Great site but.....

[omegamike]

I think we all have these sites don't we?. Had a couple of hours this morning on land surrounding a Moat & Bailey and a church dating way way back. Total so far after 20 hours detecting this site (last season included) = Zilch Not so much as a bent pin. Hardly a signal to be had, not even iron. 20 minutes between digable signals, never heard such a quiet field, not even any pottery on it! Just goes to show all the research in the world and being able to get permission doesn't necessarily mean your going to find anything

At one point I thought something was wrong with my detector. So out came a hammered penny that I always carry with me, buried it a few inches and put my coil over it..... loud and clear - phew!! I think I will put this particular field at the bottom of my 'don't touch it with a barge pole' list. Unless I'm really really desperate of course

Those of you with decent Roman or Medieval fields consider yourself lucky, some of us are still looking and it ain't easy

[Captainpugwash]

I have permission on a site, about 40 ish yards from a roman bath house, when it was excavated loads of stuff came from there. But this field the famous word zilch, it is very wet due to a spring comming up in one part of the field, this probably fed the bath house. The farmer put a trench across the field about 1.5metres deep and about 2metres wide running into a sream, in attempt to drain the field. Three of us have have detected on there with absolutely no results. It took me years to get permission on there, what a let down, the same as Mikes site it looked so promising yet gave nothing.

[dave9]

Have many site's like your's Mike.The one's which on paper should produce you get nothing.Then on other's,(middle of nowhere and no history or clue's to be found or researched) you find decent coin's and artefact's.Would be nice to go back in time and see what happened where.

[omegamike]

Got to say it's sometimes demoralising when you spend as much time and effort researching as I do and still I can't find that 'field'. I have another 'dead cert' a field right next to a Norman church, original site of a Saxon church - let's hope I do better on that field once the crop is off? but to be honest I'm not hedging my bets and I'm kind of expecting no results so if it does turn into a decent field then I will be over the moon

I'm not saying all my fields are duff. I get plenty of singular finds, pocket losses, occasional losses that keep me ticking over. But of all the dozens and dozens of fields I have I can't walk onto a single one and say I'm actually going to find anything on a particular day! It would be great to walk onto a field knowing your going to walk off with half a dozen Romans and a hammy in your finds pouch

[moparado]

I always find at least one coin at just about every site i'vd searched so far....except these two.

Two really old abandoned houses in the middle of a dense forest in the middle of nowhere.
One of those times i thought for sure, i'd walk away with at least one silver coin.
NOTHING! Not even a stink'n clad penny. Waste of 3 hours.

The other one is a large soccer field which attracts hundreds of people on the weekends.
NOTHING! Not even a stink'n clad penny. Waste of time.

[Davidhod]

Don't give up, keep going back for a quick look occasionally. some of my best finds have been at random on fields I wouldn't have been on if there was anywhere else to go.

[Kyle]

i agree with above keeping popping back - its there just not in range - YET

[Tony Hunt]

Got to say it's sometimes demoralising when you spend as much time and effort researching as I do and still I can't find that 'field'. I have another 'dead cert' a field right next to a Norman church, original site of a Saxon church - let's hope I do better on that field once the crop is off? but to be honest I'm not hedging my bets and I'm kind of expecting no results so if it does turn into a decent field then I will be over the moon

I'm not saying all my fields are duff. I get plenty of singular finds, pocket losses, occasional losses that keep me ticking over. But of all the dozens and dozens of fields I have I can't walk onto a single one and say I'm actually going to find anything on a particular day! It would be great to walk onto a field knowing your going to walk off with half a dozen Romans and a hammy in your finds pouch

We have several fields we can almost guarantee some roman bronzes at least off each trip , occasional silver also and the odd hammered but its getting harder each year. In the early days out on some of these fields it was nothing to find two or three brooches along with 20 - 30 bronzes that very often included 2-3 sesterti. Happy exciting days they were. Desperate to find some more hot spots to brighten up our retirement but its not happening lately

[seanmagee1]

we'll have a pop up to wiltshire in a couple of weeks tony and see if that will do the trick!! fingers crossed

[omegamike]

I remember one of those fields Tony. The one with the long grass that a club didn't even touch because of it. Their loss was your gain! But why did that particular field produce the goods?

[Chris Hall]

I have a 60 acre field right next to a scheduled Roman Villa site. A friend (now sadly no longer with us) found masses of Roman coins, a gold Roman ring, a sceat, a Celtic boar figure and various hammered coins on the field in the 1990's. I only got my permission 2 years ago but have found only 3 or 4 Roman grots! Very strange!

[jcmaloney]

I use the random,scatter gun approach. Get a field, give it a bash, expect nothing & you won`t be disappointed. Even fields that have been hammered by every man & his dog turn up suprises now & then at every turn of the plough.

[Kyle]

capt - get in that stream with your ctx - it may produce some good finds.

[roastedtoe]

It's a bit lame...BUT...I know when I have a run where I pull a lot of good stuff out of the foreshore each time I go...and it gets a little less exciting (yawn, another gold ring, this sh*t is getting easy...la la...was like that for a few weeks earlier in the year...boy do I miss it now...). Then I have a run where for weeks I can't find anything but rusting modern small change and the occasional button...and boy is it fun when something actually noteworthy pops up! And a relief!

So the dud fields (or a run of poor deposits on the foreshore) balance out things mentally I reckon. It's the uncertainty of the pursuit that has a lot to do with the excitement of a find I think. Although I understand that if you put as much effort into getting permissions as you do it would be nice to get some reward from each field.

The certainty is though, if you keep looking, you're going to find what you're looking for sooner or later. That's my pep talk done (it's what I tell myself in the dark moments when the pouch is only full of 2p's) .

[omegamike]

Yep, got to agree with you

I'm my own worst enemy sometimes. I should know better. Just because I haven't found anything in 20 hours doesn't mean there is nothing to find. It may take 30 hours before I find a hot spot or maybe another turn of the plough might reveal something?. I had one field next to a Roman villa that was the same, hours and hours of detecting and zilch. Then one day I found a Roman grot, slowed right down and concentrated on that area and pulled out another 12, several of which had pretty good detail. All in an area no bigger than a tennis court. If I hadn't initially pulled out that first Roman I would probably still have zilch from that field so it just goes to show you must persevere, even if the goings tough!

[roastedtoe]

I had 5 hours at Hammersmith this afternoon and pulled out a bucket of mod spare change (well, paid the train fare...), lead and copper odds and sods. Oldest find was a 1955 sixpence. I would have expected in that amount of time to have at least a Viccy something or a silver ring or something...but there you go. But that's the same area I've my oldest find from (bronze age awl) and where I found my first ever gold ring and much else besides. Was a cracking afternoon weather wise though, so a nice way to spend the time by the water.

It's a funny pursuit this. Makes me think of that adage about actors "You're only as good as your last movie"...I've that nice little roman from yesterday and that small gold signet ring from last weekend but what's foremost in my mind is today's kilogram of 2p's. . Now I'm trying to figure when I can next get down for the next hit....and maybe the next tidy find...it's an addiction.

Think I'll have another look at that little roman...ha!

[Tony Hunt]

I remember one of those fields Tony. The one with the long grass that a club didn't even touch because of it. Their loss was your gain! But why did that particular field produce the goods?

Because nobody else had bothered with it mike. The finds on our first visit in the field were a bit slow but gradually as we slowed down, concentrated more the finds rate shot up. We did no research on that farm, hardly ever do, the good fields just turn up. Our best ever field, better than the one I just spoke about took several visits of nothing before we started finding, since then we have had literally hundreds, maybe into the thousands of bronze romans, quite a few silvers, plus brooches and other artefacts. To cap it off we also found a hot part of the field where a mate of ours pulled out a Gold stater with a C Scope ( still rankles that one) plus we have both had several silver staters and a few bronze ones. Where the Celtic are we have found no Roman and vice versa, they seemed to have used opposite parts of the field as their campsites.

This is one of the fields that convinced me that the Deus just couldnt compete with the ETrac and why I sold it after giving it six months to prove itself while I locked the ET away. Because we had spent several years going over this field with the Explorers then the ETracs the Deus found nothing while my mate kept finding with the ETrac. Soon as I got the ETrac out again I started finding again and I'm still finding occasional coins with the CTX & the Blisstool.

The single most thing that leads to more finds for us and we prove it often is speed over the ground. Slow right down to a crawl and concentrate more and the finds rate climbs. Of course if some of these fields that you do research on have been nighthawked to death over the last 30 odd years because they are obviously places that should and did once have finds in you are going to find them quiet. People 30 years ago only did what you are doing now, poring over maps and books trying to cherry pick. They just got there before you did.

[Cumbrian Fox]

I think we all have these sites don't we?. Had a couple of hours this morning on land surrounding a Moat & Bailey and a church dating way way back. Total so far after 20 hours detecting this site (last season included) = Zilch Not so much as a bent pin. Hardly a signal to be had, not even iron. 20 minutes between digable signals, never heard such a quiet field, not even any pottery on it! Just goes to show all the research in the world and being able to get permission doesn't necessarily mean your going to find anything

At one point I thought something was wrong with my detector. So out came a hammered penny that I always carry with me, buried it a few inches and put my coil over it..... loud and clear - phew!! I think I will put this particular field at the bottom of my 'don't touch it with a barge pole' list. Unless I'm really really desperate of course

Those of you with decent Roman or Medieval fields consider yourself lucky, some of us are still looking and it ain't easy

I am having the same problem with furness abbey, I have managed to obtain all the fields surrounding the place and had nothing of any age.. had a few things 200 years old but anything earlier forget it.. Its very very frustrating when you know by fact it was the 2nd richest abbbey in England and was built during King Stephens short reign. I wont give in as I know somewhere near the workers who built the place must have stayed, and all the folk who must have visited.. Does your head in but patience pays

[Tony Hunt]

We got an abbey near us where I have found zilch all around its grounds, not even modern money. I put it down to the fact that the nuns who had been in that particular abbey for hundreds of years maybe upto somewhere in the last fifty years when they left never had any money, they didnt use money maybe. Nope we have had far more success searching out the places that are not obvious places if you see what I mean.
all the hotspots we have found have been in the middle of a field, well away from all the obvious places like hill forts and the like, people have already searched and cleared long ago.

[omegamike]

Our best ever field, better than the one I just spoke about took several visits of nothing before we started finding, since then we have had literally hundreds, maybe into the thousands of bronze romans, quite a few silvers, plus brooches and other artefacts.

That's what I find difficult to get my head round. I can go on a field and find plenty of non-ferrous but often there is a distinct lack of anything Celtic, Roman or Medieval. I know some fields are vast and it could take a while to find that 'hot spot' but it can be demoralising spending hour after hour, year after year finding very little except modern trash! How the devil you can go on a field several times and not get a sniff of anything Roman then all of a sudden your pulling them out of the ground like there's no tomorrow? I can only assume your detecting different part of the field until you come across them? There's still hope for me I'm sure but this season is predominantly fresh fields (like last season) and hopefully I will come across what I'm looking for. I must say I do reasonably well with the occasional Celtic, Roman or Medieval but I'm still looking for the dead cert field - hopefully it's just round the corner!

Thanks for the replies gents, it's given me a new boost of energy