3/24/18 Report - Diving Great Lakes Shipwrecks. Useful Artifact Database. Increased Surf Next Week.

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

Occasionally I get an email asking if a find might be a meteorite.  That is something I don't know much about.  Fortunately I know a person that hunts meteorites and can give some good information on the subject.  I'm talking about SuperRick

SuperRick recently sent me a link to a web site that has a good finds database including everything from coins and buttons to clay pipes and pottery.  You might find it helpful.

http://www.glevumdetecting.co.uk/

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Below you'll find a story by Steve in Sebastian about shipwreck diving in the Great Lakes.  I put the title on the article.  The rest is by Steve.

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Making Memories Diving Shipwrecks 160 Feet Down In The Great Lakes

My friend Ken is over in England on a Metal Detecting Holiday. He has found some wonderful old Roman hammered coins already.

But I also reminded him that no matter how good he was... no matter how fertile the ground under his feet... that he would never, ever beat my oldest coin that I found! My 200-400 BC Roman Silver Denarius! Ok...I cheated a bit...it was rolling by inside a cuff link...definitely adding to my ability to spot it. Otherwise on its own... probably too tiny to spot in the dull gray silver color. Unless the tiny coin had the glint of gold! You get an eye for the glint of gold down there, in your very bright lights. You see the "little guys" the $1 U.S. Gold Pieces... tumble on past you! Then you have to turn around, and go chase them down... most of the time you find them!!!

Better yet I reminded him that I got my Denarius coin --with my naked eye- in 160 feet of water, as I laid on the deck of a passenger and freight steamship from 1865, up in the Great Lakes...watching a 2 foot deep vertical cut wall of debris, breaking up for the 1st time in over a century, in a cloud of rotting, organic detritus that swirled on by me...as I fanned the leading edge of the pile. My light held up high in my left hand, angled down on the debris pile, and a modified ping pong paddle fanning the leading edge of the pile in the right hand.

It took many years, more correctly decades, to have the intestinal fortitude to hit the deep in 160 feet of water...in total darkness, and sometimes 38-40 degree water, bleed the air out of your dry suit, and "settle in heavy" on the deck. Literally laying out on the deck, resting on your knees and your fins flat on the deck, to hold position. And do this for 20 minutes, but with the decompression needed to arrive on the surface without the bends, stops were required at 20 and then 10 feet, having a total dive time of 52 minutes. Then 4 hours out to bleed off some nitrogen, relax, warm up, eat lunch, and then back down for the afternoon dive of 15 minutes, with the same 52 minute profile. Day after day after day...weather permitting. When the wind blew and the waves rose...you did shopping, laundry, and maintenance on a huge amount of diving equipment

Honest, hard, dirty, grueling work... NOTHING IS FOR FREE....that is what made a professional salvage diver different than a sport diver who just swam around "sight seeing" and looking over the ship.

I did this for over 30 years in 4 of the 5 Great Lakes on over 100 different shipwrecks of all types. My diving in Central and South America, and the Philippines we'll talk about another time... if The "Boss" here so wishes.

I recall one year when I got up there awful early in the beginning of June, and the water was just a few degrees above freezing, 20 miles offshore. June is summer, right??? I had the finest of regulators made for the cold and deep water, but they would still freeze up by the time I hit the deck in 160 feet. So do I sit around down there waiting to see what my regulator was going to do, or do I get down to work? __Time was as precious as the gold I sought__. You were always careful to never take a breath while adding air to your suit. We all know the physics of how air cools or freezes as pressure is released. But even with the best of care, on very cold water days...I would hit the deck with a very slow but steady free flow...just a "blub, blub, blub...about 1 "blub" every 5 seconds. But the -next- breath would be... twice as fast... and on and on. Within 30 seconds you would have had a totally -life threatening- massive free flow, the air roaring out your regulator, quickly emptying your tank!!!

So there I am... setting up to start my work, and first... I had to switch out my regulator for my "pony tank" regulator! Yup...on the deck at 160 feet, I would pull the regulator out of my mouth, and replace it with my spare. Just another day on the job! But the little "pony tank" (for emergencies) held only 12 cubic feet of air. Only a few minutes at that depth. But never the less... I got down to work in the swirling mud, using the pony tank, wait a couple minutes for the main regulator to defrost, and then stop my fanning, and put the main regulator back into my mouth!!!

Sounds insane...almost to me after all these years later...but it was just what you --needed to do--. Period. There was no alternative. And so you did....

Once while down on the deck at 160' with very cold water, I felt a ball of ice in my mouth. I thought..."Oh boy, this ain't good" the regulator shot me out a lump of ice from in its frozen 1st stage. One mistake and I will gag on the ice chunk that I could feel was way bigger than a pea, almost a marble size.

So I stopped what I was doing, and very carefully worked the ice ball around in my mouth, to the exact point I thought I could best swallow it. (Kind of like when you need to swallow a big medicine pill). It had to go, and evidently the cold air passing by was not melting it! I knew if I failed at swallowing the ice chunk, I would involuntarily -Gag- and -Gasp- and Spit out my Regulator!!! This was no laughing matter!!! This could be easily...life or death at that depth.

So when I had it just perfect in my mouth, I gulped it down. All went well, and man...was I ever relieved! But when I got up on deck after the dive... I came to realize that it was not ice, --but that I had bit off one of the two "tangs" inside the regulator mouth piece that you bite down on--!!! So far worse than ice... I swallowed down a big lump of rough ripped off rubber!!! Another of my "nine lives" gone!!!

Stay warm in your beds....it's a lot safer there... but you will surely die of boredom. Live...take risks...calculated risks, enjoy life, take the trip you think is a little risky, or that you cannot afford to.... and know this...you will never, ever look back on your life and say..."Oh, I wish I had not taken this vacation or that adventure." •You will love and cherish each and every memory•. Because when you are old... those memories might be all you have to sustain you. God Bless.

Steve in Sebastian

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An increase in the surf is predicted for next week.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

1/11/18 Report - Finds: Sight and Otherwise. Dutch Warship Found. One Reader's Success Sifting For Silver.

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

14 Inch Spike Found On Treasure Coast Yesterday

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Divers in the blue waters around the Yucatán Peninsula have discovered three historic treasures: a sunken lighthouse and the remains of an 18th-century Dutch warship and a 19th-century British steamer, according to Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH).

The battered wrecks were found near the coastal town of Sisal, Mexico, a modern beach destination that was once a bustling port in the 18th and 19th centuries...

Here is the link for the rest of the story.

https://www.livescience.com/61378-shipwrecks-yucatan.html

I've long suspected that old wrecks could be responsible for the shape of some of the Treasure Coast.  The wrecks were covered with coral and then in some cases, sand.

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A couple days ago I was talking about a couple kinds of sloth.  One reader responded to that post as follows.

After spending a few hours on the sifter today, your entry resonated today!

I am on a new site or at least a new site using the sifter.  It was a small lot with the house removed two years ago.  I hand dug, then detected, repeat, most of the lot as it was extremely trashy, with good success:  tons of marbles and at least 13 silvers, including some barber dimes.

There was a fifteen foot wide stretch at the front next to the sidewalk that had a very overgrown Camphor tree that I did not work.  Finds had diminished as I approached anyway so I wasn't too worried about it.  A week ago they cleaned all of it up and it has perfect sifting soil (mainly, no grass) so I decided to give a sample of it a shot with the sifter (after hitting with the detector and finding nada, I might add).  I might have sampled the best spot that first day with 19 marbles and a Merc and some wheats, but the finds have continued.  I've spent about ten hours and have two Indian head pennies, two V-nickels, 10 or so wheats, war nickel, two mercs and, the highlight, an 1892O Barber quarter.  I should also include the 40 marbles.  If you want to build a marble collection, sifting is the way!  I probably find 200 a year, including a bunch of clay, using the sifter.

Now I regret not sifting the entire lot, just digging.  I'm sure I missed some dimes, nickels and probably IHP's.

Anyway, not many want to hit sifting hard.  It is a lot of work.  But if you want to find the older coins, do it!

Thanks for all your blogging efforts.

Russ

Sifting isn't easy.  Most people won't put in that kind of work, but if you do, you will definitely find things that you would miss with a detector - including coins.  Did you catch how much he found with the sifter after having used his detector first?

Thanks for sharing Russ!

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I often visually scout areas before deciding to detect.  Good sites will often show evidence that something might be there and maybe even give you a good idea of the kind of things that might be there.

I decided to check out at a spot along the Indian River Lagoon, and found the two following items.  They were both sight finds.  I consider eye-balling to be a speciality of mine and enjoy finding things that way.  These two items aren't worth much but they do tell me that the area is probably worth checking out with a detector.

Cork Top McCormack's Bottle.

Even if this bottle was in great shape, and it isn't, it wouldn't be worth much, but it does tell me that some older things might be found in the area.

Vintage Earring.

This earring, like the bottle above, was a sight find.  Both were found in an eroded area.  The area was eroded much like the near ideal cut that I talked about a couple days ago.

The earring tells me that there might be some more jewelry in the area,

Such sight finds are common if you know how to read sites.

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We're supposed to have a 4 - foot surf and a south wind today.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net