Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.
According to a Globe Newswire story (Tampa, Fla., April 17,2013), as a part of a multi-media traveling exhibit, Odyssey Marine Exploration will present to the public for the first time, silver recovered from the SS Gairsoppa along with hundreds of authentic artifacts and historical treasures recovered from deep-ocean projects from around the world. The exhibit will be at
I started to add a poll to the blog last night, but blogger didn't seem to want to cooperate. Hopefully that will start working soon.
On the Treasure Coast, the wind is now from the northeast. It was a little gusty last night. I haven't been out to see what if anything happened. The surfing web site says that the surf is 3 - 5 feet today, but the more interesting thing to me is that they are still predicting a 5 - 7 foot surf for Sunday. That could be enough to improve beach detecting conditions. Before that, the surf will decrease a touch.
Also today, the tides are a little bigger than they have been lately. That could be a help too.
Low tide today will be around 12:30.
Yesterday I mentioned that I heard that Brevard County was considering making it illegal to dig holes on the beach. News travels fast these days. It didn't take long for a statement to come out in the news.
Here is a News 13 article that addresses the subject.
http://www.cfnews13.com/content/news/cfnews13/news/article.html/content/news/articles/cfn/2013/4/22/cocoa_beach_commissi.html
That helps to clarify the situation.
I don't think everybody read the article at the above link, and I wanted to clear up some confusion, therefore I added this section (in purple) at approximately 4 PM 4/23.
Notice that the first two lines of the news article, says...
It may soon be legal to dig holes in the sand at one Brevard County beach.
Cocoa Beach’s city commission is planning to fine tune some of its ordinances, including digging on the beach.
Notice that the article says "may soon be legal." That seems to me to say that it is not legal now (which is the case, and has been, as Mitch K points out, since early 2012). It also means that it MIGHT change, but that it is not a settled issue yet. That means it is a perfect time to provide input.
Sorry if I wasn't clear before and I hope this adds clarity rather than more confusion.
But Bill F. said, The beach is owned by the state..their jurisdiction stops at the high
tide line. How can the county make laws about someone elses' property?
Hmmmm. Good question, it seems to me. I don't know the answer. But just going on what the article says, it looks like they are concerned with holes 18 inches or deeper and intend to "fine-tune" their ordinances.
The news article also addressed the subject of kids digging holes, which I thought was funny since I mentioned that just yesterday.
The public has a lot of misconceptions about detectors and detectorists. They seem to think that detectorists love to go around digging big holes. That is a big misconception.
Who wants to spend their day digging big holes? No detectorist that I know! That wouldn't be any fun. And it wouldn't be profitable.
If you think digging holes is fun in any way, why does every construction project that I see on the Treasure Coast use heavy equipment and three supervisors to dig anything near the size of an 18 inch hole.
Getting back to detecting, while some sand scoops may look big, they are actually as much for sifting as digging.
What people don't understand is that the vast majority of coins on the beach are found within a couple inches of the surface and can be kicked out of the dry sand without any digging at all.
There is a definite need for some public education. Take the officials out to the beach, give them a metal detector and see how it goes. They'd quickly see that detectorists rarely dig deep holes and don't want to spend their day digging deep holes even if they could detect a coin at great depth.
Also, detectorists, unlike kids, fill their holes.
By the way, the article did not mention anything about detectorists, but the relevance is clear.
I know that sometimes there will be a bad apple that doesn't fill a hole, but even in that unfortunate circumstance, if it is in the wet sand, the water will fill it before long, or if it is high on the beach in dry sand, nature will take care of it before long. A hole just doesn't last very long in dry sand.
If they are only concerned with 18-inch or deeper holes, that really doesn't have much to do with metal detecting. That doesn't mean it wouldn't be a problem. An over zealous old lady or young life guard might think that a eight inch hole looks like an 18 inch hole. And there is always the slippery slope phenomena.
What would you say is the average depth of a coin found in dry sand? I'd say it has to be about two inches or less. I'm talking average here. And I think the vast majority of coin finds in dry sand are recent drops.
If you've been reading this blog for a few years. you know that what I teach is finding the places where coins are found on or very near the surface. That will generally be where you find the hot spots.
On my last few outings, I think the average coin was found at less than two inches even though the coins had obviously been out there quite a while and had a heavy green patina. They had recently washed up onto the the front of the beach where a couple were eye-balled and the rest were under a very thin layer of sand.
It sounds like they are really trying to come up with some good reasonable rules. They'll need to know how it could possibly affect you. It would be a good idea to let them know what you think.
I wanted to get this in, and I lost some of my work somehow and had to do it again. Hopefully I'll get it posted now.
Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net
