In the mid-1970's, my parents bought me a Relco Metal Detector. It had a depth range of about 6 inches, no earphone jack, and you could barely hear the audio tones on the beach when it was windy. But I had a blast with it and I was hooked on detecting. Now I am primarily a beach hunter in the Orlando area. I hunt with the Minelab Excalibur about 80% of the time. I love the amphibian advantage of this machine and thus, the ability to walk into a good trough as I spot it. I also use a Minelab Sovereign GT when I want to cover more ground, and I recently bought a White's Dual Field Pulse. As a beach hunter, most of my finds are rings and jewelry. My best hunts have always been the short-focused tactical hunts. Longer hunts are useful for observing beach crowds and conditions, but the finds have not been as numerous. My most productive spots tend to be recurring troughs that tend to always be on the same spot of the same beach. I think of one trough as my "Diamond Rings Trough" because it has produced FIVE diamond rings in about 15 hunts! [split] My favorite find to date is a ring that is covered with diamonds. I had been hunting a popular beach and getting no signals at all. I had my Excalibur and I decided to pause for awhile to re-tune it. I slowed down my swings, turned up my volume and moved excruciatingly slow. Then, I started getting signals; LOTS of signals. They were faint bumps, but they were repeaters. The beach had been sanded in and by slowing down to the extreme, I was giving the detector more time to push to the limits of its capabilities. I dug up a few clad coins and then I heard another bump signals. I could not call it a whisper, in that it was not a faint signal, but more of a bump in the threshold tone. As I was scooping, nothing came up. It was still in the ground. Finally on the third full scoop in the same hole I was looking at the ring. There were so many diamonds I thought it had to be fake. But when I arrived home and put the needle of the diamond tester on it, it shot up to green; for REAL diamonds! I couldn't count the diamonds in it so I had to look at the bottom of the ring and count the settings; 51 in total. And I will never forget the value of trying something different when the hunt is not producing. The strangest thing I have ever found was a 2 foot shark wrapped in fishing line. It had a hook in its gills and the line was wrapped around its body with the weight on its tail. I calmly walked it into the beach, but since it was a big holiday weekend there were lots of kids and tourists there. The entire beach seemed to converge to take a look at this shark. I quietly slipped out of the circle and went back to water hunting. The lifeguards later told me that they buried the shark in the sand after all the tourists were done taking pictures with it. My advice to new detectorists would be: You have to love the hunt. Metal detecting is a wonderful hobby that is only self-limiting. If you don't have the patience required and a love of the hunt then you'll be frustrated and quit. I once went three months without a find, I was frustrated, but I never doubted my love for the hobby and pure enjoyment of detecting. I also knew that my guarantee of finding future gold was determined by how relentless I could be. It's like the saying that "A bad day fishing is better than a good day at work." The same thing goes for detecting. Be patient, enjoy the hunt, the finds will come. The biggest mistake I see new beach hunting detectorists make is going out, buying the top of the line water detector, and then skimping on the beach scoop. Get a good, long handled scoop. I have seen people on the beach with an Excalibur who are digging with a plastic cup, or tiny folding shovel. In regards to success, I do okay, but I would definitely not rank myself as a professional or even a heavy hitter. For the longest time I would only score a ring on occasion, until I met a very successful detectorist. I was very fortunate in that having a mentor increase my ability to find jewelry. The first question that every new-comer asks is "Where did you find that?" But I never ask that question anymore. I ask "What detector were you using?" "What techniques did you use?" "What settings did you use?" "What are you doing different, that other detectorists are not doing?" If I have a day where I find three rings, I consider that to be a great day. I was talking to my friend and he was disappointed that he had only found 11 rings. The amount of jewelry and treasure he has found boggles the mind and yet he is completely low key and doesn't even keep a ring count. It is very humbling to know that there are hunters like that, with real talent to consistently score insane gold and treasure finds. Kellyco has been wonderful and I have purchased four detectors from them. Whenever I have had any questions they have been very helpful and completely committed to my satisfaction with my new detector purchase. I was also fortunate enough to do some water hunting with Tony and Wanda. It is obvious why they know their detectors so well; they field test them and are enthusiastic hunters that love the hobby. One really cool thing about Kellyco is that they rent detectors. I really like this because you can rent many different types of detectors to see how you like them before you buy. Also if you are buying online, the staff is extremely good at asking you questions that will point you toward the best detector for your needs.

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