Baby Beach in Orange County, CA

[TheFrood]

Hit a massively popular beach in Orange County, CA on Saturday night at low tide. Was walking around in the dark with my headlamp and found that the backlight feature on the Legend is really nice.

Didn't find much (it's a beach in a harbor so really not much wave action at all). Some trash, pull tabs, and $0.36 in clad. Oh, and two hotwheels. Only detected the exposed wet sand and I know that I didn't hit it 100% as well. I think the dry sand would have been a better bet for this one since that's where the adults tend to set-up but it was getting late and they kick people out of the parking lots at 10PM.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

Your best bet is to wait for big swells, onshore winds, and high tides to combine (preferably @ 2 or more back-to-back consecutive days), to erode the beach. Then look for cuts, slopes, etc... where mother nature does all the work for you (arranging heavy targets in pronounced zones for easy-pickings). Trouble is, you might go long long periods when the beaches are sterile and not eroding. Doh !

The harbor and inland bay beaches will be immune from that (since they don't face the open ocean).

 

[KOB]

That beach in DP gets hammered by hunters on a regular basis. Very seldom will you find anything good. Back in the 90s it was good , before the onslaught.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

That beach in DP gets hammered by hunters on a regular basis. Very seldom will you find anything good. Back in the 90s it was good , before the onslaught.

Well gee Kob, that was rather RUDE of you guys back in the 90s, eh ? I mean sheesk, if you were nice, you'd have left a few goodies. Tsk tsk

 

[TheFrood]

My first MD find ever was in the early 90's on the beach just outside the harbor by the river mouth. Was after some big storms and found a late 1940's quarter before I knew what I was doing. Was my cousin's Bday so it was gifted to her.

 

[KOB]

My first MD find ever was in the early 90's on the beach just outside the harbor by the river mouth. Was after some big storms and found a late 1940's quarter before I knew what I was doing. Was my cousin's Bday so it was gifted to her.

Nice. There is a large park up above that area overlooking everything. They hold weddings there , parking can be tough. If you are into dirt fishing , try that. Still some decent finds there but mostly clad. You never know. GL

 

[Bklein]

Well gee Kob, that was rather RUDE of you guys back in the 90s, eh ? I mean sheesk, if you were nice, you'd have left a few goodies. Tsk tsk

Just think of all the poor kids and moms getting hurt on the pull tabs and bottle caps if KOB didn’t clean them out.

 

[TheFrood]

I look at it this way... A day at the beach with temps in the 80s beats being at home with temps in the 100s. If there aren't any targets, that's why I carry fishing gear too. As for parking, I make it a point to get as much out of my state park pass as I can. Cost me almost $200 so I'm parking everywhere I can whenever I can that it is valid. It covers a surprising number of beaches and the like.

 

[OCBeepDigger]

That beach in DP gets hammered by hunters on a regular basis. Very seldom will you find anything good. Back in the 90s it was good , before the onslaught.

I did pull a tiny gold ring from there last year, along with about 37 toy cars.... but, yeah, it's gets hit hard I think.

 

[low tide]

I know the best place to hunt but I aint tell'n. Just waiting for conditions again. A few yrs ago a small group of us were pulling barbers, walkers, signets, you name it scoop after scoop... Just out side of Newport. KOB might know.......

 

[TheFrood]

I know the best place to hunt but I aint tell'n. Just waiting for conditions again. A few yrs ago a small group of us were pulling barbers, walkers, signets, you name it scoop after scoop... Just out side of Newport. KOB might know.......

If you are going to go hunting there please send me an invite. I need to learn the ropes on beach hunting (I know there are other locations but I just like being at the beach so... either fishing or MDing). I'll bring food? Beer? New enough at this that I don't know the appropriate bribe...

 

[Tom_in_CA]

I know the best place to hunt but I aint tell'n. Just waiting for conditions again. A few yrs ago a small group of us were pulling barbers, walkers, signets, you name it scoop after scoop... Just out side of Newport. KOB might know.......

Aint that the truth ! If you've ever been in one of mother nature's thick storm erosion deposits, you'll get spoiled rotten. I've seen conditions so thick that for an hour, I could never leave an area as big as a bedroom sized square. And where every signal had multiple targets per scoop. Including silver coins. As fast as you could dig. And utterly zero aluminum or light weight objects.

If you are going to go hunting there please send me an invite. I need to learn the ropes on beach hunting (I know there are other locations but I just like being at the beach so... either fishing or MDing). I'll bring food? Beer? New enough at this that I don't know the appropriate bribe...

Here's an article I wrote many years ago. Many of the links might be dead by now. And southern CA might have peculiarities and idiosyncrasies that my part of CA doesn't have. But there might be some helpful tidbits here for you :

MDHTALK - Tip: Beach Metal detecting by Tom Tanner

MDHTALK - Metal Detecting Hobby Talk is a website dedicated to the hobby of metal detecting. This website is design to be a repository for metal detecting information and data. The website offers information on: laws, national resources, state resources, metal detecting clubs, local...

www.mdhtalk.org

 

[TheFrood]

Aint that the truth ! If you've ever been in one of mother nature's thick storm erosion deposits, you'll get spoiled rotten. I've seen conditions so thick that for an hour, I could never leave an area as big as a bedroom sized square. And where every signal had multiple targets per scoop. Including silver coins. As fast as you could dig. And utterly zero aluminum or light weight objects.




Here's an article I wrote many years ago. Many of the links might be dead by now. And southern CA might have peculiarities and idiosyncrasies that my part of CA doesn't have. But there might be some helpful tidbits here for you :

MDHTALK - Tip: Beach Metal detecting by Tom Tanner

MDHTALK - Metal Detecting Hobby Talk is a website dedicated to the hobby of metal detecting. This website is design to be a repository for metal detecting information and data. The website offers information on: laws, national resources, state resources, metal detecting clubs, local...

www.mdhtalk.org

It doesn't mention what the best bribes are to incentivize experienced MDers to drop an invitation though!
Thank you for the link though... Wish I'd kept up with this hobby in my 20's - 40's so that I wasn't on the bottom
end of the learning curve now,
but was succumbed to the negative influence of motorcycles, and jet-skis. When that influence waned it was
cheaper to get back into fishing than to get a good detector (or so it looked at the time... How little did I know).

 

[Tom_in_CA]

It doesn't mention what the best bribes are to incentivize experienced MDers to drop an invitation though!
....

It depends on the individual experienced MD'r. Some are free-flowing to take newbies out, tutor and assist them, etc.... Others tend to be more snooty. Ie.: Will only hunt with like-minded advanced hardcore hunters.

This is ESPECIALLY true when it comes to land-hunting for old coins, since that's not a renewable resource. And since more #'s of hunters can .... uh .... create eyesores at spots .

But it can also be true of beach hunting to some degree. For example : I've come under fire , from long-time buddies, for bringing newbies to eroded zones on the beach . After someone(s) I'd just met on the internet had cold-called me , asking to get invited along and tutored. My other long-time buddies will look askance at me wondering why I'm bringing along guys we have to keep stopping and assisting. And then, shucks, if the zone is only going to have XX # of targets, in a concise small zone (which creates cross-talk with too many machines), then my buddy gets irritated that I've brought along a total stranger.

And some times (not always) the newbie will not lift a finger to reciprocate later. Ie.: to share his reconn./research as to spots where mother nature is eroding. And instead always/only/ever picks up the phone and calls YOU to find out where the action is.

I personally do not mind meeting strangers and showing them the ropes. But just saying that I do not fault those who could be labelled as "snooty" either. Because think of it like this : If you were Minnesota Fats, then I'm sure you'd only want to play billiards with other sharks, right ? If you are Tiger Woods, you will tend to only golf with other pro's, right ? So too is the same psychology with md'ing . Hardcore guys will tend to hang with hardcore guys.


About the only way to crack into exclusive circles, is to pay your dues, show off some show & tell, and then presto : Other long-timers will begin to drop their guard when they see you post some good finds after the latest storms. Yes I know this is a vicious case of chicken & egg scenario. But ... oh well

 

[TheFrood]

It depends on the individual experienced MD'r. Some are free-flowing to take newbies out, tutor and assist them, etc.... Others tend to be more snooty. Ie.: Will only hunt with like-minded advanced hardcore hunters.

About the only way to crack into exclusive circles, is to pay your dues, show off some show & tell, and then presto : Other long-timers will begin to drop their guard when they see you post some good finds after the latest storms. Yes I know this is a vicious case of chicken & egg scenario. But ... oh well

I guess it's the same for all of the 'discovery' type activities... prospecting, fishing, MDing, rockhounding... There is a trade off between camaraderie, competition, and the risk of being too welcoming and inadvertently bringing... shall we say donkey-posteriors... into the mix.

Was about 1/4 serious and 3/4 joking about bribes for invitations though. Well, not about the bribe goods but about getting invited into a group being a marginal misanthrope. I am curious what the stereotypical metal detector bribe goods are (ie for fishermen it's beer, for programmers it's pizza, for adrenaline junkies it's red bull). Or is there one?

For the time being I'm content to just wander around on the beach removing trash and finding the occasional coin.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

I guess it's the same for all of the 'discovery' type activities... prospecting, fishing, MDing, rockhounding... There is a trade off between camaraderie, competition, and the risk of being too welcoming and inadvertently bringing... shall we say donkey-posteriors... into the mix.

Was about 1/4 serious and 3/4 joking about bribes for invitations though. Well, not about the bribe goods but about getting invited into a group being a marginal misanthrope. I am curious what the stereotypical metal detector bribe goods are (ie for fishermen it's beer, for programmers it's pizza, for adrenaline junkies it's red bull). Or is there one?

For the time being I'm content to just wander around on the beach removing trash and finding the occasional coin.

Yes, fishing is a good example : If you have a good trout hole on the river, that's got a few lunker trout there, then it's no longer a "secret hole" nor has any more lunker trout, the moment you alert 5 other fishermen to join you. Doh !

If you want to make the 4+ hr. drive to my part of CA @ the next winter storms, You're welcome to pick my brain and I'd give my condition/location analysis. But obviously, that's too far and too speculative for a type hunting where conditions can change-overnight.

But instead just read the article I wrote. See when high tides coincide with high on-shore or cross-shore swells (which would mean S, and SW swells, for So. CA beaches). And on-shore winds. Then go out and see if you see any of the tell-tale signs of erosion. Eg.: Cuts, slopes, scallops. It's all right there in my article.

And if you see anyone else digging targets furiously, then : He must have zeroed in on one of mother nature's deposit zones. But just be polite and don't get too close (lest electronic cross-talk cause interference between your two machines). However, generally speaking, when passing another md'r, they will tend to compare notes and ask each other "having any luck" ? And in that process, you can begin to pick up pointers.

 

[Tom_in_CA]

Here's some pix of what beach erosion cuts look like :

 

[low tide]

If you are going to go hunting there please send me an invite. I need to learn the ropes on beach hunting (I know there are other locations but I just like being at the beach so... either fishing or MDing). I'll bring food? Beer? New enough at this that I don't know the appropriate bribe...

I live to far from the beach now to have ANY upper hand. I just get down there when I can and hope for the best. KOB LOVES teaching... I'm sure he'll assist..

 

[Scubacat]

There's Baby Beach in Aruba. Are they relatives?

 

[LongJohnSilver1]

It depends on the individual experienced MD'r. Some are free-flowing to take newbies out, tutor and assist them, etc.... Others tend to be more snooty. Ie.: Will only hunt with like-minded advanced hardcore hunters.

This is ESPECIALLY true when it comes to land-hunting for old coins, since that's not a renewable resource. And since more #'s of hunters can .... uh .... create eyesores at spots .

But it can also be true of beach hunting to some degree. For example : I've come under fire , from long-time buddies, for bringing newbies to eroded zones on the beach . After someone(s) I'd just met on the internet had cold-called me , asking to get invited along and tutored. My other long-time buddies will look askance at me wondering why I'm bringing along guys we have to keep stopping and assisting. And then, shucks, if the zone is only going to have XX # of targets, in a concise small zone (which creates cross-talk with too many machines), then my buddy gets irritated that I've brought along a total stranger.

And some times (not always) the newbie will not lift a finger to reciprocate later. Ie.: to share his reconn./research as to spots where mother nature is eroding. And instead always/only/ever picks up the phone and calls YOU to find out where the action is.

I personally do not mind meeting strangers and showing them the ropes. But just saying that I do not fault those who could be labelled as "snooty" either. Because think of it like this : If you were Minnesota Fats, then I'm sure you'd only want to play billiards with other sharks, right ? If you are Tiger Woods, you will tend to only golf with other pro's, right ? So too is the same psychology with md'ing . Hardcore guys will tend to hang with hardcore guys.


About the only way to crack into exclusive circles, is to pay your dues, show off some show & tell, and then presto : Other long-timers will begin to drop their guard when they see you post some good finds after the latest storms. Yes I know this is a vicious case of chicken & egg scenario. But ... oh well

I don't see the point in being snooty. I've been put onto some GREAT locations simply because I was willing to talk to people and swap info.