Lost Silver Ring Found in Land O' Lakes Florida

Item recovered August 13, 2024. Neena had reached out in the afternoon about a ring she lost in the conservation area behind her house. I arranged a call later that evening to get a better understanding of the area and circumstances of her loss.

Neena said she had lost her ring while enjoying the quiet area behind her house back in November, 2023. She wasn’t exactly sure where it was lost, and the area where she was standing was small in size. She had looked for it herself, but wasn’t able to locate it. In addition, the neighbor had recently constructed a fence and she was worried the ring may have been found by the workers, or possibly lost in the small pond with all the rain we received from Hurricane Debbie.

She also mentioned that this particular ring had a high sentimental value to her as it was given to her by a life-long friend who had recently passed away. It was very important to have this ring returned!

I met Neena at her house the following day after work and surveyed the area. Because of the fencing, it was necessary to use a step ladder to be able to get over the fence in the back, which stood approximately four feet tall. I grabbed my equipment and used Neena’s ladder to scale over the fence into the conservation area.

Once over the fence, I started detecting near the ferns, where she said she spent much of her time when she lost the ring. I immediately got a loud signal with a high VDI, similar to how a silver item would sound. Upon digging the item from the ground, it turned out to be a crushed-up soda can.

I slowly moved toward the pond, thoroughly covering the area about 15-20 feet away from the ferns. I found additional garbage-worthy items, but not the ring we were looking for. I returned to the fence to Neena to again discuss where she was on the day she lost the ring. She mentioned she also walked along the edge of the pond to where it turns left and so I started back out to search the edge of the pond.

Approximately five feet past where I had stopped earlier, and on the very edge of the pond, I had another signal on the metal detector that sounded like silver. It was the ring! It must have been pushed into the ground by about 1/2″ (perhaps by someone stepping on it, or being run over by a lawn mower tire). I turned around and yelled « Neena! I found the ring! » I probably should have verified it was the one we were looking for so as not to get her hopes up, but it matched the description and found in the loss location. We hadn’t even had a chance to thoroughly clean it off yet, but she put it back on her finger and it fit perfectly.

Neena was overcome with emotion and very thankful I was able to help return this ring to her.