On Friday August 8th, I received the following text message
“Hi Dennis, I am reaching out as I lost my gold bracelet in my lawn yesterday evening while playing with the dog. We searched last night with a flash light with no luck and was wondering if you would be able to come out and help? We live in Limington, so wasn’t sure if you come out this way. It is a thin rose goal bracelet with diamonds. I can send a picture. Our address is: *** Cape Road., Limington, Maine. This was a wedding gift so would love to try to get it back. Thank you!!”
I called and was able to talk with Carly. Carly told me that not only did she and her husband, Taylor, search last night, they also searched again this morning. They just can’t find the bracelet. Carly was worried that when he dog jumped on her, the bracelet may have been eaten, by the dog or became stuck on the dog and ended up in a totally different area. She explained that it was a very thin chain with just a very small pendant, in the shape of a smile and the smile contained small diamonds. Carly also told me the bracelet was a Tiffany & Co. Bracelet. I told Carly that I would be happy to help and explained a few concerns. Very thin gold bracelets and necklaces are extremely difficult to metal detect. There just isn’t a lot of gold on them and is one of the two most difficult gold pieces of jewelry to metal detect. The other one is gold stud earrings. These very low conductive, non ferrous, metals that will barely register on a metal detector. As an example, Sterling Silver will ring up in the 90’s, loud and clear. A Men’s Gold Ring will come in and show up, as a 20 into the 60’s, depending on the size and shape. Gold stud earrings and very thin chains will only register in the 01 to 03 range and just as a whisper. In order to metal detect these items, you must set up your detector properly, to find these items. You must have the proper technique also. You have to cover an area as slowly as you can. I do not walk through the area, swinging the coil. I take one step swing the coil, low and slow, take a half step, swing, low and slow, repeating this for the entire search. If you are walking through the area, swinging, you may not find it. You must also use the proper coil, as small as possible. I have 4 coils that I swap out, depending on the job. For this search, I went with my most sensitive and smallest coil, the 8” elliptical coil. We agreed that I would search, first thing in the morning, at 8:00am
Because I was not certain on how large of an area, would need to be searched, I enlisted the help of Gary Hill. Gary and I arrived promptly at 8:00am and were greeted by both Carly and Taylor. We were shown the area in which the dog had jumped on Carly and where she thought the Tiffany Bracelet would be, if the bracelet hadn’t ended up on the dog and moved to another area. Gary and I decided that we would split the area, in half. Gary would search the lawn area, closest to the road and he would work his way towards the house and I would start near the house, working my way towards the road. As I slowly walked towards the corner of the house, I received a few low conductor targets in the 12 to 15 range. Not low enough to be the Tiffany Bracelet and the depth, of the targets, were anywhere from 2 to 6 inches, in the ground, according to the depth gauge, on my Minelab Manticore. As Gary and I continued to search, I received the best target of the morning. A target reading 01 – 02 and exactly the reading I was looking for. I looked down and didn’t see the bracelet. I ran my fingers through the grass, hoping to snag the bracelet, but nothing was found. I told Taylor, who was very close to me, visually searching, for the target and he came over. As I was reaching for my pinpointer, Taylor started running his fingers through the grass and pushing the grass back. All of a sudden I hear him say, there it is and when I bent down, he showed me the Tiffany Bracelet , all balled up, deep in the grass. No wonder it wasn’t visually found, it was blending in with the grass and hidden by the grass, on top of that. Carly came running over and couldn’t be we had found it, thanking Gary and I. As Carly and Taylor looked at the bracelet, they could see one of the links had broken, when the dog jumped up on her. She and Taylor would be bringing the bracelet to a jeweler, to be repaired and it should be as good as new. Carly and Taylor thanked us again as were preparing to leave, telling up that they were amazed we found it and that they never would have found it, down deep in the grass like that. Gary and I thanked them for having the faith and trust, in us to find their sentimental piece of jewelry. When I asked Carly if the Tiffany Bracelet had been a gift or anything else special to it, she told me that she and Taylor had bought it together, the week they were married, a few years earlier. Thankfully we were able to find the Tiffany Bracelet and put the smiles back on their faces. Funny how finding a Tiffany “Smile” Bracelet put a smile on all of our faces. Who doesn’t love putting smiles on peoples faces ❤️🙏
