Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of the Treasure Beaches Report.
An old map believed to mark the spot where German soldiers hid treasure worth millions of dollars during World War II sparked the imagination of amateur treasure hunters in the Netherlands this week.
Armed with metal detectors and shovels, groups wandered through the fields surrounding rural Ommeren in the east of the country after the map was made public by the Dutch National Archive on Tuesday.
The archive said the map was believed to indicate where Nazi soldiers had hidden four large boxes filled with diamonds, rubies, gold, silver and all sorts of jewelry which they had looted after an explosion at a bank in August 1944...
The research file which held the map was released this week as the maximum period of 75 years during which it could be held confidential had lapsed...
Here is the link for more about the treasure which has attracted a lot of detectorists to the hunt.
Old Nazi map sparks treasure hunt in the Netherlands (nbcnews.com)
Thanks to Norbert B. for that link.
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Yesterday I listed a number of techniques that can be used in addition to metal detecting, Today I'll talk about one that I started using just last year.
A lot of finds are made in ploughed fields. Many paid hunts take place in ploughed fields. There is good reason for that. Ploughing can expose old things or bring them closer to the surface.
Experiments were conducted by archaeologists to determine how ploughing displaces objects. That is the kind of experimentation I like to do myself, but I was somewhat surprised that archaeologists would do it because ploughed fields are disturbed and much of the contextual information has been destroyed. Anyhow here is an excerpt from a summary of a report telling what they learned.
These tests sought to answer questions such as; if a site is located in a plough zone, how far will the artifacts be displaced from their original location. What percentage of artifacts can be expected to be found while field walking? What direction will the artifacts be scattered during the ploughing process, and does ploughing completely destroy a sites integrity?...
One experiment involved systematically placing small painted lithic artifacts 10 - 15 centimeters below the surface and then having the field ploughed several times. After ploughing and rain, they searched the ploughed field. Less than 10% of the artifacts were recovered in the plough zone. So less than 10% of the planted lithic artifacts were brought to the surface where they were seen. A metal detector would undoubtedly locate a much larger percent of metallic targets in a ploughed field.
Another brief excerpt of the report follows.
Cowen and Odell’s experiment showed that while the rate of recovery in a plough zone can fluctuate by 5-6 %, there are factors that influence the recovery rate of artifacts (Cowen and Odell 1987: 461). For example, artifact recovery rate is controlled by the mean length and width of an artifact. Furthermore, the size or weight of an artifact tends to be affected by repeated ploughing. The length and width of an artifact seems to be more of a factor in appearing on the surface of a plough zone rather than weight and thickness (Cowen and Odell 1987: 461). This result has been supported by Frink’s study of plough zones in 1984 (Frink 1984: 359).
So the surface area of the artifact influenced the recovery rate. No surprise that a larger surface area made the artifacts easier to see.
Objects become smaller as they were chipped or broken by ploughing. Again, no surprise, but worth noting. The surface area of the artifacts had more to do with items appearing on the surface than the artifact's weight or thickness. The surface area made objects easier to see, but did it also help them remain on the surface rather than sinking into the soil after rain?
Where have you heard anything like that before? It seems that the factors that determine how deep items remain in ploughed soil are similar to those that determine how deep items will be found in disturbed sand. Of course, this is all very general and crude, but it seems to be consistent with what I've said before.
Of course, there are a lot of variables that weren't addressed in the experiments. Ploughing can be done in different ways, depths, and angles and besides ploughing, there could be harrowing, and the wheels of the tractors compact the ground, etc.
Another excerpt of the report follows.
In addition to the reduction in size of a sub-surface archaeological site in a plough zone, damage occurs to the sub-surface artifacts when ploughing occurs (Spandl et al 2009:5). Other factors that influence the magnitude of destruction to a sub-surface plough zone are the applied force of ploughing, the load of the plough, the depth of the buried artifacts, the strength of the soil and the amount of moisture that is trapped beneath the surface (Spandl et al 2009:5)...
Nonetheless, in my opinion the experiments produced some useful information and is the type of experimentation that I enjoy.Here is the link if you want to read more about the experiments.
Just last summer I discovered an effective new technique for finding bottles, and it is a little bit like ploughing. While I mostly find surface bottles by sight, there were times when very few or no bottles were visible. I found that I could find bottles buried under the sand by dragging a rake as I walked.
People often use metal probes to locate buried bottles. One danger of using a probe is the possibility of breaking any bottle the probe hits. And you have to hit the bottle to know it is there. Probing takes a lot of time and covers little area. It takes a lot of time and effort.
If you drag a rake through the sand, you will hear when the rake grazes a piece of glass. It will make a sound that is distinctly different than the sound made by wood or a rock or something else being scraped. Occasionally a hard smooth object might fool you, but usually you can tell when a tine scrapes a piece of buried glass.
It isn't exactly ploughing, but it is similar. The purpose isn't to turn soil and expose artifacts. The bottles are exposed by sound rather than being made visible. Use all of your senses when you hunt.
Raking has proven effective when there are bottles buried just under the surface. Of course, if there are no bottles or the bottles are deeply buried, it won't work. Just drag the rake as you walk. There can be a little fine tuning to the process. You want the rake to penetrate the sand just an inch or two. You can add a little weight to the rake, but if drags too deep, it will be harder to pull, and results probably won't be improved much by the little extra depth. You can cover a lot more area by raking than probing.
I'm not just telling you about a specific method. I'm also suggesting that you can come up with new methods or techniques that will add to your finds. I believe there is always another, and better, way. Don't get stuck in the rut of always doing the same thing and never trying anything new.
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The surf remains small on the Treasure Coast. We are having some big tides, but the east winds are diminishing the effects of the low tides.
Good hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net