Layer of Sand and Shells Accumulated on Front of a Treasure Coast Beach.This is pretty much the type of beach you'll see all along the Treasure Coast right now after the southeast winds.
More on beach conditions below.
The guys on the trail of the Atocha are having some luck. After the two-pound gold bar, now they just found an emerald ring. Looks like they are on a hot trail again.
A day or two ago I was talking about fake cobs and treasure coins and gave you a link to a database of fakes. The thing that set me off on that topic was an email with a photo that I received. The sender was wondering about the find shown immediately below.
As you can see, there are some red flags. But I'm never real confident when basing my judgments on photos alone. Photos can be misleading. Sometimes the coloring is off and other details can be misleading. I've seen a lot of photos of silver cobs on eBay where the lighting made the coin look more like gold than silver.
In any case, the following fake cob was recently found on one of our beaches.
Recently Found Fake Cob.One thing that I noticed in the photos is what looks to me like the plating on the coin is pealing. Of course, genuine cobs would not be plated. Actually this fake looks like it reacted to the salt water pretty much like a zinc penny. It has a sand adhering very similar to what you would see on a zinc penny too. There are other things that don't look right on this one too.
The finder took my advice and took it to the Mel Fisher museum in Sebastian where they confirmed that this coin was a fake. Too bad.
You'll find the people at the local treasure museums to be very friendly and helpful. I often recommend that people take their finds to have an epert look at them. The people at the museum are generally interested and like to see what is being found on the beaches. Don't make a pest of yourself though. They do have other things to do and may be too busy at certain times.
In the past few days we saw a gold bar that was found on a hard bottom and a fake cob that was found on the beach, probably in new sand. Those things might tell you something. Gold works its way down to a hard bottom. Lighter objects, like this fake cob and zinc pennies, will sometimes come in with new sand.
Other Side of Same Fake.Not only does the density of the object determine where it will end up but so will other surface characteristics and the size and shape of the object also determine where an object will end up.
A flat thin sheet of copper will often be washed up on a beach while a copper coin would not, for example. The thin sheet will offer more surface area and be more easily moved by the water than a copper coin made of the same type of copper. The copper coin will tend to lay flat and only present the rounded edge of the coin to resist the water. They will however, sometimes flip.
Watch how the water moves various objects at the waters edge.
The price of gold is absolutely wild today - up about $40 an ounce. The dollar continues to decline, which is why the price of gold continues to decrease. If this keeps up, the value of those green backs you work for won't be worth hardly anything. Think about that if you are someone who sells your gold whenever you find some.
Treasure Coast Beach Forecast and Conditions.
As you can see from the photo at the top of this blog, the beach conditions are not good. Sand and shells have accumulated on the front of the beach over the past few days and weeks.
I was going by Jensen Beach this morning and found one shell pile containing fossils. I entertained myself with that for a short while.
You can almost always find something interesting somewhere, but sometimes the good spots are rare, as they have been lately.
Renourished Beach by Fort Pierce Inlet.As you can see the work seems to be done here. Notice the upper end where there is a little cliff - most likely totally unproductive. Also notice the accumulation of sea weed here.
About noon today the wind shifted and is now coming from the northwest instead of the southeast. It is actually blowing pretty good right now. I would expect to see a few small cuts scattered around a little later today, but only superficial cuts in the newly accumulated sand. With the amount of sand on the front beaches all around the Treasure Coast it would take more than that to create anything very good.
Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net
