7/5/19 Report - Other Kinds of Treasures You Might See On Florida Beaches. The Official Florida Stone and Arrowheads. First Find of Dinosaur Eggs.

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

Arrowhead Found on Treasure Coast Beach.

I recently posted a broken spear point that was found on a Treasure Coast beach and decided to post some more Native American artifact finds.

The above arrowhead was found in a shell pile on a Treasure Coast beach.  I was told that it looked like it was made of agatized coral, which is Florida's state stone.

Agatized Coral specimens are collected and are sometimes sold for nice prices.  Here is a web site where you can see some specimens and learn more about agatized coral.

https://www.spiritrockshop.com/Agatized_Coral.html

The site says, In 1979 the Florida Legislature designated agatized coral as the Florida State Stone.
It is described in the statute as “a chalcedony pseudo morph after coral, appearing as limestone geodes lined with botryoidal agate or quartz crystals and drusy quartz fingers, indigenous to Florida.”

Continuing, Much of Florida’s natural foundation is composed of soft, highly-fossiliferous limestones intermixed with sand and clay. This is known as the Early Miocene Tampa Formation. There are several distinct exposures of this formation which produced silicified corals and mollusks; the best known of these is Ballast Point on Tampa Bay in Hillsborough County. Six Mile Creek on a nearby Tampa Bay exposure of the same formation produced only calcareous specimens.

Wondering if the arrowhead might really be agatized coral, I took a closer look.  Here is what I saw.

Magnified Surface of Arrowhead.

Despite my overwhelming ignorance of geology and such things, it looks like it could be coral to me.

The image was enhanced somewhat to show the markings.

Below is an interesting translucent arrowhead that I found online somewhere.

The one I posted at the top of the post is not translucent.

I've talked to a few tourists that have found arrowheads on Treasure Coast beaches.  I remember, for example, one lady that came up to me near the Disney Resort and showed one she found.

Here are a few more arrowhead finds.

Three Arrowheads.

Arrowheads are not really rare finds on the Treasure Coast beaches, but they seem to be found more by shell collectors than detectorists.

If you know about Native American artifacts, you might be able to provide additional information on the ones I showed today.

I talked about Native American artifacts made of metal in previous posts,  but most of those found on the Treasure Coast are made of stone, shell or other materials, and are not sought or often found by metal detectorists.

As you know, I often recommend keeping your eyes open for other types of items while you metal detect.  There are many different kinds of treasure that you can find on Florida beaches and you never know what you might see.

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Riley Black, from Smithsonian Magazine, points out that the first naturalist to discover and describe dinosaur eggshells was, in fact, the Roman Catholic priest Jean-Jacques Pouech. Father Pouech was the head of Pamiers Seminary in southern France, but in his free time he explored the geology and paleontology of the Late Cretaceous rock preserved in the foothills of the Pyrenees Mountains.  That was in 1859.

Here is how he described his find.  The most remarkable are eggshell fragments of very great dimensions. At first, I thought that they could be integumentary plates of reptiles, but their constant thickness between two perfectly parallel surfaces, their fibrous structure, normal to the surfaces, and especially their regular curvature, definitely suggest that they are enormous eggshells, at least four times the volume of ostrich eggs.

Here is the link to learn more about that.

https://aleteia.org/2019/06/29/how-a-catholic-priest-was-the-first-to-discover-dinosaur-eggs/\

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Its amazing how people can see things so differently.  If you are a five year old, you might have seen the Macy's fireworks last night as little more than a bunch of sparkling lights and noise.  If you are an environmentalist, you might have noticed all the smoke and pollution.  If you are a left winger, you might have thought of the waste of such an extravagant display put on by a capitalist organization to increase profits at the expense of the poor against the backdrop of city built on the backs of immigrants. If you are on the other side politically, you might have seen a celebration of the country and opportunity and success. You might have thought about the invention of gun powder and the millions killed, or the evolution of rocketry and going to the moon.  A person could easily write hundreds of pages about the events, history and conflicting views represented in that single fireworks display.  Rather than responding emotionally to the first things that you hear of that catch your attention, if put it all together, add a large dose of facts and sift through it all, you'll end up with a more realistic, pleasing and well-balanced view of the world.  That's my opinion.

I hope you enjoyed Independence Day and gave some thought to it

We should be seeing some more treasure salvage finds before long.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

7/21/14 Report - First US Mint Coins. Why Such Different Views On Same Detector & Chikungunya Virus in Florida Mosquitos

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

1792 Half Disme
Photo source: American Heritage Auctions Site.

 Here is a trivia question.  In what year did the US Mint deliver its first coins?  Find answer at end of post.





My 7/17/14 report included a review of the Garrett Ace 250.   I was up north at the time I received the detector, assembled it, and used it for the first time on three different days.  Not only was it easy to use, but I found a variety of types of targets in a short time, including coins from 1909 and 1829.   I felt that was a decent demonstration of the detector's capability.  I considered the fact that it cost me only $212 including batteries and headphones.  I had no idea how well it would do and was pleased with the results.

Yesterday I read a number of reviews of the ACE 250 and was surprised by some of what I read.  It seemed there were a lot of people who did not like it at all, and there were also a lot of people who were happy with it.  There were very few reviews that fell in the middle.  It seemed that people that wrote reviews  either hated it or liked it.  I would guess that people who are motivated to write a review fall on one side or the other.  People who are middle-of-the-road might not be motivated to waste their time writing a review.

Anyhow, I wondered why so many people were so much against the detector while so many others liked it.  Some called it a toy.   Others complained that it wouldn't find anything.

One possibility could be poor quality control.  There might be some lemons sent out, but  I really doubt that is the reason for the mixed reviews.

Some people might expect a $212 detector to look, feel and work like a $1200 detector.  I don't.

I think the mixed reviews come more from something that was discussed in my 7/12/14 post.  I posted some of views on detectors and detecting that were sent to me by James F.   Commenting upon the suitability of different detectors, James said it depends upon the type a hunting a person is going to do and where they are going to hunt.  I agreed with that.

There are additional considerations that I've discussed since then, such as your specific strategies and techniques.  I have presented some of mine in the past few posts.

I don't doubt at all that some of the poor reviews for the ACE 250 were the result of the fact that some people did not use it well.  Maybe they didn't take time to learn how to use it.  Maybe they didn't watch the instructional video.  Maybe they didn't test it first under controlled conditions to learn more about it.  Or maybe they expected it to perform like a high-end detector that they had more experience using.  Or maybe they were unrealistic about target ID and discrimination.

Some people commented that it did not perform in wet salt sand.  I haven't tested it there yet, but I suspected that would be the case.  The irregular mineralization at the water's edge is difficult to cancel out, especially for a detector that is trying to do a lot of analysis.  Some detectors simply don't handle wet salt sand very well.  I thought that the ACE 250 might be one of those.

In summary, I stand by what I said.  As James F. suggested, no one detector is a good fit for everybody or every detecting need.  The ACE 250 exceeded my expectations, especially when the price is considered.

Many people seem to blame there detector when they don't find much.  There are a lot of things that can be going on, but he skill of the operator is always a big factor. 

Don't expect a detector to find anything for you.  As I've said before, a detector is little more than a pin-pointing tool.  You have to put the coil over good detectable targets.  That is the big factor and the key skill.


Bad news!  Florida mosquitos are not only being their normal pesky selves, but they may be carrying a virus.  The Chikungunya virus has been detected in Florida.

Here is the link for more about that.

http://www.palmbeachdailynews.com/news/news/local/tips-to-avoid-mosquito-borne-virus-with-video/ngjQx/


Trivia question answer:  The first delivery of coins from the US mint was in 1793, consisting of over 11,000 copper cents.  That is what the US Mint web site says.

The half disme shown above is thought by many to have been a test piece, although there is evidence that some found their way into circulation.

http://coinauctionshelp.com/Half_Disme_First_U.S._Coin_Minted.html


Same old story on the Treasure Coast - a one to two foot surf for the entire week.  Easy water hunting, but sandy conditions.


Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net