ONE MANS TRASH - You dig it, you carry it. - 19 lbs of trash pulled from the ground by one part time metal detector enthusiast over a year’s time.

TREASURE OR TRASH

For every penny, nickel, dime, quarter, half dollar, silver or gold trinket, ring or relic found each year, a huge amount of metal hazardous trash is detected, picked up and removed by the metal detector enthusiasts and this may amount to many hundreds of tons. This trash is removed from our beaches, parks, schools, public and private lands by detector enthusiasts who find the trash while looking for that next very interesting buried item.

Every person that operates and swings a METAL DETECTOR knows that more pieces of trash, metal cans, bullet casings and other dangerous objects are removed from the ground than any treasured items (coins, jewelry, relics) found.

As a part time DETECTOR ENTHUSIAST, (going out less than 30 days per year) I pulled 19 lbs of metal trash from searched lands. If this finds ratio 19/30 holds true, then a full time detector enthusiast (going out 90 plus days per year or more) re­moves at least 57 lbs of metal trash each year.
HOW MUCH IS THIS? LET’S DO THE MATH AND SEE!!

For the sake of argument, lets’ estimate that across the country this hobby numbers about 100,000 detector buffs, full and part timers with full timers being 40,000.                                          

            40,000 detector enthusiast times 57 lbs equals   2,280,000 lbs or 1,140 Tons

            60,000 detector enthusiast times 19 lbs equals      1,140,000 lbs or 570 Tons

            100,000 detector enthusiast                            3,420,000 lbs or 1,710 Tons

                                                                                            WOW!
855 TONS of TRASH and WHAT DO YOU GET?
NO RESPECT!

METAL DETECTING HOBBYISTS are thus picking up many hundreds of tons of dangerous trash and this may be more than the amounts collected each year during the well publicized environmental beach and park cleanups held across the country.

NOW WE ASK? Why are environmentalists, archaeologists etc. praised for there good work clearing trash from the beaches and parks? While THE DETECTOR ENTHUSIAST of the world go unnoticed and are even excluded from practicing this hobby in many National, State, and Municipal lands.