Denmark hunt IV: Zot's ugly duckling - meet the ugly duck!
Zot
Posts: 825 ✭✭✭
Hello 
Out we go again in Denmark (Feb 2) – despite the chilly winter weather.
The weekend before there was so much snow that detecting could only be done at a salt-water beach, but this week saw a few days of slightly warmer weather, causing some of it to melt
It got chillier again during the weekend, but there was only about 2 inches of snow in the woods, which I figured would be OK.
I headed out to the same area as before. In addition to the fort and the nearby beach, this area has a large park/forest. When I was detecting on the beach, a guy suggested I should also try the forest, as it’s an area people have “walked through for hundreds of years”
Today I first quickly checked the beach: very high tide.
Finds there were few and far between. I picked up a few modern coins that were in extremely crappy condition despite their young age….
…I thought I’d try the forest instead..
Here’s an open, “park” part of it that. Note the dog on the far right.
The park was old with plenty of massive trees. Ones like this were typical
And here’s an even bigger one. Compare to the length of the detector!
The very first signal I got was a pulltab signal 4” ‘down’, in this case 4” from snow level… As I had to swing the coil on top of the snow, I tried to squeeze every bit of gain from the detector in order to still get good depth
I first cut a plug of snow and tossed it aside. Snow is a great insulator, and the ground underneath was easy to dig.
Ha! Zot earns a round metal disc! (the round object in the snow)
Unfortunately this was a relatively modern one (mid 1900’s 10 öre)
I then found this bottle opener. Being of this type, it’s not particularly old of course, but looks quite nice and appears to be made of copper
This was partly a prospecting hunt for warmer days ahead, so I walked around quite a bit, which ate into my detecting time. I got several nice signals with good depth to them (7"+) that got me excited, but I didn’t get anything good from those.
On the opposite side of the park I got a nice signal, again only four inches down. As I had totally maxed out my gain and volume, trying to hear those deep signals through the snow, it rang in my ears like a rifle shot!
Another coin! I must have breathed on the camera lens when I took it from my pocket. It was quite chilly by now (ca 18 F).
As soon as I got my paws on the coin, a tiny piece broke off from the edge. My first thought was that it was a lousy WW2-era zinc coin. However, upon closer inspection, this proved not to be the case – the piece breaking off was only part of thick layer of crust surrounding the actual coin
By now it was getting dark so I headed home
The coin was unidentifiable at first, just a round black disc with no features whatsoever. The layer of crust was so thick and hard that I first did a very quick electrolysis to loosen it up some. After this, the coin was partly black, partly green. I was, however, able to identify it as a 2 øre coin of the type struck from 1874 to 1906.
This made me more careful – potatoes would be the next cleaning step
The coin started responding well to the potato treatment. But there was a lot of “green death” to get rid of… Here is a part of it after a couple of potato rounds..
This coin type has a ridiculously small date near the rim. Halfway through the potatoes I could see “18”, but it looked like the two last digits were gone (fortunately I was wrong here)
So here it is, a Danish 2 øre 1874 , the first year for this type. I shot it at an angle with some hard light on it to show the design (or what’s left of it) a bit better.
In the obverse picture, you can see part of the date near the rim, at about 7:30 (“87” shows best). I had to play with the angles a bit to get a decent picture of the full date..
The last digit of the date is very faint (nobody sneeze or it might be gone!
), but it’s there alright!
The entire coin feels quite fragile, it could probably easily be snapped in half.
This was the confirmation I needed - I’ll definitely be back to this site for more!
Happy hunting!
-Z
Out we go again in Denmark (Feb 2) – despite the chilly winter weather.
The weekend before there was so much snow that detecting could only be done at a salt-water beach, but this week saw a few days of slightly warmer weather, causing some of it to melt
It got chillier again during the weekend, but there was only about 2 inches of snow in the woods, which I figured would be OK.
I headed out to the same area as before. In addition to the fort and the nearby beach, this area has a large park/forest. When I was detecting on the beach, a guy suggested I should also try the forest, as it’s an area people have “walked through for hundreds of years”
Today I first quickly checked the beach: very high tide.
Finds there were few and far between. I picked up a few modern coins that were in extremely crappy condition despite their young age….
…I thought I’d try the forest instead..
Here’s an open, “park” part of it that. Note the dog on the far right.
The park was old with plenty of massive trees. Ones like this were typical
And here’s an even bigger one. Compare to the length of the detector!
The very first signal I got was a pulltab signal 4” ‘down’, in this case 4” from snow level… As I had to swing the coil on top of the snow, I tried to squeeze every bit of gain from the detector in order to still get good depth
I first cut a plug of snow and tossed it aside. Snow is a great insulator, and the ground underneath was easy to dig.
Ha! Zot earns a round metal disc!
(the round object in the snow)Unfortunately this was a relatively modern one (mid 1900’s 10 öre)
I then found this bottle opener. Being of this type, it’s not particularly old of course, but looks quite nice and appears to be made of copper
This was partly a prospecting hunt for warmer days ahead, so I walked around quite a bit, which ate into my detecting time. I got several nice signals with good depth to them (7"+) that got me excited, but I didn’t get anything good from those.
On the opposite side of the park I got a nice signal, again only four inches down. As I had totally maxed out my gain and volume, trying to hear those deep signals through the snow, it rang in my ears like a rifle shot!
Another coin! I must have breathed on the camera lens when I took it from my pocket. It was quite chilly by now (ca 18 F).
As soon as I got my paws on the coin, a tiny piece broke off from the edge. My first thought was that it was a lousy WW2-era zinc coin. However, upon closer inspection, this proved not to be the case – the piece breaking off was only part of thick layer of crust surrounding the actual coin
By now it was getting dark so I headed home
The coin was unidentifiable at first, just a round black disc with no features whatsoever. The layer of crust was so thick and hard that I first did a very quick electrolysis to loosen it up some. After this, the coin was partly black, partly green. I was, however, able to identify it as a 2 øre coin of the type struck from 1874 to 1906.
This made me more careful – potatoes would be the next cleaning step
The coin started responding well to the potato treatment. But there was a lot of “green death” to get rid of… Here is a part of it after a couple of potato rounds..
This coin type has a ridiculously small date near the rim. Halfway through the potatoes I could see “18”, but it looked like the two last digits were gone (fortunately I was wrong here)
So here it is, a Danish 2 øre 1874 , the first year for this type. I shot it at an angle with some hard light on it to show the design (or what’s left of it) a bit better.
In the obverse picture, you can see part of the date near the rim, at about 7:30 (“87” shows best). I had to play with the angles a bit to get a decent picture of the full date..
The last digit of the date is very faint (nobody sneeze or it might be gone!
), but it’s there alright! The entire coin feels quite fragile, it could probably easily be snapped in half.
This was the confirmation I needed - I’ll definitely be back to this site for more!
Happy hunting!
-Z
Minelab: GPX 5000, Excalibur II, Explorer SE. White's: MXT, PI Pro
0
Comments
keep it up
Jeff
or should I say I ACCUMULATE!
I also dabble with the darkside
Ive recently gotten more into currency, especially modern star notes
Great post Zot, thanks for taking us along for the ride. I love old, huge trees like those
because my mind races thinking about the people that sat below them many decades ago.
(and of course you were able to provide the obligatory "ZOT animal pic" too
Congrats on the oldie. That place looks like a great spot to hunt... relax, unwind, and
get away from the curious public. Looking forward to seeing more oldies come out of
there once the snow starts to melt!
Congrats on the conservation job on that coin- it looks like you did a good job, especially considering what a challenge that must have been.