReceived by My Grandfather in 1909.

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Did you notice that this Megalodon tooth fossil received a winning bid of $550 in the recently concluded Sedwick treasure auction?

Auction Listing From Sedwick Auction 22

I showed that to remind you that there are other types of treasure on the Treasure Coast besides coins and artifacts.  You can find fossils all the way along the Treasure Coast.  I've seen fossils on most of the beaches.  Some beaches provide more fossils than others, of course, but you can find fossil shark teeth, as well as rhinoceros, giant sloth, camel and even mastodon bones on the Treasure Coast.

This meg tooth is more valuable than the vast majority of what you might find, but there are valuable fossils to find, and if you like finding old stuff, you should know that Treasure Coast fossils can be millions of years old.

Below are a couple of fossils I picked up the last time I was at the beach.  Beach conditions were not good for finding fossils, but I noticed them along the way.  They aren't really worth anything, but it shows that fossils are out there.

Matrix Containing a Few Pieces of Fossil Bone.

On the left bottom of the photo above is a vertebra.  At the top is larger piece of fossil that I have not yet identified.

Larger Piece of Broken Fossil Bone.

This one is larger and a little unusual because of the two colors.

Keep your eyes open.  You never know when you might see a nice shark tooth or something else nice.

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There is always more than meets the eye.  You've seen the huge stone heads of Easter island. but they are actually more than heads.  They have bodies too.  The bodies were buried over a period of about 500 years by natural processes. They didn't sink - at least not much.  They sit on rock foundations where they were originally carved and then raised from horizontal to vertical.

Here is the link.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/trevornace/2017/07/26/famous-easter-island-heads-have-hidden-bodies/#220cb45af804

People wonder how huge stone blocks like these could have been moved.  In this case they weren't moved - at least not far.  They were carved on location and then flipped up.

Use your head and save your back.

Speaking of which, I was glad to see on a recent episode of Oak Island that the fellows FINALLY decided to do things a bit more systematically and methodically.   They finally drilled a grid of holes to do some testing and sampling.  I've been screaming at the TV for them to do that for at least a couple of years.  I felt the same way when the Hoffman's ( I think) finally had Tony Beets (sp) do some serious core sampling.

In the past I've done a few posts on sampling.  Sampling can save a lot of time.  Very important concept.

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Here is a sad article.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2017/11/18/wwii-veteran-calls-for-help-and-dies-as-nurses-laugh-video-shows.html

While you are being thankful, express your gratitude by being kind, especially to those who need it most.

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Today we'll have a three to five foot surf.  The next few days the surf will be decreasing.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/29/17 Report - Army Corps To Metal Detect Large Part North Hutchinson Island. Diagnostic Artifacts Web Site.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

Area Designated for Study.

The area shown above will be the subject of a study to determine what materials might remain on the old amphibious training base.  Below is an excerpt describing the study.

A Tiny Tim was found in January of 2017 during a construction project.  Munitions were also found during a removal project in 1998 and munitions were removed in 2014 and 2015.

The Tiny Tim is a 1200 pound rocket or torpedo (I've seen it referred to both ways) that was detonated in the water off Vero.

Here is the link to that event.

http://www.wptv.com/news/region-indian-river-county/vero-beach/world-war-2-era-tiny-tim-rocket-dug-up-in-vero-beach-neighborhood

I saw them remove the obstacles from the shallow water a long time ago.  It must have been 1998, although it seems like it could have been longer than that to me.

It should be interesting to see what they find, military or otherwise.

Trez sent me a copy of the proposal prepared by the Environmental Science and Engineering Co. of Gainesville for the Army Corps of Engineers.  There goes our tax dollars again.

Thanks to Trez for the great info.

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I found a great web site just yesterday.  It is the Jefferson Patterson Park and Museum website.

I commend them for putting it out there and making it accessible to the tax-payers.  Good example of other states and government organizations to follow.

The have sections on diagnostic artifacts, including projectile points, prehistoric ceramics, colonial ceramics, and other small finds.  You have to go two or three clicks deep in each of those to get to the individual examples.

Here is the link.

http://www.jefpat.org/researchtools.html

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On the Treasure Coast we still have a one-foot surf.  The tides are more moderate now though.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

9/2/15 Report - Nice 1715 Fleet One Escudo. Buried Nazi Gold Train Found. First ECC Photo. Jamestown Discoveries.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

1715 Fleet One Escudo

Very nice one escudo from the 1715 Fleet.  This is referred to as a Type II in the Sewall Menzel book.

The date appears to be 1712, if I am reading it correctly.  Looks like it could be a 2 over 1.

The other side would have the cross potent.

The mint is Lima, and the assayer (M) would be Felix Cristobal Cano Melagejo.

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This is an Indiana Jones mega-treasure story.  It appears that an armored train full of Nazi treasure has been discovered in a buried tunnel.  If you read the different accounts of this story it is hard to tell how much is true and how much is myth and how much is cover-up.  The different stories just don't stick together entirely.

Here are a couple of links.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/02/nazi-gold-train-poland-to-bring-in-army-to-help-in-hunt


http://my.xfinity.com/video/treasure-hunters-claim-to-find-nazi-treasure-train/517077059784/Comcast/Today_in_Video?cid=hero_sf_TIV

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When the Jamestown Rediscovery Archaeological Project started, the hope was to find the site of the original 1607 James Fort, which had been written off for more than 200 years as lost to shoreline erosion.

Since then, the team has discovered the fort and more than a million artifacts in the ground...

This is an ongoing excavation.  They keep coming up with more every week it seems.  

http://wydaily.com/2015/08/28/local-news-jamestown-unearthed-recycled-breastplate-stoneware-found-in-probable-cellar/

CT Scan technology is being used to analyze artifacts to help identify the presumed important persons buried under the church.

http://news.cornell.edu/stories/2015/08/cornell-technology-identifies-artifacts-jamestown-graves

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I have been hearing from people who are going to get a detector and start detecting and people who want to know the laws.  That happens every time after a big discovery.  People get excited and people that have never detected before get interested.

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Yesterday I wrote about the Environmental Metal Detecting Movement and the proposed Environmental Clean-up Crews.

Here is the first picture from an independent volunteer of the ECC (Dan B.).

Removed By Dan B. From A Boat Launch Area.

Just an example of the type of work provided by the ECC.  Good work Dan!

For those of you thinking of going out and buying your first detector, you can find a lot more of these than gold coins.  Just a reality check.

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Fred is a tropical storm and won't affect us.  It will dissipate in the middle of the Atlantic.


The Treasure Coast will only have something like a one foot surf through the weekend.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net