A couple of times very recently I’ve whined about not getting into that mid 1800s zone on the silver at my current honeyhole, but not today.  Nailed an 1845 seated dime; only my 2nd career seated dime and 4th career seated coin overall, out of about 1000 silvers and about 19,000 coins dug,  That’s how rare they are for me.

Day started out slow, only 1 wheatie in the first 2.5 hours, but that’s the nice thing about a proven honeyhole, you keep at it.  And then I got a rosie, the seated, then another rosie, all within 15 minutes, and within 5 feet of each other.  Are you kidding me?

Why is that?  I dunno, but the site has always been bursty.  I gave up on it once, and came back, and almost gave up on it again.  Now that’s its been declared a honeyhole, every blade of grass gets gridded (and most have been, by now), but it seems to me something technical may be at work here.  Why is a site so bursty?

I dunno, but I do know that the pinpoint on each of these three silvers, all very close to each other, came in much shallower than the coins were.  That suggests to me extreme mineralization that fooled the pinpoint, and perhaps fooled the competition’s machines, but not the E-Trac in “see-thru” mode.  I dunno.  I think it is possible due to the variable mineralization at this site, and the large swaths that appear to be hunted out.

Now, one more technical observation.  Those who read me (and I’m not sure if I should use the plural), know I am obsessed with channel management on the E-Trac.  Here’s what happened on the seated —

It was a deep, iffy signal that I wasn’t sure was worth digging or not, but I had decided I would.  I had just pulled a tough rosie, and was feeling hot.  I was running channel 2 (one of the best for silver, IMHO, and the channel recommended at the last noise cancel).  Whenever I get one of these deep iffy ones, I play with the channels.  I did a noise cancel on the dirt next to it, and it recommended channel 7, one of the very worst channels for silver according to my previous data.  I ran it over the target in channel 7, and it gave a sorta kinda i’mnotsure kinda signal; would I have dug it had it been the initial signal? I dunno.  It was slightly worse than 2, but since I was already predisposed to dig the target, it is hard to judge.

Then, I put it on channel 9, the best silver channel, IMHO, and it did not give a dig me signal.  Had I been running 9, I most likely would have missed it.  So, its still a game of managing the best channels for silver, and the best channel for the local dirt.  Noise cancel alot, with the coil on the ground, especially in dirt with high, and highly variable, mineralization. Learn the good silver channels in normal dirt (2, 6, 9, 10 IMHO),.  And play with it alot.  It matters some of the time: I wish could offer a cookbook, but I can’t.  You’ll “get it” if you play with it alot in the field.

Anyway, the seated is thin, and was at about 6-7 inches, on its side.  What a joy to see down there when I sliced away more dirt from the side of the plug.

But, there’s more.  Are you kidding me?  Maybe the seated wasn’t the best find of my day (tho it was certainly my favorite).  Also pulled a copper ring today.  I don’t even get excited about KG II copper coins, cause they are so abused, and this ring is no exception, but it could have been a wedding band from over 200 years ago.  Who knows?  How cool would that be?  Amazingly, the ring has some sort of stamp, hallmark, or inscription in it.  Are you kidding me?  Given that it is abused copper, I can’t read the hallmark now, and may never be able to, but if I am able to, it could be really cool.  Will work on it when I have the time.  Not much to look at, but here it is —