New Zealand Gold Prospecting & Metal Detecting Forums Archive

Had a heck of a good silver day.

Yeah, makes up for yesterday when I found none.

Wow. Very impressive.

Nice haul!

Shane, the Shilling is an 1874, I think that is the oldest.


Bit of a story about the Florin; I was talking to a guy about metal detectors and was letting his two sons use my metal detector. They were 9 and 10 years old I think and not too handy with the detector. They didn’t get much swinging done and had it way to high, but would get a beep now and then and I would say “No, that’s nothing, keep going.”

Then the one boy was over by this tree and he got a real ding so I said “Hold on, swing there some more.” And sure enough it was a legitimate signal. So I said “Let me see that thing” and pin pointed the location right at the base of the tree. It was deep and I was not sure I would be able to dig it, but started in among the big roots and was trying to wriggle down in to where the signal was coming from. The kid kept swinging between digs and the signal kept getting stronger, and I kept asking him what it was reading and the number kept going up. I was thinking “Holy crap, this is going to be something really good and who is going to claim it?” It was a pretty tuff excavation because I didn’t want to knick it, but finally got a bead on it with the pin pointer and sure enough out comes this great big shinny silver coin.

The kids were pretty excited to have found something, but I am sure did not appreciate that they had actually found something really good. The father immediately said “Ok now it is his detector so it’s his coin.” I have to say I really wanted the coin because it was obviously a real prize, but I am also a firm believer in finders keepers. So I said “I really want this coin, but you did find it so how about I take the coin and you take this $20?” The kids were pretty happy with the proposition but the father said it was too much money. I told him the coin actually might be worth $20 and they did find it. So I got the coin and they got the money.

I would like to say that was the end of the story but a few minutes later I had found a dollar and let them have another go. So again they would be sweeping around in quite poor form and I would be saying “No that’s nothing keep going” and I did dig up a couple pieces of junk just so they would feel like they were finding something, when again the one kid gets this good ding. And again I said “Hold on, back up and swing there some more.” And up comes an old British sixpence. The father insisted I take it since I had already given them $20 so I didn’t argue.

A while after they left this little tiny girl came up and said “What are doing?” and I told her I was looking for treasure and showed her a handful of coins. She sorted through them and said “Do they belong to someone?” I said “Not any more, people lost them a long time ago and I just found them so they are mine.” She thought about it for a minute and said “Can I have these?” She had a pretty good handful of loot so I said “No, but you can have these” and gave her some 2 cents. My theory being that 2 cent coins would be just as interesting to a 4 year old as pennies and silvers and she would probably lose them in pretty short order anyway. And she was quite happy and ran off. Probably thirty seconds later I got a good signal and dug up two $2 stacked together right under the surface.

So what I have concluded from the days experiences is that being nice to kids is good karma and the fossicking gods repay it with good treasure.

Nice one Rgmcbrid. Looks more like a penny than a florin.
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A very cool two shillings.

hi, great silver finds the florin is a standing brittania,i know guys in the uk who have not got one of those

Well, I thought it would be more interesting than posting a photo of the 175,000 one and two cent coins I found today :)

Attempt no. 3
Theres nothin worse than trying to write a post when ya loaded.