My find of the month is rather different than most, although I’ve found some items that are very impressive the main thing about my find is a lesson to be learnt. I live in a small rural town at the bottom of the South Island of New Zealand, fewer than 400 people live here, the nearest city to me is over 100km’s away and it’s a small city with a population of around 50,000 people. The entire province has around 90,000 people. The region was first settled in 1856 with a small town forming and by 1859 there was 1000 inhabitants, that small town is now the small city with around 50,000 people about an hour’s drive from where I’m located. I started detecting just over a year ago, I bought an entry level detector, then another and another which I quickly grew out of or just didn’t find right for me and then decided I may as well get as good as it can get then I won’t have to change detectors again and I can grow into my new detector rather than grow out of it. I’d been reading a lot of forums at the time and most advanced users were using Minelab detectors, so I upgraded myself to the Minelab Equinox 800 which came highly recommended on the forums. I found it an absolute pleasure to use, so easy to operate and worked in every type of environment I could throw at it. The thing I liked the most about it was how accurate it’s Target ID’s are and the great depth it can achieve. I never really bothered detecting around my local area, the small population really put me off thinking there would be very little to find around here, instead driving hours each time I wanted to do any detecting. One day I figured I may as well give the local football field a try, I was more wanting to try a few things and practice on my detector rather than do any serious detecting. I thought if I’m lucky I may be able to find a coin or two. This football field is basically abandoned, it hasn’t been used properly in many years, I've since asked locals who have lived in the town long enough which have indicated its prime was really about 50 to 100 years ago when the town was a railway stop on the route to the sea port and the areas city from the farms inland. The trains no longer exist, the tracks are long gone. After switching on my Equinox and walking along it was only a few meters and I had my first coin, an old 1908 Penny, this continued, I walked across the field in a random way and was digging up coins all over the place. I went back day after day, any time I had some free time and it was the same thing…. Coins over and over again. I often couldn’t walk more than 10 steps and had another coin. This was truly unbelievable. A place with such a small population the people had lost so many coins. I wasn’t finding many modern coins at all, over and over again I was digging old pennys and silver coins, often from the UK and Australia as prior to 1933 New Zealand had no currency of it’s own, British coins were legal tender from 1858 and Australian coins were often accepted as currency at the time, In the early 1800’s right after the first European settlers arrived in the country any currency was accepted and was valued on it’s weight and metal content. New Zealand is a very young country. This field turned into a coin history of New Zealand, I found many old British coins with the oldest being 1866, the population in the nearby city was only just over 1,000 people at around that time and had only been settled 7 years before. The first inhabitants in my town where coin was found arrived in 1862. A truly remarkable find and a real piece of the town’s history. I named the football field Cointopia, going back day after day harvesting coins. I was recovering a lot of silver coins, many of the early British ones are sterling silver, along with early New Zealand silver coins from the 1930+ to 1950’s which are 50% silver, many are quite valuable finds and a lot of them are rare dates. Many of the coins were quite deep, I guess due to how long they've been in the soil, averaging between 20 and 30cm’s in depth with some even deeper, the Equinox was absolutely perfect for the task with it’s 15x12” large coil, the Target ID’s on the coins were often spot on, I was regularly very confident of the coin I was about to dig up. The Equinox was an absolute pleasure to use. Then one day I had a very unusual Target ID and tone come up, ID was constantly a solid 34. It sounded very nice and the first time I’d had an ID like this. Out popped what I can only describe as a bucket list coin, a 1918 British Half crown, 14 grams of sterling silver in great condition. I was fortunate enough on a later date to find a 1933 New Zealand 50% silver Half Crown also, a great find considered to be a rare date, it was the first year NZ made its own Half Crown. I also found a 1930’s Sterling Silver Charles Horner Mickey Mouse Brooch from UK in great condition, a quite rare and valuable find. One of the more unusual treasures I found was a WWII US Navy Pin Amico Sterling Silver Anchor Shield Eagle, Marked Sterling 10k Amico, weighing 10.2 grams, unfortunately one of the wings had broken off it and I'm yet to recover that wing piece although I'm sure I will. A United States solder perhaps had a game of football on this field and lost it during the match. More incredible history of this field. Probably my most notable find on the field was a 1910 Perth/Australian minted Gold Sovereign which is 0.9167 Gold. A find that is too good to be true, it does appear to be real although I’m yet to take it to be tested as I know fakes of these coins do exist with lower grade gold produced in the 1970’s which is still within the dates of lost coins I’ve been finding. Many of the coins are rare dates, and some quite valuable, one of the old Australian pennies is worth hundreds and many of the silver coins hold good value. I’ve now been going to this field a number of days and I feel I’m not even a quarter done, there will likely be more valuable treasures to find and I’m certain hundreds more coins to come. What a great hobby metal detecting can be unearthing history and with the Equinox 800 and its super accurate target ID’s it’s a real pleasure to use. I’ve also found over $400 in semi modern but still current currency gold NZ $1 and $2 coins, mostly dated from the early 1990’s which my 8-year-old daughter has claimed for her money box, and some she’s spent already so they’ve missed being included in my photo 😉 I’m sure she’ll turn out to be a mighty fine detectorist. I’ve already given her a Minelab Go-Find detector to get her started. The Equinox has almost become an extension of my arm and if anyone ever needs to find me, they know where to look, I’ll be at Cointopia - the local football field. The lesson…. Nowhere should be discounted, treasures can be found in the most unlikely places. I was never a coin collector before, I guess now I am!
Simon – Southland, New Zealand
