Hunting Local sites

I've been lucky to find most of my local cellar holes to be pretty much never hunted before. Well, one of them I think was hit by some guy in the past who only dug high tones and left a ton of buttons and some other goodies but that's another story. Anyways usually if a site is within 15 minutes of me and on public property, I've been there. Most of the time however I am away from my area and detecting other towns I'm familiar with or have had previous success in. Some of these towns i know are home to some very good detectorists. And then to my surprise, the cellar is almost close to virgin. So here's my question, do people just not research their area throughly enough? Or do they simply not hit their own town? I've just wondered this question

Jim what do you consider a "virgin" cellar site ?? for example i wouldn't consider any cellar "virgin" unless i pulled at least a dozen or more coins plus many many other high vdi targets and scores and scores of buttons .

del said:

Jim what do you consider a "virgin" cellar site ?? for example i wouldn't consider any cellar "virgin" unless i pulled at least a dozen or more coins plus many many other high vdi targets and scores and scores of buttons .

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I guess I should have used the term "lightly hit". Sorry for the confusion. I've only been to 1 for sure virgin site but I've been to others that have been about as lightly hit as you can get. (30+ buttons, 5 coppers, 2 shoe buckle frames, other colonial relics) but they probably were hit before long ago

I guess the point I'm getting at is that there were obvious targets around the hole (high tones) that an experienced detectorist should have found even with an older machine

older analog machines were ok at best unless some one really put the time into them Jim . so most hobbyists ran with their machine's discriminators set pretty conservatively or the person ran it wide open and that leaves a lot of discrepancy . I've been detecting cellars exclusively for about 15 years now and can only positively say i've found one virgin cellar the other was pounded around the cellar but they overlooked and missed a picnic area where some 40 plus coins and scores of buttons came from .

I can't comment specifically about cellar holes since we don't really have any here in my part of the country, but I will say that here anything that even remotely resembles an area that has promise has been hunted to death over the past 30 plus years. That's why parks within 30 to 40 miles have mostly been wiped clean, and only rarely get anything old. But, research can and does pay off sometimes.

An area I have been in that is actually part of a large park but had been a mill site in the 1840's until around the 1880's or so. It's common knowledge the mill was in the area, but the historical marker is inaccurate. As I researched this area, I located the actual position of the mill which is a couple hundred yards downstream from where it looks like it should have been. The mill pond itself was used for over 100 years as a skating area in winter and should have produced tons of coins, but didn't even find a single button-just a few almost new zincolns. But the mill area itself produced an 1871 suspender buckle! I'm sure there is lots more there too, but just have to go back in spring when the grass isn't neck high.

I guess the moral of the story is that in general I think a vast majority of detectorists do NOT research anything much, but go for either the easy pickings or just go to where they THINK the site was and hope they find something. Sometimes they get lucky, but I think more often they miss the mark because history and memory gets skewed over time.

Digger_O'Dell said:

I can't comment specifically about cellar holes since we don't really have any here in my part of the country, but I will say that here anything that even remotely resembles an area that has promise has been hunted to death over the past 30 plus years. That's why parks within 30 to 40 miles have mostly been wiped clean, and only rarely get anything old. But, research can and does pay off sometimes.

An area I have been in that is actually part of a large park but had been a mill site in the 1840's until around the 1880's or so. It's common knowledge the mill was in the area, but the historical marker is inaccurate. As I researched this area, I located the actual position of the mill which is a couple hundred yards downstream from where it looks like it should have been. The mill pond itself was used for over 100 years as a skating area in winter and should have produced tons of coins, but didn't even find a single button-just a few almost new zincolns. But the mill area itself produced an 1871 suspender buckle! I'm sure there is lots more there too, but just have to go back in spring when the grass isn't neck high.

I guess the moral of the story is that in general I think a vast majority of detectorists do NOT research anything much, but go for either the easy pickings or just go to where they THINK the site was and hope they find something. Sometimes they get lucky, but I think more often they miss the mark because history and memory gets skewed over time.

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yup I agree. Funny thing about parks in my area. There's a very well known park that has some age to it near me that one would assume to have been pounded to death over the years. I guess that wasn't the case cause I've pulled 11 silver coins from there including my only 2 half dollars. I guess you should never say "oh that's sites probably pounded I'm not going there" until you actually put the coil on the ground and see for yourself

I've never had more than 3 coppers come from untouched sites in virginia. Some people over estimate what "virgin" means imo.

yup I agree. Funny thing about parks in my area. There's a very well known park that has some age to it near me that one would assume to have been pounded to death over the years. I guess that wasn't the case cause I've pulled 11 silver coins from there including my only 2 half dollars. I guess you should never say "oh that's sites probably pounded I'm not going there" until you actually put the coil on the ground and see for yourself

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I have been lucky to also pull a silver or 2 from parks that were actually pounded to death. Luck, maybe-but some of the areas that are really trashy get avoided for easier targets. But I also try to research what the park was like in it's early days. Many areas that draw the crowds now were not in existence say maybe 50 plus years ago. So I ask myself, "what would attract people going to the park at that time?" It often pays to actually think more, or to work a bit harder than the last 50 detectorists through the area.

One thing you might have to understand, items move in the ground over the years too. I have been to some sites with obvious signals and you wonder how they were missed if someone was thorough. Like perfect copper signals not more than 5 ft from the cellar hole itself, and then you go around the back and see iron pieces stacked on rocks. The first time a Roman coin got pulled up in the center of this state, the guy said he and a few others have been over the same spot a few times last year but it was this year he heard it and dug it. He said it wasn't more than 2 or 3 inches down, so there must be an explanation that something like a winter frost changed it's position in the ground and now it was heard. This is all hearsay and speculation from my aspect, but I can still relay it as a confirming situation. Not to deviate away from issues with different machines and different coils being a case as well. We never knew where they put their coil, how well they knew their machine, if their machine was a DD or CC and if they ever overlapped their swing enough, or if they even bothered with the obvious spots. Did they even get close to the trees? All aspects we don't know.

I even have two cellar holes within a mile of my house. My house is 1959 in a section of town built after the early 30's so you don't see the streets in one aerial, but you do in the next. But the other streets were there well before 1756 (which is the oldest standing house). I just haven't gotten to those spots. One is owned as a vacant lot and I have tried 3 times to door knock but no one has answered at the house listed on the assessor property card. The other is owned by a business and I have to see what time they are open. Btw, Isaac.... this latter spot is near the spot I showed you months ago from pics where I noticed weird trees. Sure there is a standing 1850 house near, but there is actually a cellar as well.

I have over 300 sites on my excel list and each site gets ranked as to how I think it will perform in the future. I also note if they are within 10miles of my house. I'll hit the close ones after work and the further ones on weekends. I'd be at a close one right now if it wasn't my wife's birthday :lol: