The Responsible Detectorist

Monday, 5 January 2015

Metal Detecting on BBC 4 Farming Today

There was an interesting little piece on Radio 4's Farming Today about metal detecting (4 mins in).

A few comments on it.

1. Not all items are recorded as the piece says, only items over 300 years old that are voluntarily reported to a Finds Liaison officer (FLO) who work for the Portable Antiquities Scheme (PAS) are recorded. There is no legal requirement to report finds to a FLO. Many detectorists do not report their 300 years old to their local FLO.

There is a legal requirement to report possible Treasure to the local Coroner. Usually Treasure finds are reported the local FLO instead of the Coroner as they act as a go between. The legal requirement to report possible treasure come from the Treasure Act 1996.

2. Any responsible detectorist should have their own specific insurance rather than relying on the farmers public liability insurance. If I was a farmer I would want to see the detectorists insurance.

3. If the farmer is interested in the history of their land they may wish to make sure they ask the detectorist to show them everything that they have found and make sure items are recorded with the FLO.

A farmer might also wish to ask the detectorist to print out and show them some of their personalised PAS finds records (A detectorist can create a username on the PAS website and the finds that they record can get linked to the username. This shows it was the detectorist that reported the find).

4. As to 'lucrative diversification' then a farmer should be aware that it's not just shinny coins that are worth money. Beehive thimbles, buckles, spurs, crotal bells and all sorts of other things can be commonly found by detectorists and can be worth a fair few quid. Some detectorists might think that they can buy you off with a bottle of whiskey in exchange for them not showing you stuff they then keep / sell without you knowing.

Friday, 2 January 2015

To all new fortune seekers!

If you've just bought a metal detector because you read about a bloke finding thousands of coins worth loads of money then please please realise that there are rules and responsibilities that come with owning a metal detector. THIS page lists some of them and THIS page lists links that you need to read first before going anywhere. Please remember that if you start detecting anywhere without permission of the landowner then you may be committing a criminal and / or civil offence. Please note this includes your local park, common, beach, random piece of land, you need permission for these places to.

To all you budding new treasure finders please note that 99.999 pct of days are spent finding things like

Lots of these

and

Stuff like this

There is a reason so many detectors end up of ebay. If you want a million quid go play the lottery.

If you are new and have any questions then please post them and I'll do my best to answer.

Thursday, 1 January 2015

Aylesbury hoard of Anglo Saxon Coins in the news

Old news to many now I imagine but just noticed the first more mainstream media mention of the Aylesbury hoard found on 21 December 2014. (no comments on it being the Daily Mail!)

You can read more about the hoard on the Weekend Wanderers website.

Tuesday, 30 December 2014

Back in time at the beach

Christmas done, DIY done, finally a trip to the beach.

Arriving at the beach it was a lovely sunny day, no wind, no other folks about. Lovely.

About 90 minutes later I hadn't found didly, apart from random small bits of copper. Still was great just being out so decided to carry on. About 30 minutes later I came hit my first coin, a 1949 six pence. I then proceeded to dig out quite a few more coins in the same area of the beach. Weirdly they all dated from around 1940 to 1960. Nothing decimal at all. Still shouldn't be that surprised as this beach seems to be decimal up one end and then gradually gets older (oldest coin i've found there is 1870 something).

Happy with my little pre-decimal hoard I carried on when I got a lovely loud 'ding ding' two bars from the top of my euro-ace. I didn't need to dig as laying on the ground was what seems to be a gold signet ring. Bit of an odd one in that I don't know if it's solid or just gold plated. There isn't a hallmark and it's rather cruddy inside. Still have popped up a post on The Metal Detecting Forum so hopefully somebody will know more than I which when it comes to gold ain't hard.

I carried on for another hour so and found a pound coin and a 10 pence piece before deciding to head home. All in all a lovely 4 hours out.

Whilst I haven't done much beach detecting at all one thing I often find is that where you find one coin you will often find more close by so always have a good look around the hole.

Have a good new year all.