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Does this constitute "No Metal Detecting"?

So please tell me what you do when you ask that random park worker and they tell you "no"?

I don't normally just ask a 'random park worker'; I ask the city hall or parks office. I find email works well too and I carry a copy of their reply with me (if they've said 'yes'). I have had situations where I have obtained permission and while detecting a park worker approaches me. I explain in a friendly manner that it's been 'ok'd' by the city hall or parks office and it's always been totally fine. The worst I've had a guy say is, "Well we work really hard to keep this place nice so please do your best to leave things the way you left them". No problem, seems reasonable to me. :yes:
 
False. In the absence of any restrictions I would go ahead and detect. Things like "no digging", "no removing items/artifacts", "no disturbing the ground" are very clear restrictions that quite obviously relate to metal detecting. Whether that was the original intention behind writing the law or not makes no legal difference. In such cases I clarify with either the city hall or the city works (parks) office. In my experience most of them have been very friendly and accommodating and even thanked me for taking the time to clarify.

Disagree. Haven't you ever surface detected after public events on public grounds that have "no digging rules". Helps pay for my equipment.

So, I have to say that "no disturbing the ground" is not a restriction that quite obviously relates to MDing. It does mean NO DISTURBING THE GROUND or NO DIGGING.
 
Disagree. Haven't you ever surface detected after public events on public grounds that have "no digging rules". Helps pay for my equipment.

So, I have to say that "no disturbing the ground" is not a restriction that quite obviously relates to MDing. It does mean NO DISTURBING THE GROUND or NO DIGGING.

No I don't normally go detecting for only surface finds and I would imagine that for most people, metal detecting involves some form of digging. If not though, cool! If you're just picking things up off the ground, then yes, it would probably be legal even though there is a 'no digging' rule. I had assumed that this whole conversation was referring generally to detecting involving some form of digging.
 
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Stewart73 (and Harvey and others) Sorry I have been condescending. I will tone it down. :no:.

Stewart, you say:

"If it says 'no digging' then technically 'digging' is illegal, regardless of whether you fill the hole back in..."

The issue of disturb versus disturbED, and alter versus the alterED is pretty defensible. But you're right: The dIg versus dUg distinction is quite problematic. Because yes, there's the temporary evil process of extraction, where .... yes, you did "dig", however-so-quickly. And having left no trace STILL doesn't mean a person didn't "dig". Thus yes, I am the first to agree that this is problematic. Therefore, let's say, for argument's sake, that you are totally right: That's it's universally illegal. Clear-cut, and not up to anyone's interpretation to say-otherwise. OK?

Then that merely presents another problem: Because if that's the case, then how is it that people have routinely gotten permission to dig and detect in parks ? I mean, a city person can't give permission to someone to break the law, can they? For example: they can't permit you to shoplift, exceed the speed limit, etc.... right? Therefore, the mere fact that opinions DO vary (as evidenced by the "yes's"), simply means that it IS up for interpretation. Because if it WERE as cut & dried as you're saying , then .... how can people get permission then ? Mind you verbage like that exists in every single park in the entire united states, in some form or fashion. right?

And a lot of the other objections here are still understandibly doubtful of my stance that people asking can BRING about laws, rules, or policies I thought that the way to show this is to cite a bunch of case-stories. But then this would merely be met with the criticism that I am instigating arguments, or responses like that I think I'm " ...the keeper of the one Great Truth and those who question or disagree are simply stuck at various levels of 'not quite getting it yet'.... " So therefore I changed my mind and won't be posting such examples (unless they come out in the course of others threads, by-way-of-example).
 
Here is my look at the "asking permission of public officials" debate. Stewart and others think there absolutely zero harm that can come from this. That is completely wrong. Does anyone here believe they are the only person to ever want to metal detect in your (or my) town? We all know how many people jump into and out of this hobby every year. What all those people followed your advise and went asking around for permission in the absense of a restricting law? It would get pretty dang annoying for them to be constantly fielding those questions for every person in the town who thought about buying a detector.

So then, what was never cared about before, is NOW firmly on the radar of the people who make the rules for the parks and it all depends on what pre-conceived notions he/she has (or heaven forbid seen on TV). What's even worse? City officials talk to other cities to see what rules and regs they have and often adopt them even if they don't have the exact needs for them.

So your actions do affect every other detectorist in your area and possibly even my area.
 
Stewart73 (and Harvey and others) Sorry I have been condescending. I will tone it down. :no:.

Stewart, you say:

"If it says 'no digging' then technically 'digging' is illegal, regardless of whether you fill the hole back in..."

The issue of disturb versus disturbED, and alter versus the alterED is pretty defensible. But you're right: The dIg versus dUg distinction is quite problematic. Because yes, there's the temporary evil process of extraction, where .... yes, you did "dig", however-so-quickly. And having left no trace STILL doesn't mean a person didn't "dig". Thus yes, I am the first to agree that this is problematic. Therefore, let's say, for argument's sake, that you are totally right: That's it's universally illegal. Clear-cut, and not up to anyone's interpretation to say-otherwise. OK?

Then that merely presents another problem: Because if that's the case, then how is it that people have routinely gotten permission to dig and detect in parks ? I mean, a city person can't give permission to someone to break the law, can they? For example: they can't permit you to shoplift, exceed the speed limit, etc.... right? Therefore, the mere fact that opinions DO vary (as evidenced by the "yes's"), simply means that it IS up for interpretation. Because if it WERE as cut & dried as you're saying , then .... how can people get permission then ? Mind you verbage like that exists in every single park in the entire united states, in some form or fashion. right?

And a lot of the other objections here are still understandibly doubtful of my stance that people asking can BRING about laws, rules, or policies I thought that the way to show this is to cite a bunch of case-stories. But then this would merely be met with the criticism that I am instigating arguments, or responses like that I think I'm " ...the keeper of the one Great Truth and those who question or disagree are simply stuck at various levels of 'not quite getting it yet'.... " So therefore I changed my mind and won't be posting such examples (unless they come out in the course of others threads, by-way-of-example).

A good response Tom. In the parks I hunt the rules are set by each city and can vary from place to place. I imagine they are decided on and penned by some form of city council. In these cases I think that the city does have the right to interpret, apply, disregard these rules as they see fit. If not the right, then at least in practice they seem to have that power (in my experience). In my way of thinking they are probably less likely to apply them to strictly to me as a detectorist if I ask first rather than just go in, dig, and then try to fight it after I am approached. Maybe the situation is different in the States but most of the people I have dealt with have been quite friendly, and in the one or two cases they weren't, it seemed to be because idiot detectorists had, in the past, not cleaned up after themselves. Somebody earlier mentioned that "nobody can give you permission to break the law"...I suppose I see it that these laws were in some cases purposely written vaguely to cover a wide range of activities, the final word in enforcement being left up to whomever is in charge at the time. As an example, if I am caught speeding then I have definitely broken the law but the police officer has some leeway in how forcefully he applies that law (a warning? a ticket?). For me, instead of leaving the interpretation of these laws up to chance and having to be worried about it while I'm detecting then I prefer to ask. Again, these would be for sites where there are rules that could be applied to detecting (digging, disturbing ground, removing objects). As for the case stories where asking for permission has resulted in detecting-specific laws being implemented, I believe you that such things have happened, but surely for each of them there are a hundred cases where somebody has asked permission and it was simply granted (or refused).
 
...... surely for each of them there are a hundred cases where somebody has asked permission and it was simply granted (or refused).

thanx Stewart. Good topic.

As for the above quote, you note that one of the outcomes is (of course): refusal. Ie.: a "no". Remember that the mere fact of a "no" (to even a singular asker) maybe didn't become a "rule", yet it became a "policy".

By that I mean that the same person who gave you that "no", might NOW start booting others. Whom perhaps they've never have noticed or paid mind to. But now they'll remember the inquiry and think: "aha! there's one of THEM!" and start booting.

Or how about this scenario: you get a "no". So you leave the detector at home. But you're walking past the park the next day, and see another md'r out there. You talk to him, and find out he's lived in the city 30 yrs. and md'd this park that entire 30 years. You alert him "but I thought it wasn't allowed here?" He says "shucks, beats me. No one ever said anything to me about that". Thus you realize your "no" was an arbitrary and whimsical by some desk-bound bureaucrat. Is the other md'r a low-down rotten scum for his ability to detect there? Can you see that in that case that you merely precluded yourself from a potentially good hunting ground?
 
thanx Stewart. Good topic.

As for the above quote, you note that one of the outcomes is (of course): refusal. Ie.: a "no". Remember that the mere fact of a "no" (to even a singular asker) maybe didn't become a "rule", yet it became a "policy".

By that I mean that the same person who gave you that "no", might NOW start booting others. Whom perhaps they've never have noticed or paid mind to. But now they'll remember the inquiry and think: "aha! there's one of THEM!" and start booting.

Or how about this scenario: you get a "no". So you leave the detector at home. But you're walking past the park the next day, and see another md'r out there. You talk to him, and find out he's lived in the city 30 yrs. and md'd this park that entire 30 years. You alert him "but I thought it wasn't allowed here?" He says "shucks, beats me. No one ever said anything to me about that". Thus you realize your "no" was an arbitrary and whimsical by some desk-bound bureaucrat. Is the other md'r a low-down rotten scum for his ability to detect there? Can you see that in that case that you merely precluded yourself from a potentially good hunting ground?

In such a situation, yes, I can see that I would have precluded myself from a potentially good hunting ground. I mean, anything could conceivably happen but I still don't think it's a likely or common enough scenario to be advocating a policy of 'never ask permission if you're not sure' right across the board.

Say if I were into fishing and I arrived in a new area and saw a likely spot but wasn't sure of the regulations (or worse, I knew of laws that stated something like "no disturbing of wildlife"). It would never enter my mind *not* to ask permission simply on the miniscule chance that my very asking is going to alert the authorities to something they had never before considered, cause them to refuse me AND start booting other long-time fishermen out of the area. Right, it's technically possible this could happen, but not nearly likely enough for me not to ask permission before possibly breaking the law.

Put simply, I believe that, generally speaking, the possible negative fallout from not asking permission far outweighs the possible negative fallout from asking permission (again, I'm talking about areas where there is already some wording in place that could apply to detecting). I also don't feel very relaxed hunting a place that I know is under wording that could be applied to what I was doing...unless I can first ensure that it will not apply to me (ie. securing permission from local authority).
 
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In such a situation, yes, I can see that I would have precluded myself from a potentially good hunting ground. I mean, anything could conceivably happen but I still don't think it's a likely or common enough scenario to be advocating a policy of 'never ask permission if you're not sure' right across the board.
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ok, going by your quote above, you acknowledge that in THAT situation, you DO see that you got nothing more than a whimsical arbitrary "no". When in fact, you acknowledge no one cared. And that by asking you nothing more than preclude yourself from a potential good hunting spot. And so therefore, in that case, it was NOT a good idea to have asked. Right? But still though, you say that such scenarios are too infrequent to base such a "don't ask" stance on. Right?

If I'm understanding you right, then the only thing anyone can do to counter this point (of frequencies of such scenarios happening) is to post a bunch of examples where that's EXACTLY what happens/happened. And even THEN I suppose that someone could look at each individual occurrence, and say: "oh that's just a fluke too", and so on. Arrgghh
 
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... Say if I were into fishing and I arrived in a new area and saw a likely spot but wasn't sure of the regulations (or worse, I knew of laws that stated something like "no disturbing of wildlife"). It would never enter my mind *not* to ask permission simply on the miniscule chance that my very asking is going to alert the authorities to something they had never before considered, cause them to refuse me AND start booting other long-time fishermen out of the area. Right, it's technically possible this could happen, but not nearly likely enough for me not to ask permission before possibly breaking the law....

Well for starters, the #'s of people who "fish" versus the #'s of people who detect, is quite different. Md'ing is an odd-ball hobby, while fishing is a universal ancient thing. But let's cut to the chase here, since you brought up the "fishing" example: Lets say you arrived in that "new area" as you say. And as you say, you "weren't sure of the regulations". Ok, but lets say you saw 5 other fishermen there. Or that the only reason you knew about and went to the spot, was because it was where all the old-timers in your town fished, and they all had trophy trout from there. So in that case, do you assume "oh, it must be ok then", or do you go ask someone "can I?"

When you used that fishing example, I can think of a certain trout fishing on the Tuolumne river in the sierra nevadas. The fellow that took me there, told me it was where his dad before him had fished (1950s). And when we arrive, we see other campers setting up, fishing poles in plain view, etc.. At NO time did I ever wonder "gee, I wonder if fishing is allowed". In fact, I think that was the very purpose of this particular CCC era campground, was JUST for fishing. But I never asked or checked with anyone to make sure. It would never have crossed my mind that I COULDN'T fish there. You can see then, that human nature instinctively accepts actual reality and practice as: "it must be ok".

So to apply that to the md'ing example: What if you'd never have bumped into the fellow who detected there for 30 yrs? Would it change the fact that you got an arbitrary "no", that didn't really apply in "actual practice"? No. It would merely mean you didn't bump into that lone md'r. You STILL precluded yourself.

Yes I realize that all this doesn't answer the factor of: "But what if someone REALLY DID care?" I suppose I could say that "oh well, they boot you, you give lip service, apologize, and move on". But I'm sure that some people would say that THAT leads to "laws", eh? The only answer to that, is a study in frequencies of each type thing happening. And to do so, is next to impossible. And example you can give, I would admittedly say "that guy was a sore thumb begging for attention" and promptly dismiss it. Likewise, any example I can give, you too would say "that was a fluke, it still doesn't outweigh..." blah blah.
 
LOL seems to me the topic has been pretty well covered and then some, I'm amazed at how much time everyone has to play "posting badmitten" LOL

Bottom line is, and others have covered all aspects of the laws very well, but the laws are the laws, and just because it may not be spelled out "No metal detecting" when the rules state in every possible way that no digging/excavating/turning over, beating up rocks etc etc" boils down to no metal detecting for me anyway, sure, it would probably be "legal" to take a metal detector into one of my county parks and swing it around listening to targets, heck I could even track where they are on my GPS but I can't go get them legally so why bother, how smart will I look trying to get an officer or park official trying to believe that I am just in it to wave my wand. Can anyone see themselves going that far without having a digging tool on their belt?

Everyone is equal, in different ways LOL apparently two people can read one law and come up with more than 2 possibilities if they want to. But there have been a lot of good posts on this topic, thoroughly covered it I think by now.

We used to get customers in my office before I retired, It was my job to know and interpret Postal rules and regulations, for both USPS employee's and mailing customers. Believe me, their rules and regulations are confusing to begin with.

And believe me, customers big and small all want to interpret (bend) the rules the way they see fit and that works best for them (costs less), and I would regularly hear people telling me "Well we have always done it this way and its never been a problem before" Even when it came to revenue issues, sure someone might get away with something but just because they do, because no one was looking at the time, did not make it legal and we could have and have gone after certain parties that continued to read the rules their way.

When a customer would tell me "well we always did it that way in the past and got away with it, no one said anything" I would just point out that sure, if you drive your car through a red light, and a cop does not see you, and/or you do not T-bone another car in the process that time, does not mean it is legal and you will get caught eventually. That thought process, when you get right down to it, is like that of a child, that desperately wants to do something his mother is telling him no to.

If a person uses the reasoning that I have seen stated on here, then basically every thing would be "ok" as long as you don't get caught" mentality exists. People will do what people do.

Do it right, or do it wrong, but don't stand in front of me trying to convince me that your wrong is right, or like it was said in Clint Eastwood's Outlaw Jose Wales, don't stand their pissing down my back and telling me its raining!

So if someone wants to interpret the "no digging or excavating of any kind with any tool" type rule to mean it is ok to metal detect because it does not say no metal detecting, then by all means go right ahead!!! Have fun, but you sooner or later will get caught, and possibly or maybe even likely make life that much harder for the detectorist's in your area when parks that have allowed metal detecting in the past suddenly decide to not allow it because people just don't follow the rules in other parks so now we have to spell it out for them we might as well make it easy and just flat out say NO METAL DETECTING.

Like other responsible metal detectorists here, I look into the rules before going somewhere to detect, I don't want to play that game of easier to ask forgiveness than permission because when someone is trying to ask for forgiveness from a park official they are probably going to wind up just making it worse when trying to persuade the park employee to see their side of it.. Happy hunting everyone!
 
The last word

I am reading a lot of "if this" and "if that" in this post. Let me add some of my "if this's" too. LOL

My last word is I will ask permission.

An example of not asking permission in this park we are taking about here. The rules say No digging, the rules don't say anything about Metal Detecting. Someone lost a expensive wedding ring in the park. I get my detector and help locate it right. Search off the surface of the ground. No digging required. Another example the kids got a new detectors for a birthday present. The kids go over to the park and find coins on the surface of the ground. No digging. I printed a copy of the rules for the city park and have them with me. I don't take any digging tools in the park.

HH
 
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