Nice article on metal detecting in a local online news source today. The writer did a good job covering this man and his passion. ...
Agreed. Fun article. Thanx for linking and sharing here.
.... The only thing that wasn't mentioned was the Metal Detecting Code of Ethics. ...
You lament that they didn't bring up the "code of ethics" ? There's a mixed bag of "gotchas", if the author were to have done that. Because, to immediately go assuring readers "they obey this and that law" will ... guess what .... serve to do ? It will only conjur up images of "oh wow, it's got restrictions and laws" (that perhaps no one thought of, nor cared about).
Ie.: to "defend oneself" from the outset merely presumes that we have something to dodge, or be guilty of, in the first place. Why even plant those images in people's minds ?
Instead, start with the assumption (for a "feel-good article " like this), that md'ing is benign, harmless, safe, etc..... To start listing all sorts of "code of ethics" stuff merely plants images of "oh my gosh" stuff.
When in reality, the average reader of an article like that, it's simply not something they care or think about. And best to leave it that way.
... and the fact that the man is detecting on Ocean Beach in San Francisco which is in the federally protected Golden Gate National Recreation Area (GGNRA). I know people detect here all the time, without issue.....
Uhhh, interesting that you know that people are detecting there w/o issue. You're right. There's been md'rs (who perhaps simply didn't know any better), who went for ages, and no one ever said so much as "boo" to them. And if someone ever DID get something said to them, it was just a "scram", at worst.
And I also have a sneaking suspicion of how this rule came into print there, way back when. And how any rangers, who *did/do* boot people, became appraised of this rule. Care to take a guess ?
But , back to Ocean Beach : If someone has legitimately lost a ring there, and calls for a hoybbist's help, then .... No ranger is going to forbid you from looking for it. I would not hesitate, for a minute, to go look for someone's lost ring there. I'll tell the true story of this happening there in the next post :