7/8/20 Report - Mel Fisher Expeditions and Finds. Quintessential Treasures. Digital Treasure.

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

Quintessential Treasures That Fortunately Were Never Lost.
See link below.

Not lost but still representing the kind of objects that any treasure hunter might dream of finding.  I'm sure that out there somewhere are lost objects that are as finely crafter and beautiful as these.

Click here to see more Sotheby's auction items like these.

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Down south, Mel Fisher's Expeditions are working on the the well-known Atocha and Margarita sites, but also the less well known "Lost Merchant" somewhere off the east coast of Florida, and another 1622 wreck that has yet to be found.

The Magruder went sifting for emeralds and then back to the area known as the Bank of Spain.  Their latest finds included a nice emerald, 1 complete silver candlestick, a piece of a silver plate rim, some pottery shards and half of a silver coin.

The Mel Fisher museum in Sebastian will be reopening on May 8.

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The nature of treasure is changing.  I guess it always did.  Wealth is becoming less tangible.  Most transactions no longer require coins or currency.  It is done digitally.  Digital currencies include cryptocurrencies, virtual currencies, central bank digital currencies and e-Cash.  You've probably heard of bit coin for example.

And you know about the scammers that do their own form of illegal digital treasure hunting by mining the digital information that resides on our computers.

FBI Director Christopher Wray on Tuesday warned Americans that the Chinese government’s theft of American information is taking place on so large a scale, suspected incidents make up nearly half of his bureau’s counterintelligence cases.

Speaking at an event hosted by the Hudson Institute in Washington, Wray said that Chinese thefts amount to “one of the largest transfers of wealth in human history,” and that the American people are the victims...

See https://www.foxnews.com/politics/fbi-director-wray-says-half-of-bureaus-5000-counterintelligence-cases-are-related-to-china

Yesterday I mentioned some of the products of our culture. If you thought China might be a place you could escape from our culture, the Chinese have been going to great lengths to become wealthy by stealing our Culture.  Can you believe they even have a Shanghai Disneyland Park?

Now that Crossfire Hurricane is over maybe the intelligence agencies can spend there time on more useful things.

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One great book that I think you'll enjoy is Bill Bryson's At Home: A Short History of Private Life.  It goes into the invention or evolution of the things around us and how we live today.   It is really an very exceptional book on the history of most everything we encounter in our homes and lifestyles.

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Source: nhc.noaa.gov

There is a 60% chance that the system up by North Carolina will develop into a cyclone in the next 48 hours.  It is expected to continue to the northeast though. 

Most days now there is something developing somewhere.  I think we are supposed to get 20 some names storms this year.  It was upgraded some the last time I saw the forecast.

Looks like the page view counter will hit 2.5 million later today.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

8/21/19 Report - New Salvage Finds Down South. Coins Found At Eroding Site. Metal Detector Testing and Noise Adjustments. Storm Scene.

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

Silver Ewer Spout Find.
Source: https://www.melfisherartifacts.com/

What do you think the object shown above is?  I'll tell you below.

Down south the crews of the Dare and Magruder recently found silver coins musket balls, pottery shards, a barrel hoop, and a possible carpenter's file.  

They also found an ewer spout very much like one shown above.  I know that the single view didn't give you much of a chance of figuring it out.  Multiple views are always helpful.

The spout shown above was found on the Atocha site years ago and is pictured in the melfisherartifacts database.   Entire silver ewers have also been found with the same kind of spout attached so there is no question of what it is.

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I got a few responses on John E's mystery object that I posted yesterday.

Joe D. looks like an aluminum sprinkler repair tool!

And Susan E. Plumber's multi-tool.

Steve M . says That is definitely an automotive battery connection cleaner.  I have seen those in the 70s but could still be in use today.   They cleaned the lead clamp inside and the lead post outside.

I think John will be able to decide which of those it is.

Thanks to all of you for the help.

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An archaeological site being eroded by the sea revealed Roman coins and pottery.

"The main problem is that everything is under a metre of sand and we're wondering if it blew in in the big storm in 1330 - so it looks like it's been buried for a long time and it's superbly preserved."

Archaeologists' initial estimations think the Roman pottery could be from around 200 to 300AD while the fort is thought to be from the Iron Age, which dates from around 800BC to 43AD.

"That's not to say Romans occupied the site but perhaps a tribe lived there that traded with the Romans," said Dan Amor, of the Gwynedd Archaeological Trust...

Here is the link for more about that.
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-49397328

1. Luke 3:5 ⁵Every valley shall be filled in, every mountain and hill made low...

--- Yesterday I described some air tests I did. It seems I can't do that without repeating the limitations of an air test, and the importance of not making too much out of the results. You have to start somewhere, and an air test is a convenient starting place when you are just starting to become familiar with a metal detector.  You can form some initial theories to be tested more effectively at a later time, but an air test will not tell you what you will get in the field with real targets. An air test is an OK starting place, but that is about it. If you want to compare metal detectors, the best way is to take those detectors out to the area you want to detect and compare signals on UNDUG targets. Don't dig the targets until after you have thoroughly explored the signals and all of the adjustments you might be interested in. It is important that the targets remain undisturbed in the naturally settled sand or earth to get a good test. If you are interested in the wet sand area, compare the performance of your detectors there. If you are interested in submerged areas, test there. Or dry sand, test there. Test in the same type of area you want to detect. Testing in dry sand for detecting in wet sand will give you very misleading results, but it will help you learn a bit about your new detector before venturing into the wet sand. Also, when conducting a test, you should sweep as you would naturally sweep when hunting. Since I conducted the air test in an area with a considerable amount of electrical interference, I wanted to make a few comments about that. The Ace 250 isn't bothered too much by electrical interference (much less than some metal detectors) but when you need to, you can turn down the sensitivity. The Ace 250 does not have other additional options for dealing with that. The Equinox has a frequency check function to find the best frequency for you. Besides that, you have several choices that you can manually select. You can choose multi-frequency or other specific frequencies. I found that both 5kz and 10kz worked well when I needed to adjust. Sometimes multi-frequency works well, but if you are getting a lot of noise, you can easily change frequencies. You can just cycle through the various frequencies and use the one that seems to work well. From my limited experience, I've been impressed by several things about the Equinox. I didn't expect the display to be as clear and easy to read. Also, for the variety of features that are available, the options are easy to understand and use. The human interface was well designed. Eventually I'll get around to testing it in the field on real targets. That is what really counts. ---

Source: nhc.noaa.gov

Way to the north is Tropical Storm Chantal, and on the other side of the Bahamas is another system that could form. I'll keep an eye on that one. Happy hunting, TreasureGuide@comcast.net

7/23/18 Report - Cache Hunting: Tips and Misconceptions. Fisher Organization Salvage Activities.

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

I've written about a couple of Florida cache finds this year.  Caches are found, but not real often.

Hunting for a cache is different than hunting for individual coins or pieces of jewelry, and a lot of what you read about how to find a cache is wrong.

The first thing about cache hunting, is you have to have reason to be looking for one.  If you just go out and cover a lot of ground, you might eventually find one, but the odds are very long against it.

Caches are rare, so it helps if you have reason to believe there might be one.  Of course if you are hunting the right kind of place, for example a historic home site, you should be aware that there is always the possibility of a cache being present.  If you don't want to miss any possible caches, you want to alert to a variety of types of targets that you otherwise might discriminate out.

If you read most articles about cache hunting, you'll probably read about things like two-box detectors for detecting really deep targets.  For many caches, a regular detector will work just fine if you aren't using too much discrimination.  The idea that every cache is going to be buried ten feet deep just isn't true.  People don't have to dig down ten feet to hide a cache.  There are other things that will hide a cache as well or better than a few feet of earth.

Someone who buries a cache, will usually hide it where they think they can find it again.  That means that the cache will be near landmarks or features - perhaps a tree, wall, fence or walk.  That can cause a problem for the detectorist.  They will not be able to detect the area well either because of physical obstacles, like walls, or noise from rebar or buried cables.  You can't detect with a two-box detector in small areas or around other big metal items.

The caches that I'm most familiar with were buried in canning jars, not treasure chests.  One cache was distributed around a home site with individual jars placed in different areas.  And each jar contained different kinds of coins.  You don't know what the container might be so you don't want to discriminate iron or a lot of other metals

If you've been hunting very long, you can probably easily tell the difference between a small surface target and a deeper large target from the sound of the signal.  You can't pay too much attention to your meter.  Many caches will give mixed signals because there can be signals from the container as well as the coins or whatever else is in the container.  They can be quite a mixed bag.

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A very dark two carat emerald was discovered on 7/11/18 while the Magruder was working Emerald City.

The Magruder will be going back to the site of the Margarita to dig the virgin area on the northern trail near where the gold chalice was found years ago.  They will be using an airlift to excavate holes in the bedrock.

The Margruder was finding Ming Dynasty blue and white porcelain and olive jar shards on the Atocha site.

The Fisher organization will also be returning to the deep target site with Dolores.

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I think it is amazing how little coins have changed over the past thousand years.  I guess they were well-designed for the job and worked well.  Mostly flat and round with designs on two sides.  It is fairly obvious what works well about that.

Anyway, I think coins will be going away before long.  Canada quit producing the-one cent coin in 2012.

Keys had a long run too, and are disappearing.

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We had a nice west wind this morning, but there are no storms around, and the surf is only one to two feet.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

6/16/17 Report - Small Gold Artifact Found. Gold King Mine Disaster. Shipwreck Wood on Beach. Two Tropical Disturbances.

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

Animas River After Gold King Mine Disaster.
Source: See Daily Signal link below

In August 2015, an EPA crew inexplicably dug out the rock and rubble “plug” to the long abandoned Gold King Mine, triggering a massive blowout that flooded the Animas River with 3 million gallons of acid mine drainage and, according to the EPA, over 550 tons of metals...

Click here to read more about that.

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Things have been going well down south.  The Dare recently recovered three silver coins on the trail of the Atocha.

The Magruder found a small gold artifact said to be a pendant.  It appears to be gold wire with a gold two-piece filigree bead and with a pearl near the end.  A similar one was found in 1985.

Here is a picture.

Small Gold Artifact Found by Margruder
Source: Personal email.

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Shipwreck Wood Washed Up on Beach.
Source: See Daily Astorian link below.

CANNON BEACH — What at first glance looks like one of the many logs that line Cannon Beach may be an uncovered keel of a boat from a possible shipwreck.

The wood object, which measures about 18 feet long and several hundred pounds, was found Wednesday afternoon on the beach close to the Taft Street access by Jeffrey Smith of Portland. Looking for a place to rest after walking with his wife, he noticed rusty square nails, notches and square cutouts in the log and decided to call the Cannon Beach History Center and Museum...

Here is the link for more of that story.

http://www.dailyastorian.com/Local_News/20170615/possible-shipwreck-debris-uncovered-in-cannon-beach

Cannon Beach!  Pay attention to place names.

Shipwreck wood occasionally washes up onto Treasure Coast beaches too.

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As I've been saying, "Its time to start watching for tropical weather."   There are two disturbances out there now.  Neither will likely affect the Treasure Coast much, but keep watching.

Source: MagicSeaWeed.com.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

7/22/15 Report - WWII Bomb Found On Beach. Atocha Finds. Mitch King Video. Smooth Surf.

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

100-Pound WW II Photoflash Bomb 
Found On St. Pete Beach.

A 100-pound WW II photoflash bomb was found by a beach-goer on Sunday.  It was detonated by the bomb squad.

I think I see the Don Cesar Hotel in the background of the video linked below.  It has a long history.  It was opened in 1928 and members of high society played there including guests such as F. Scott Fitzgerald.  It was purchased by the U. S. Army in 1942.

Below is the link to the video about the bomb.

http://www.9news.com/video/4363574513001/1/World-War-II-Bomb-Washes-Up-On-Florida-Beach

Thanks to Doug for sending me that link.

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The crew of the JB Magruder uncovered a silver coin, musket ball, gunners dice, encrusted objects, a large barrel hoop fragment, two iron spikes and pottery. The Fisher organization believes that there is still at least $260 million dollars worth of treasure to be found on the Atocha site. 

The Dare searched over Lost Merchant 100 linear miles with side scan sonar and magnetometers in the search for the Lost Merchant.

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Here is a very nice video of Mitch King talking about metal detecting.

http://www.tcpalm.com/franchise/tcpalm-social/treasure-coast-metal-detectorists-looking-for-more-than-just-treasures_62822210

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The price of gold has been dropping.  Now it is down around $1100 an ounce.

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Treasure Coast Beach This Morning Near Low Tide.

Notice the same old flat beach created by the smooth surf we've been having for months.  That sand is very fine grain.

Sparkling Ocean.

I just happened to catch the sun reflecting off the water and thought it was neat.

There were good numbers of coins and junk jewelry this morning and a few better pieces.  Maybe with the price of gold going down more people will be buying gold again, but I doubt it.  I don't think the middle class feels good about the economy.

One thing about the smooth surf is that although nothing old is being uncovered, and that is more what this blog focuses on, recent items that are being lost in the water are not disappearing.  There are a lot of shallow coins that look like they haven't been out there very long.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

3/19/15 Report - First Gold Of The Year From Santa Margarita Site. Nice Treasure Coast Finds. Cave Explorers Find 2400 Year Old Treasure.

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

Here are some great finds and photos from Robert H.

Very nice Robert!  Thanks for sharing.

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The weather down in the Keys has been good for hunting lately, and Captain Andy and the crew of the Magruder found the first gold of the year.

They were on the site of the Santa Margarita when they found a ballast stones, a musket ball, a spike and a gold ring with a clear stone.

They were using a GoPro when the ring was found so they have the find recorded.

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The Northern lights were seen as far south as West Virginia Tuesday night.  For anyone that hasn't seen them, it is very impressive.  I've seen them a few times.

That could also mean a possible increase in electrical interference in the atmosphere.

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A couple spelunkers found 2400-year-old treasures while exploring a cave in Israel.  Included were coins showing Alexander the Great.

http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/09/middleeast/israel-ancient-treasure-found-in-cave/index.html

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Aqua-Cycle Water Trike.

    You've seen these.  I received an advertisement today that reminded me of the time I was metal detecting in front of a hotel that rented these things.   There was a nice couple pedalling along not far out from shore, and a kid, maybe about 12 years old, got on a jet ski, took off like a torpedo on a curved path and hit the back wheel of the water trike, instantly breaking the wheel.  The trike listed to one side and sank.  I thought that was hilarious.  It was even funnier seeing the people involved and the expressions on their faces.

I don't think I'll ever forget that.  That kid on the jet ski looked like a torpedo.

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On the Treasure Coast today we had a surf of about three to four feet with the wind coming from the East.  The surf will decrease slightly through the weekend.

Not much very promising on the weather front.  At least we're having some good tidal action.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net            

12/7/13 - Pearl Harbor Day, Sword, Atocha and Margarita Finds, and More Sand Planned for IR County & Sebastian

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

Recovered from USS Oklahoma Sunk at Pearl Harbor.

Indian River County wants to dump more sand on their beaches.  WOW!  Isn't that surprising?
Actually it seems that dumping more sand on the beaches has become a continuous project.  Millions and millions of dollars of sand that makes its way into the ocean.

According to VeroNews.com,  As early as January, the county hopes to once again rebuild some of these (John’s Island to Treasure Shores Park) beaches, but the scope will be much smaller this time as money for only about 155,000 cubic yards of sand is budgeted.


Also in January, the Sebastian Inlet District will begin rebuilding a three-mile stretch of beach starting about a half a mile south of the inlet to about a half a mile south of Ambersand Beach.

If you ever wondered where this sand comes from, as I have, the article names some places including the Ranch Road Lake Mine, the mine the county utilized for its $15 million John’s Island to Treasure Shores project.

They also mention the David Mine and Henry Fischer’s 86th and 17th Street Mines, and the Hammond Mine.


The article says, The Sebastian Inlet project doesn’t have such stumbling blocks thanks to a sand trap deep in the belly of inlet, about 2,000 feet from the A1A bridge.

I always like to know where sand is coming from because the sand might have some goodies in it. as was the case for the sand dumped at Amber Sands, which held old coins that were released when there was erosion.

Here is the link for that article.

http://www.veronews.com/news/indian_river_county/government/heavy-winds-high-surf-fuel-more-beach-erosion-in-indian/article_37717d8a-5e34-11e3-8dcd-001a4bcf6878.html?mode=jqm

Yesterday I showed a Civil War sword found by a young boy.  The photo above is of a sword recovered from the USS Nebraska that sank in Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941.  To most of us that date might be a little uncertain in our memories, but to those of the WWII generation, that is a date that is much like the assassination of JFK for the next generation who can tell you exactly where they were when they heard the news.  I was in a high school English class.

Here is a web site on military swords including US Navy regulation swords.

http://www.totalnavy.com/regulationsword.htm


And here is a web site about the salvage of the ships of Pearl Harbor including the Oklahoma.

http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/events/wwii-pac/pearlhbr/ph-ok9.htm


 

The Mel Fisher organization reports that the crew of the Dare has recovered more silver coins from the trail of the Margarita, and the crew of the Magruder is finding lead split shot and musket balls and some other stuff on the trail of the Atocha.

Unfortunately the earlier predictions for an eleven foot surf in a week or so has already been reduced - nearly cut in half.  I thought that might happen.


Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net