A Second Open letter to:
The Archaeology Forum
taf@archaeologists.net
Dear Sirs,
Artefact Hunting using “deep” metal detectors
A year ago we wrote to you expressing concern that the new Minelab GPX 5000 was able to detect small targets 17- 22 inches down, far below most disturbed plough soils. Since then the original product tester, Neil Jones, has commented on the Heritage Journal: “I can now get 24 inches on the same small coins as i know the machine inside out and a lot lot deeper on the larger finds”
It was said there was no reason for concern because the price of £4,500 would mean very few would be sold. However, you should know that another machine, the Blisstool LTC64 V3 has just been launched amidst claims that it too can detect small objects at 24” but with a price of only £558. It seems to us that this machine and others that may follow herald an imminent deterioration in the situation since most detectorists will be able to afford them and, given the hobby-wide obsession with depth, will do so. This leaves the Code of Practice request to “work” only within the depth of ploughing looking completely unrealistic as a strategy for protecting undisturbed archaeology. As a well-known, highly responsible detectorist has commented on the Journal:
“As far as the technological developments of detectors on the whole, they’re heading for a bloody nightmare as far as I can see. The current top-end machines are more than capable of detecting finds beneath the plough-pan and the vast majority of detectorist would not walk away from a good signal that deep….”
For many years the official stance has been to tell the public the man in the ploughed field with the metal detector isn’t doing much harm as the soil has been “disturbed”. That has been a controversial claim to say the least given the statistical probability that he won’t be reporting what he is finding. But if he is now holding one of the new ultra-deep machines the claim is simply untenable and it is not right to give landowners the impression that the man will probably resist digging into the archaeological layers despite getting frequent signals from them. In truth he probably won’t – and in our view the official line should not imply to the public that he will. We should be glad to hear if you have any thoughts on this issue. Is seems to us that not reacting while the situation worsens incrementally sale by sale is not a course that should be taken.
Yours faithfully
Heritage Action
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Update 2nd April 2012
Readers may be puzzled by how few mentions of the Blisstool LTC64 V3 there are on detectorists’ forums considering how powerful it seems to be and how depth is such an obsession amongst detectorists. We were equally puzzled by the fact there seemed to be a lot fewer mentions of it after our article was published than before – for instance, where had the Detecting Wales thread titled “Blisstool LTC64 V3 The Worlds Deepest Detector?” gone to?
Mystery solved by this little forum exchange on Detecting Wales last week:
DavyR: “I can’t seem to find some of the Blisstool posts”
Rjm: “They have been taken off by the site administrator. I’ll PM you with the details you want.”
Taken off by the site administrator. Who, strangely, has left this posting untouched – a review of the Blisstool recently posted that is astonishingly withering about how useless it is! (Now also removed!)
It would be hard to imagine a more resounding confirmation that the new generation of ultra deep detectors is a significant threat to undisturbed archaeology and that PAS’s Oh-so-conservation-minded partners know it is. But will it be heeded? After all, who are listened to and back-slapped, some ordinary members of the public who are concerned about conserving heritage or PAS’s “partners” that dig it up for themselves? PAS has spent millions of taxpayers funds on sending Finds Liaison Officers to befriend and praise detectorists at their digs or club meetings but not a penny on attending any of Heritage Action’s Megameets!
Update 1 May 2012
American detectorist Dick Stout of “Stout Standards” obviously hasn’t signed up to the Blisstool silence of his British counterparts. In his piece “How much is enough” he has voiced fears that “depth” has gone too far – “Depth has always been the most important feature, but now I wonder if it continues to be the ultimate criteria, will we even have a place to use it?” He was thinking that digging deep holes in parks could result in loss of permission but the applicability of his words to the British context is inescapable. Of course people shouldn’t be allowed to metal detect in places where their machines are operating deep into archaeological layers. But what will the Establishment do? Politely request them not to? “Of course you can shin up a tree to look at Ospreys’ eggs, we know you’ll leave them there. If the farmer has doubts, tell him you have our approval”.
________________________________
Update 14 November 2012
A Third Open letter to:
The Archaeology Forum
taf@archaeologists.net
Dear Sirs,
Artefact Hunting using “deep” metal detectors
It is now eight months since we wrote to you pointing out that the Minelab GPX 5000 (cost, £4,500) had now been joined by the Blisstool LTC64 V3 (cost £558) in the deep seeking category with both being said to be capable of detecting small objects at a depth of 24 inches. Our concern was that depth plus affordability represented a major threat to archaeological deposits lying below plough level, one which the Code of Responsible Detecting doesn’t properly address. “Don’t dig below plough level” doesn’t reflect the new reality. The following forum postings made last month serve to show that the problem is no longer theoretical but current:
“the performance of [the Blisstool] against price is amazing, looking for another machine at the moment so will be giving it a lot of consideration, it looks like Blisstool could revolutionise the hobby.”
“I have found the Bliss most outstanding for the deep searching for the remnants of scattered hoards and where a field has been very productive in the past but the plough is no longer getting down to where other coins and artifacts lie there undisturbed I have opened back up some of my long left sites where I had presumed I had cleaned out and left as worked out”
As we said in our previous letter, we should be glad to hear if you have any thoughts on this issue. It seems to us that not reacting while the situation worsens incrementally sale by sale is not a course that should be taken.]
P.S ………
Lest it should be thought we are advocating this matter should be dealt with by means of an amendment to the Code, we aren’t! There is little point in replacing one code that most detectorists ignore with an amended one that most detectorists will also ignore. No. The only way this technological threat to the archaeological resource can be addressed is for you to make sure a simple message gets to every landowner in the country:
“Please do not allow any metal detecting on your land using the Minelab GPX 5000 or the Blisstool LTC64 V3. These can reach far below the plough levels and into undisturbed archaeology and there is therefore no responsible reason for them being brought onto your land.”
It can be anticipated that this might be held up as an unfriendly act towards detectorists, and not just by detectorists. We prefer to see any opposition to such a move as an unfriendly act towards archaeology.
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More Heritage Action views on metal detecting and artefact collecting
_________________________________________________________
The Heritage Journal 
19 comments
Comments feed for this article
07/05/2012 at 09:16
supernova
Reblogged this on Digging History and commented:
14/11/2012 at 11:15
Paul Barford
Not much of a “comment” though, is it? What IS your own opinion of what these “depth advantage” machines mean for the artefact hunting hobby?
http://detectingblackpool.wordpress.com/2012/06/27/1513/
So I see you suggesting “we” should discuss the issues “between” us, so what is your viewpoint? What is the issue with the effects of the use of depth advantage detectors from the metal detectorists’ point of view?
10/03/2013 at 10:20
Hugo Falck
The GPX`s are constructed for golden nugget hunting and with no ferrous discrim, useless for common detecting in the fields. People who use them for relichunting to get finds under ploughlevel are trophyhunters with no respect for archeological context, theyre as bad as the criminal nighhawkers.
The reason why many forums have deleted posts about the Blisstool its cause it have been hyped and doesnt perform anything near it when you recieve it. Its to help people from wasting their money on crap machines!
Your friends in HAPPAH, France i believeit is easy to fool… They refered to the “Nokta Golden King” who are a wll known scam when they tried to warn Swedish National Heritage Board about “new detectot tech!”
So silly…
10/03/2013 at 14:07
heritageaction
“People who use them for relichunting to get finds under ploughlevel are trophyhunters with no respect for archeological context”
Interesting. Does that include prominent detectorists Gary Brun, Gordon Heritage and Neil Jones and all the ordinary club detectorists they demonstrated and recommended the GPX 5000 to? (See Youtube)
Come off it.
11/03/2013 at 05:33
Hugo Falck
“……and all the ordinary club detectorists”
Cant remember seeing others than the MLOTV crew !?
– Relax! First of all most detectorist would never dig deeper than ploughlevel even if they could, our machines are runned at frequensies mostly ranging from 7,5 to 18 kHz with capabilities to pick up finds down to 8 inches for most items with majority of finds in the 0-4 inches range.
Biased and with no knowlegde about “tecting and detectorist your making a fool of yourselves!
11/03/2013 at 17:11
heritageaction
Well if you think ordinary club detectorists aren’t using them you haven’t been paying attention on the forums!
Basically you are saying what lots of detectorists deliberately decided to say 2.5 years ago (see Update 31/10/10 on https://heritageaction.wordpress.com/2010/10/30/metal-detecting-minelab-announces-a-major-and-disastrous-technological-advance/ ) with the only difference being that you are 2.5 years late so it may not be us that are loooking foolish here!
Incidentally, if you only bother digging down to 8 inches and no-one uses these machines anyway then you will have no objection whatsoever to them being banned.
Will you?
12/03/2013 at 08:32
Hugo Falck
Why ban a gold prospecting machine? It`s banned to dig underneath ploughlevel isnt it? Would you ban all hunting rifles or motorcycles cause theyre dangerous in the wrong hands?
When that you tube video was released most detectorists didnt like it, i know, at least up here in Scandinavia! To dig deeper than ploughlevel are taboo, and on top of it, how careless and brutal they worked the shovel .
If you joined a metal detecting excavation you would see that no one digs that kind of holes, novices maybe, but never any experienced!
Most people like to scan the upper level soil, its safe, and you dont spend too much time digging. Most deeper signals, who the machine cant ID are just iron trash anyway.
I dont think the deep seeking machines will be of any big trouble, they are very expensive and not very comfy to do field searching with, we`ve got smooth machines already who can find tiny objects among iron, theyre not very deep, but perform very well in the ploughlevel, and thats what we do, recover objects who have lost their protection.
12/03/2013 at 09:11
heritageaction
“To dig deeper than ploughlevel are taboo”
Perhaps metal detectorists in Scandanavia are more educated than many of the British ones but if you believe a lot of British artefact hunters don’t dig below disturbed plough soil if they get a signal you are very mistaken.
But let us pretend that they don’t, even though they do. In that case your great anxiety to ensure deep machines remain legal even though you say they would be expensive, awkward to use, deeply unpopular and now – useless – is highly suspicious. And you tell us WE are making fools of ourselves!
12/03/2013 at 09:54
Hugo Falck
“But let us pretend that they don’t, even though they do. In that case your great anxiety to ensure deep machines remain legal even though you say they would be expensive, awkward to use, deeply unpopular and now – useless – is highly suspicious. And you tell us WE are making fools of ourselves!”
You know, what its buildt for, goldnuggethunting… Thats one of the hobbys niches, ¨totally harmless!
Happily quite few archies i know are as paranoid as you guys in Heritage action and HAPPAH, some of them even detect themselves, and with your silly, absurd “Artefact Erosion Counters” none of us will ever be taking you guys serious!
Your problems are in your own imagination, i refuse to believe you have any experience with detectorists IRL, and the whole environment of detectorists are provoked by you, HAPPAH and Paul Barford cause no one of you are being honest, with lies and fabrication you try to do your best to draw a picture of metal detectorists as criminal looters, all tarred with the same brush of lies!
12/03/2013 at 10:18
heritageaction
You know, what its built for, goldnuggethunting… Thats one of the hobbys niches, ¨totally harmless!“
Yes but there ain’t no gold nugget hunting going on in Britain! Saying that using it for what it isn’t used for is “totally harmless” is ludicrous
Do you know the expression “flogging a dead horse”? Enough!
PS – “none of us will ever be taking you guys serious!”
Fortunately, the Artefact Erosion Counter isn’t for the attention of artefact hunters, but for everybody else.
12/03/2013 at 10:25
Hugo Falck
I dont know if the Brits go nuggethunting in the UK, some do here in Norway even if its not exatcly Klondyke or Australia. But some go abroad to detect during holidays, Arizona or Oz the most.
Its not the machines who are the problem, same with guns, understand?
12/03/2013 at 10:35
heritageaction
“I dont know if the Brits go nuggethunting in the UK“
Then why mention it as a reason for them to be used here?!
“But some go abroad to detect during holidays, Arizona or Oz the most.“
Fine. That’s no reason for those machines to be legal to use over here. Some use guns in Arizona no doubt but fortunately we have strict laws that prohibit the use of guns here.
Why is that so hard to understand?
12/03/2013 at 15:48
Hugo Falck
“Why is that so hard to understand?”
For me not knowing if anyone detect for gold in the UK doesnt mean nobody does.
Took me few seconds to find out there are gold in Falmouth Cornwall,Hopes Nose Torquay, The Forest of Dean, Parys Mountain, Anglesea, The Northern Pennines and Pembroke-shire.
Its already forbidden to dig deeper than ploughlevel so it doesnt make sense to forbid a gold prospecting machine just because it may get that deep signals.
It would be stupid to forbid motorcycles just cause they may run faster than any speedlimit! Wouldnt it?
12/03/2013 at 17:19
heritageaction
“Its already forbidden to dig deeper than ploughlevel so it doesnt make sense to forbid a gold prospecting machine just because it may get that deep signals.”
You clearly know nothing about the UK:
1.) It is NOT forbidden to dig deeper than plough level in Britain. That is why these machines are so damaging.
2.) As you said yourself earlier: “People who use them for relichunting to get finds under ploughlevel are trophyhunters with no respect for archeological context.” I agree. They are. But in Britain they are LEGAL trophyhunters with no respect for archaeological context and there are quite a few of them. You see? Damaging the archaeological layers is legal here and you want to arm those people that have no sense of good behaviour with GPX 5000s!
The dead horse has now been flogged quite enough thank you.
13/03/2013 at 05:40
Hugo Falck
1.) It is NOT forbidden to dig deeper than plough level in Britain. That is why these machines are so damaging.
Have to admit i didnt know that, took it for granted, in both Norway and Denmark its illegal to dig objects in original context and i believe 99% of the metal detectorists respect that.
Criminals isnt stopped by laws and regulations itselves, up here i think maybe its the metal detectorists who are the best “watchdogs”.
What you call flogging a dead horse i would call plain stupid, if you want to ban a special kind of metal detector, which you say by yourselves, dont break the law by using to get to dig deeper than ploughlevel…!
Wouldnt it be more clever to ban digging this deep?
British Nighthawkers/looters laugh us in the face on the internet, cause of the small fees they get when being caught, “name & shame” both in detecing forums and in the media doesnt seem to stop them, must be very lucrative being a criminal in England.
What they do have very litte in common with our hobby, point your cannons the right direction, should be tougher penalties, and seized equipment for those criminals, but leave us hobbyists alone!
Thank you
13/03/2013 at 06:24
heritageaction
” It is NOT forbidden to dig deeper than plough level in Britain. That is why these machines are so damaging.”
Have to admit i didnt know that, took it for granted, in both Norway and Denmark its illegal to dig objects in original context and i believe 99% of the metal detectorists respect that.
Well there you are, Paul Barford and we have a point. British lack of law about that is unforgivable. That is one of the things we are calling for – a law that you already have and agree with in Norway!
“Wouldnt it be more clever to ban digging this deep?”
Of course it would. That’s exactly what we want. But the damage is happening daily and banning the machines is easier and quicker to get through parliament.
” point your cannons the right direction, should be tougher penalties, and seized equipment for those criminals, but leave us hobbyists alone!”
No. Detectorists, archaeologists, police and government all point their cannons at nighthawks. They are wrong. There is no law requiring 99.8% of finds to be reported (more unforgivable British lack of law) and sadly most detectorists don’t report most of their finds. Since there are many thousands more legal non-reporters than nighthawkers the damage they do in terms of loss of archaeological knowledge is far, far greater. It is to those thousands of legal non-reporters that we and Paul direct our fire.
So you see – we are not fools, we are not anti-metal detecting obsessives, we are simply trying to point out how damaging the British system is. The best thing you can do is go on British metal detecting forums and tell them to throw all non-reporters out. Try it. You’ll be called anti-metal detecting and a fool!
16/03/2013 at 09:27
heritageaction
It would be nice Hugo if just occasionally a detectorist said yes, I see you have a hell of a point, instead of disappearing once it became obvious that we do.
What now for you? You came here with completely wrong information and having had that proved to you what will you do? Go back to back-slapping non-reporters who are collectively causing vastly moe damage than nighthawks? See, that’s why regulation is needed. Detectorists don’t want to acknowledge the truth so reform will never come from them.
01/08/2013 at 00:12
Bob
Interesting read, especially the comments.
Not sure I entirely agree with your debating methods, you were getting your views across quite well up to a certain point.
Surely it would be more productive to try and actively engage the UK metal detectorists without going straight for the jugular from the onset and instead try to educate them?
Maybe this is something you could do on the many forums that are operating. You could create a thread on each of the forums inviting discussion (not a slanging match) on the pit falls of the current legislation and why it needs to change…
My apologies if you are already doing this.
Also I see from your main site that you organise meet ups, would it not be worthwhile trying to organise a meeting every year with metal detectorists and PAS for open discussion?
Keep up the good work (I hope this does not come across as overly critical)
Kind regards
Bob
01/08/2013 at 02:22
heritageaction
Hi Bob,
The taxpayer has been paying £1.5 million a year for 15 years to maintain a team of archaeologists to engage with and educate detectorists. Most detectorists don’t report most of their finds.