Metal Detecting in Trashy Areas

After years and years of people pounding all the easy sites to death, good solid signals are getting harder and harder to come by. Does this mean that all the good finds are all gone? HECK NO!!!! It just means that you have to slow way down almost to a snails pace in order to metal detect. I’ve found most of my old coins in super trashy areas, you know those places where you just picked up your detector and walked right on past. Well you weren’t the only one, I am guilty of doing this too as I tried my luck trying to find easier targets. Well now I know better, the trashy spots are loaded with old coins, the trick is you simply have to slow way down with your swing so you can listen for any good hits.

The problem is that your metal detector doesn’t have enough time to relay the message to you that there’s a good signal right under your feet when it’s catching 10 different targets every sweep. Now if some trash is too close to the coin target you’ll probably get what’s called an “iffy signal”, which is just your display bouncing around and the sound will go from coin to garbage. No 2 iffy signals sound or display alike but after awhile you will be able to tell the difference between a good and bad iffy signal. When you get a one of these signals what you have to do is try to isolate the good signal from the bad. To do this, try detecting in a circle all the way around the target. If you can lock onto the coin signal great!!! If not then there are a few more tricks that you can try.

First what you can do is a technique called “twitching”, that is when you move from a snail’s pace swing to a super short fast swing (swing your coil over the target in short 3-5 inch swings super fast). A lot of times using this technique will either clear up my signal and let me know if it’s good or bad. But if your still in doubt take your foot and stomp 2 or 3 times on the target (I was told this a few years ago and I thought it was a joke but sometimes it really works). And finally if all else fails just dig the target to see what was giving your metal detector such a weird reading.

Now if you metal detect in trashy areas you will dig a good amount of garbage but usually it pays off in the end. I hope this can help anybody that might be having trouble finding old coins due to “hunted out” sites. If you have any other tips or tricks that you would like to add please feel free to add them as a comment below. Thanks for reading and happy hunting…