Lost & Found Category | Page 24 of 495 | The Ring Finders

1 September 2025.  Yesterday, Labor Day Sunday, Nick lost his wedding ring at the beach.  It was a special ring because it had been his father’s as well as his grandfather’s.  While he felt somewhat resigned to the loss, his wife Hannah didn’t give up easily.  She searched the internet in the evening and fortunately found the RingFinders.  Nick called me this morning and we arranged to meet at the beach within about half an hour.

At the beach, Nick described where his family had been sitting the previous day and where he had been in the water for a relatively short time.  He had not noticed his ring was missing until they returned to their B&B.  This left a range of possibilities for where the ring was lost but the most likely was the beach.  Where to search first?  The tradeoff is between the dry sand (easy to search) and the water (more difficult but also more likely).  I started easy, but after 10 or 15 minutes it was apparent that the ring was not in the area where Nick and Hannah thought they had been sitting.

Next, the water.  Nick told how he had been wading and sitting in knee-deep water off to the west of where their beach chairs were.  The current tide level was lower than it had been the previous day so I started with a long swath at the wave’s edge – no result.  With further discussion, Nick felt that he’d been at a break in slope a bit farther out so I moved there for the next swath.  This location was somewhat concerning because it contained thick, loose sandy gravel that was being moved about by wave action, raising the possibility that the ring could already be deeply buried and possibly beyond detector range.  Fortunately within a few minutes I heard that sweet signal of success and had Nick’s ring in my scoop!

I dumped the gravel but left the ring in the scoop and walked up the beach to where Nick stood.  I didn’t mention the ring but told him about the bad bottom conditions as I approached.  Then the part I love the most – I held out the scoop so he could look inside, and suddenly all was well with the world!

We wrapped up with some very happy conversation and pictures.  As it turned out, Nick, Hannah and their daughter were packed and ready to drive home, ending their Cape Cod vacation.  I’m really pleased that I was able to change that ending from a sad to a joyful one as they hit the road!

Nick’s 3-generation wedding band.

A happy family ready to head home from their Cape Cod vacation.

30 August 2025.  Sometimes you’re lucky.  I received a call from Philip, who’d been referred to me by my RingFinder friend Rick.  He told me that Jen had lost her 2 kt oval diamond engagement ring in the dry sand where they were sitting and asked if I could come with a metal detector to find it.  I of course said yes and arrived at the beach 15 minutes later.  As (good!) luck would have it, they had found the ring just as I arrived, so all was well.

Jen described how the ring went flying off her finger as she was putting on sunscreen.  The ring disappeared in the fine sand, which is not unusual, and it can be very difficult if not impossible to recover with just finger sifting if you’re not certain where it landed.  A dry-sand loss, however, is a lucky situation because a metal detector, when used by a trained eye/ear, can make recovery quick and easy if the location of the loss is reasonably constrained.   It becomes much more difficult with a loss in the water, where tides, wind & waves, rocks, shifting sand, and location uncertainty can greatly complicate a search.

I snapped some pictures of Jen and her ring and we expressed thanks all around, particularly that that beautiful diamond was back on her finger.  A lucky day!

Jen’s beautiful engagement ring.

Jen with her engagement ring back in place with her wedding rings.