Trad Gang

i was day dreaming a bit at work yesterday while driving when a flash of red caught my eye in the drain by the road. straight away i thought to myself, that'll be a coke can. this got me thinking and reminded me of some of the times i've been hunting and found coke cans. some places in the middle of nowhere! i often wondered how they get there. sometimes they come to rest along some remote stretch of waterway. just when you think your the 1st person to step here......coke can.   :mad:

have you found strange things out there? or perhaps you've found something normal but under strange or uncanny circumstances?

i once was scrambling up a little rocky gully,  making my way up to a saddle on a ridge while hunting goats. head down bum up i was, going up,  when suddenly right under my nose was an old rabbit trap. just sitting on a boulder like it had been placed there. not a strange find but i was half way up a mountain in really rocky country! no rabbit in there right mind would be up there. must have been some one in earlier times perhaps using the same saddle that i was to get to the other side.

any memorable finds worth sharing?

I was hunting elk in Colorado and had back packed in quite a ways. I was going across a little meadow just below timber line and looked down and saw a screw driver. I looked around some more and found five of them. There was nothing around that looked like there would need screw drivers for. I still have them now 35 yrs. later. They are good quality ones as well.

^ those are some quality screwdrivers then

Something I find on almost 100% of my trips is old helium balloons. Only one actually had a message card attached to it. It had been part of a school balloon launch of some kind. All the rest have apparently been from athletic events, car dealership openings, weddings, etc.
Those things gotta settle somewhere; and a lot of them seem to settle in the deserts and mountians where I hunt.

Guy

A section of an Aborigine spearhead, presumably, found near a bubbling little creek where I hunt pigs. It would've made an ideal campsite in ancient times (well, it still does).

(http://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l164/b_kleinig/Archery%20Gear/IMG_0524.jpg)

(http://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l164/b_kleinig/Archery%20Gear/IMG_0525.jpg)

interesting find ben. you can see that hasn't been knapped, instead it has been ground on another rock to form it's edge.

My Grandfater found a boot with a leg bone in it way back in the Porcupine Mountains in Michigans UP.

that jogged my memory roger.

i've been hunting in arnhem land once before. i came across a rocky outcrop near a billabong. amongst the rocks were aboriginal rock art and holes in some of the rocks where they had been grinding up seeds.
i've also seen burial caves with complete human skeletons.

Ben, what is that made from? bone? rock?

Clint, could the trap have been taken there by a wedgetail, when a rabbit was in it?

Yep, it's rock, Otis.

whats a wedgetail?

An area in Wyoming where I used to hunt deer was used as a gunnery range in WW2. I have picked up numerous 50 cal cases and links in the area. I wonder how many deer and antelope got strafed by a novice P47 pilot back in the 1940s.

I came across an RV refrigerator in the middle of some timber I hunt by the Neosho river.  Had a hunch and went upstream about 500 yards and found the remains of a big camper that had been swept away by the flood a year earlier.  What a mess.

Dennis

A bow saw on a seriously steep drain in Idaho.  There was no reasonable explanation of it.

This year I found a mound of fresh dirt about the size of a grave, more than 2 miles from a road but only a few hundred yards from a major reservoir here in Indiana.  I thought "Uh,oh" but checked it out anyways.  I didn't find any obvious body but got nervous and quit looking.  I reported it to DNR and they spent hours CSI'ing the scene only to find that it was just a mound of dirt.  Why anyone would have put it there, I haven't a clue.  They did find where it came from though.

Centaur, on that topic, I heard that our Spitfires as well as the American fighters would strafe herds of buffalo on the floodplains near here from time to time. The carnage that would've produced isn't a nice thought.

This wasn't all that far from civilization but seemed out of place nonetheless...

(http://i240.photobucket.com/albums/ff187/GingivitisKahn/20081003_ac__wheelchair.jpg)

Two things come to mind:

There is a 1930's or 1940's car along the North Country Trail near Pictured Rocks in the UP of Michigan. I'm sure thousands of peopl ehave their picture taken by it!

Another "thing" I found was on a backpacking trip in the Grand Tetons:
I stopped by a tree and dug a cathole to take care of business. My plastic trowel hit something sort of hard. It turned out to be a rusted fuel canister wrapped in a plastic bag and burried.  While I appreciated the irony that of all the millions of acres around, I happened to find this one spot and I also appreciated that someone tried to cover up their trash rather than leaving it in plain sight. I did NOT appreciate that some scumbag was depositing such refuse in that beautiful piece of wilderness.

The Potomac River winds through the area where I live and one day while by the river right after a heavy fall rain a set of Moose antlers came washing down river. Wish I would have jumped in after them in hind sight. Not alot of Moose around here in Maryland!!

iv come across old ceremonial Wood and raw hide drums in a cave on a kopjie (rocky outcrop)

like Clint in never seizes to amaze me were you find cans or in south Africa Coke bottles

i find a lot of stuff snorkeling and diving
silver chains, ear rings, shopping trolleys you know the usual    :D

still waiting to find a pouch of gold and hawkin rifle here in the mountains    :rolleyes:    

My father-in-law has some property in the Manzano mountains in NM; we found the remains of an old colt revolver buried there.  We carefully pulled it out, cleaned it, and now have it on display.  No telling who put it there, and boy, if it could talk!

I was camped in a meadow in a National Forest in Oregon back about 1968 or 69.   There was a deep, broad, overgrown depression running across it.  I was walking along the depression when I saw a rounded metal shape in the prairie grass.  It looked like an iron kettle.  At first I though it was whole, but a little brushing and digging showed it to be a broken section, maybe 1/3 of an arc of a cast iron kettle maybe 10" or so across.   Other folks in the camping group informed me that the "rut" was actually part of the old Oregon Trail, heading down to the Columbia River at about where Hood River now is.  Over the years I've thought many times about that piece of kettle... someone breaking what had to be an important piece of equipment at almost the end of the long trip out from Missouri.

I was in the woods,stood by a aspen tree,only to find a carved name in the bark,,I knew a person by that name! Funny thing,I saw that person a week later,& asked him if he carved his name in a aspen tree in the location I was in. & he just couldnt believe it.He was 8 years old.w/ his dad deer hunting back in the late 60`s.Now his 47

I was working for the forest service in the Quachita's in Arkansas right out of college.  We took a lunch break at a scenic overlook deep in the forest one day. Beautiful location overlooking the rugged terrain.  We were on this huge rock outcropping, and I noticed something shiny down in a large crack.  The other two guys in the crew lowered me down by the legs, and I brought up an old six pack of pabst.  Pull tabs and all.  It took us a couple weeks to work up the courage to see if it was still good.  Turns out it was...!

We found an old metal tractor seat way out in the woods while tracking a deer.  We also found the metal ring from the outside of a wagon wheel.  You could see where it was forged together.  It had a huge vine growing inside of it that I had to cut to get it out.  

While helping my uncle look for a deer he shot at with a shotgun, I found his bullet.  It was laying on a leaf in a trail about 50 yards from where the deer was when he missed it.  It was a Brenneke slug.  When I found it, I asked him if he was shooting Brenneke's.  He said "yes", then I handed him the slug.  He couldn't believe it.  It had a dent in one side where it glanced off of a tree

Back in the late 1980s, I found an old leveraction rifle grown into the fork of a tree.  It must have been there for 30 years.  I bet it's still there.

In 1995, I found a camoflage rifle case complete with a Weatherby rifle and a Swarovski scope floating in the channel near the Point Retreat lighthouse near Juneau, AK.  I found the owner later that winter. He was up from Oregon and lost the rifle about a week earlier and 10 miles or so from where I found it.  It bounced out of his son's skiff in some rough seas and they couldn't see it in the water.

A buddy and I were walking along the shore by the ocean to get back to our boat, and came upon a row of wooden plugs in the ground, level with the surface. We had not seen them earlier as it was higher tide when we arrived. We followed the row of plugs and came to a defined bend in their layout. Finally got up on a tall rock and saw we had found one of two rows that converged into a vee or funnel. The whole arrangement covered 75 yards by 150 yards, next to a creek. Pulled up one plug and looked, it was sharpened like a stake on the bottom. (I put the plug back.)
Later went to an archaeology lecture put on by the Forest Service, and recognized we had found remains of a Tlingit indian fish trap. Originally these poles were high walls thatched with brush. The salmon got in at high tide and were trapped when the tide went out.
I told the archaeologist about our find, and marked it on a map. Later got a report. They radiocarbon dated it, several hundred years old, and the cuts on the poles were made with a stone axe. They said you can tell the tool was stone because the cuts are wavy, not straight.Apparently the salt water pickles the buried wood, and packed in the mud with no air, it does not decay.

Hunting elk near Dubois, Wyoming some years ago I was in some black timber on an elk trail when I came across the remains of a cabin. This was about 5 miles into the wilderness area. Still had an old bedframe, and glass that probably was from the 1920s. This was before GPS; I have been in that area several times since, and could never find the cabin in the maze of black timber. Another time in the same general area, I came across a lodgepole 'funnel' high on a mountain. The Sheepeater Indians used funnels to kill game, and I think that is what this was, but again, I could never find it. Too bad I didn't have GPS at the time; sure would like to go back and do some more looking around in those spots.
And then there's this....
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v47/ceastes/IMG_0164.jpg)
This old tractor is in a nice little meadow in the Bighorns, leftover from logging operations many years ago I'm guessing.

Several years ago while gun hunting I entered the woods on an old dirt track following it about 1/4 mile in. When it got light enough I cut into the woods and could smell something burned or burning. After about 50 yds I came upon the remains of a car that had been torched. I wrote down the VIN because there were no plates. Followed it's tracks back to the dirt road. I was amazed that they got the vehicle in that far. Anyways after hunting I went to the local PD and gave them the VIN. It turns out the vehicle had just been reported stolen by the next town over.

I imagine this has happened to many of you, but I often find golf balls in places that Tiger Woods couldn't put them on his best driving day. Just last week a friend of mine was hunting up near the White Mountains and found an old abandoned apple orchard full of deer and bear sign. In one pile of bear scat he found a golf ball. Who could have guessed?

Man this is neat anybody got anymore?

I found a fanny pack on the last day of firearms season here in Michigan.

It had been there over a week I guessed. I contained a frozen and broken open Coke, rope, pruning shears, a Buck Pathfinder knife, some .35 Remington ammo, a pipe, and a bag of pot.

Still have the knife, the shears, and the fanny pack. I dumped the pot out.

Walking through a pine thicket and noticed a big black case half buried. My first thought was i it might be a case full of money, drugs or a body. Turned out to be a old drum set in great shape.

Hunting in Georgia I have come across countless numbers of moonshine stills. Some were tiny little operations and others had a truckload of fifty gallon drums and broken crock jugs.

An old friend of mine told me when he was a little kid hunting around Treat mtn in Georgia with his dad they came up on a big working still. Worried that eyes may be on them, his dad picked up a hanging tin cup and filled it with the drippings and drank it, hung up the cup and turned and went back the way they came. No sense in being mistaken for Government men!

I found a perfectly good grunt call last year.  I picked it up and tried to blow it.  A big old spider climbed out just as I got it to my lips!  I don't like spiders!  My buddy thought it was funny!

Not me personally, but my cousins own a sawmill in PA and they once were cutting some old mature timber and found a blunderbuss musket with the flared muzzle completely grown inside a tree.  I think it was a crotch piece.  They figured the gun was leaned there and then for some reason abandoned.  Brings to mind thoughts of pilgrims, pioneers and injuns.

Another find.
While in Dawson, Y.T., I was camping across the Yukon from town, and went for a walk along the river, heading north/downstream. Walked about 1/4 mile from camp and found a side slough of the river where they scuttled sternwheel river boats. Boats were floated in and left to fall apart, some places they were resting on the remains of earlier boats left there. Some had the tall pilothouses still up, reminded me of Planet of the Apes. I poked around amidst boilers, bottles & hanging shreds of asbestos. Later in town found old photos (1890's)of some of these same boats during the Klondike gold rush, recognized the names on them. The lady at the visitor center said they did not advertise these being there due to hazards, but I thought it was really interesting.

A baseball glove(the old individual finger type)on very remote timber in Southern Iowa.
I'm guessing it was from the 1950's or 60's.

Out hunting around here and found a mdl T or what was left of it, no motor or wheels.  Any way I was telling my dad about it and he said that they always heard that there was a mdl T out in the woods around there but they had never seen it.  Any way he had heard about it when he was a kid back in the early 1930s. I took my daughter to see it and to get a few pictures of it to show my dad since he isn't able to get around very good anymore.

I saw a deer once.

When I was a kid my Dad and I were walking out of the woods and saw what looked like a piece of metal sticking out of the ground.  Dad dug it out and it was obvious part of something at one time.  Turned out to be the base plate for a surveying tool used in the mid 1800's.  
Me and a good buddy were recently elk hunting in Colorado and about 4 miles into the trail at around 11,500' we found a saddle just laying there a couple feet off the trail.  It was above timberline and obviously had beent there for a while.
This is a cool thread, like to read more.

Ethan

Hunted a slope in eastern Oregon years ago. As usual, looking at the ground when I should have been looking ahead. Found an empty cartridge in a long obsolete caliber. A few steps later, I found an obsidian arrow head. Felt like I was in the right place.

As far as things like a bow saw being on a slope where they had not reason to be, don't for get that an item dropped on crusty snow can slide for half a mile or more if the way is clear.

Jim

I have 2 once while scouting a mountain side in WV a good 2 miles from anywhere.I found a grunt call sticking out of the end of a hornets nest.Hanging a good 18,20 feet up.

 Another time again in

Sorry about that.
 Another time in WV high up in a sattle on a ridge I found a snapping turtle skull.No ponds,lakes,or rivers for miles.

On a grizzly hunt back in 1987 in the Nebesna mountains in Alaska I found a old 4 wheel drive vehicle.  It was just about 100 miles from the nearest road.  

On the same trip I also found a cabin that I spent the night in.  It was raining cats and dogs and I was thankful.  There was a newspaper on the table dated 1973. Left the cabin like I found it.

I found a rifle once; a nice one that someone dropped that day in the snow after killing a spike bull elk. Reported it to the sheriffs dept.

My son found a pop can in the mountains; way up high on an old overgrown logging road. It had teeth marks in it; and the top of the can had not been opened.
 I had left it there years and years before.
I spent the night on that old logging trail; and woke up before light and found that a bear had bitten into the only liquid I had; the two cans of diet pop. They were laying next to me a foot or so away- as I slept.
 I figured leaving the cans was like a monument to my ability to sleep good. I normally to not litter - but this was in my mind something different. Kudos to my progeny.
               ~~~~~ and ~~~~~~
 I found my truck once after 3 nights- in below zero temperatures.    :rolleyes:

QuoteOriginally posted by sendero25:
I saw a deer once.

:biglaugh:    Good point.

I found a model T door sticking out both sides of a large tree trunk once. No tree crotch so it couldn't have had the tree grow around it.

There was a very old man living close by and I asked him about it. He said there was an extremely powerful tornado that came through the valley in the 20s or 30s that destroyed the area and pierced a lot of the remaining trees with debris.

Hunting the Catkills when I was kid(tagged along with dad) we came across an old, HUGE, ceramic doll stuck in a tree. It was spooky for a kid!

I found a sickle blade when I retrieved my arrow from my last bow kill(wheelie).

I find garbage all too often.

Locally there are two old school buses way out in the woods. Tehy were deer camps, way back in the day.

(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v47/ceastes/P1020616.jpg)
Saw this while searching in vain for an elk this year. The Forest Reserves were designated in 1891, and became national forests in 1907. This old benchmark has been around a while.

While tracking a deer I shot on "Lanb Between The Lakes" my dad was kneeling down looking for blood and about 2" from his hand was an old aluminum arrow shaft with a rusty bear razorhead on the front end.  Thought that was kind of cool.

was out rifle hunting one year and foud a 6mm clip fully loaded,guess whoever lost it was out of luck for the day unless it was a spare. me and my son were out metal detecting out behind the farm in the field and he walks up and says daddy is this an arrowhead,sure enough it was and a real good one at that.

The paperboy found two deer rifles laying on the berm, one Sunday morning in November. My friend and his dad drove about 60 miles to go deer hunting and then had to turn around and drive home when they discovered they had no weapon to use.

I wish someone would come and walk around the woods where I hunt and see if they can find my ability to kill deer with a bow...I seem to have lost it November of 2006 when I shot my last one with a compound.  
I switched to traditional the next year.

Seriously...I hunt near Greenville, MI...I can give directions!  :readit:  

Josh

-While hunting about 5 miles deep on a mountain near Hope Alaska I bent down to tie my boot and found a Marijuana pipe.  I found an old gold mine about 40 yards from there.

I've found several cheap knives including the Swiss army knife my uncle gave me as a kid twice.  Still havn't found it a 3rd time. If you do let me know!

The most important thing I have found is my soul   :cool:  

Charlie

I found half an Indian pot while boat hunting once. It was aged at over 3000 years.
(http://i172.photobucket.com/albums/w39/rcswampbucket/33821-R1-17-20A_018.jpg)

 and a lot of old graves.

(http://i172.photobucket.com/albums/w39/rcswampbucket/IMG_0126.jpg)

How about this old wagon wheel with a tree growed around it..RC


(http://i172.photobucket.com/albums/w39/rcswampbucket/IMG_0222.jpg)

I've searched and dreamed of finding cool stuff but never have.  I found an old holster in the remains of an old trappers cabin when I lived in the Alaskan bush.  I used it for the bill on my marten hat.

 (http://i158.photobucket.com/albums/t115/toddsmith5298/trad_gang_todd.jpg)

Can't really see the bill in this shot but that's the hat I made.  Warmest hat I've ever worn too...

Some freinds of mine found a Browning High-Wall in 45-70 in the Chatanika river.  Pretty rusted but I think they were able to get it working again.

Great thread!!  todd

Hey Todd how did you get the martin?
I found an old gold mine claim sheet stuck in a tobacco tin and nailed to a tree on a moutain in MONTANA and a set of dentures just across the drainage. A friend found a newhouse bear trap that got scratched up by a dozer cutting a new logging rd. That was sweet. I found also three knives, and lost two.
Chuck

A few artifacts from MD,WV and NV.30 rd M16 magazine from the mountains of Northern California a few miles from the military's mountain warfare school.

The revolver frame was determined to be a pocket Colt percussion revolver from the mid-1800's-Montana.

The pipe looking thing is a surveyer's lock level,that I found,half buried in the dirt under a very low,sort of rock cave in a remote area of the WV mountains.I crawled under there looking for bobcat sign.It is solid brass and the level's glass vial with bubble are still good.
(http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a140/jbrandenburg/FoundItems.jpg)

Chuck, I trapped them.  I was living in the bush up there.  I trapped of, five or six that winter.  Shot one with my bow and one with a .44 mag.

todd

roger norris- a wedgetail is an eagle we have here.  
wedgetailed eagle

I had hunted elk hard one day and was drained, coming off the mtn I saw an old Mtn Dew can and though "SOB's trashing the wilderness" and took the moment to pick someones trash up and it was still full, unopened and drank wonderfully  :)

I found a very interesting piece of turquois on top of a pice of flat rock, wedged into a crevice behind a very large indian chief petroglyph south of Albuquerque .... also found in that area was a very old cast iron wood stove.

In Colorado I've found old camp sites littered with stuff from the 1950's or older I imagine and teeth marks from bears on almost all of it.

In suburban woods I found a bong stashed in a hollow tree. I busted it up and put it back in.  I've found a few old cars with trees growing out of them.

In Alaska, near Wasilla, I came across the remains of someone's moose kill.  There was lots of hair and one small antler and a Kershaw knife, case, and three inter-changeable blades.  In Denali National Park I came across an aluminum cylinder while hiking.  It had teeth marks all over it.  I opened it up and inside was a telephoto lense for a professional movie camera. I reported it to the rangers but they didn't know of any missing equipment, although several filming crews had been there recently, including Wild America.  A week later he told me to keep it.  I sold it to a photo shop for cash and rolls of film.

I've also found  Fairy Stones (http://www.dcr.virginia.gov/state_parks/fai.shtml) .   :D  
  (http://files.tellmewhereonearth.com/Photos%20Fairy%20Stones/j586-2.JPG)

only material thing was a carbon arrow with a toy(machanicl) broadhead.  best of all i found simplicity and i found myself

I read an article about a guy who was hunting in the mountains when he came across a cave. Upon looking inside he discovered a human skeleton with an old flintlock rifle laying across the lap. Scraped into the cave wall was one word; "Lost". The hunter took the remains and the rifle, dug a grave and laid them to rest.

Thought that was pretty interesting.

Years ago, while fishing for wild brook trout in a small, Central Pa. "crick", I stopped and took a couple of drinks out of the creek with one of those orange plastic telescopic cups. I finished, took two steps upstream and found a deer, rotting in the creek, about 10 ft. from the small waterfall I just drank out of....... YUMMY.

As the saying goes, "Always drink upstream from the herd".   :bigsmyl:

Right Todd, I was thinking of the one you shot with the pistol. Thats a funny story. BTW whos the young guy in that photo?
This is a very cool thread.

I found a big chunk of AMITHEST in Michigans U.P. as well as many artifacts from the native people.

I was in New Mexico elk hunting week before last and found some indian pottery.  Pretty cool designs.

When I was a kid I found a functioning men's dressy wrist watch - kept it for many years.  It was lying in a creek that I played in way out in the woods.  Band was bent a little.  Must have snagged on something and fallen off.  Wish I still had it - I think mom threw it away eventually.  Moms...

I was trout fishing in a river in northern Michigan with a buddy of mine. We found a pair of shorts in the river that had a nice belt buckle on it and an empty wallet in it.

I also found a very old car battery at the bottom of a river. It had six battery cylinders inside and the outside was wood. I threw it out of the river.

TTT

One for ya Ozzy.....more of a lucky escape than a find.. but i've still got it.

I was hunting for Yaby's (crayfish) on some land my uncle had up in the Blue mountains(Sydney way).1983.

The creek was down a steep ravine, crystal clear water about 8" deep.  I felt something tickle across the top of my white foot.

Looked down and saw this,


  (http://i306.photobucket.com/albums/nn273/andyabersoch/102_3881-1.jpg)


Funnel web spider.


Pretty sure that if it had tagged me I would'nt have made it back to the top.

After being froze to the spot for what seemed a long time I finished it off with my forked stick (drowned it). Since found out they can survive for 24 hrs underwater.

Ha!  Chuck, I'm not sure I remember the kid in that photo...  Or, maybe the sad thing is I still think I'm him!      

Yeah this is a cool thread.  Wish I had found more cool stuff to share.

Have seen lots of old wood burning stoves and abandoned trappers cabins.  Always hoped to find a vintage lever action 45-70, still looking...

Never found a stone arrow head and have looked for years...

In several camps we've started arrow trees.  Shooting broadheads up into the tree and leaving them for future hunters.

I guess in the wilderness I did find a closeness to God that was new and a feeling of insignificance to nature...  todd

I've found pocket knives and a wagon wheel.

I also see lots of single shoes ... not pairs of shoes, just singles.  I always wonder how one shoe comes off and you don't notice till later.

I lost my granddads Marbles knife near Grayling, MI in 1976. Just sayin...........Tom

I was eating lunch on the north slope of a mountain pass near Miner's Delight, Wyoming in the Wind River Range several miles from any road and pushed over a rock to make a flat spot to sit.  Under the rock were 11 shell casings that I recognized as 45-70 caliber.  Later that summer I took them when I went to the Custer Battle Field and showed them to a resident archaeologist who identified them as Army issue and pre 1872.  They are copper and not brass and were not reloadable as are the brass ones.  No way to know if they guy that fired them was hunting buffalo or indians.  I always wondered why he hid them under the rock for me to find 130 years later in fantastic shape.  They were stacked neatly making me think they were put there and that the rock didn't just roll onto the pile.

Matt

Love this thread.

Keep 'em coming

Found an arrowhead near the Walhonding river in ohio last year, my bow found a flintlock gun hammer a few years ago metal detcting, maybe it was Ethan Allens, he used to own this land.

TTT

Great thread, I've been enjoying this for days. Never know what you'll find out there but thing I can guarantee is you ain't gonna find it sitting around the house.
The best thing I ever found in the woolies is a few great places to set and watch the wind blow by.

I was elk hunting on Elk creek in the white river NF in Colorado.  I had hiked down to the creek from Buttermilk trail head.  It started getting dark and I needed a good place to sleep with some type of cover because I did not bring a tent.  As I was walking along the creek I saw a small ledge about 10 feet up on the side of a rock wall.  There was a crack in the rock that would allow me to climb up to the ledge and maybe sleep there out of the weather.  It only looked about 3 foot wide from the ground.  By the time I figured out how to get up it was dark.  With my flashlight in me teeth I climbed up to find a sardine can with a piece of cloth and wax. I think that is the most amazing thing to think some one else had the same idea years ago.

A friend of mine in the bush of Alaska left a Jimmy Lyle knife sitting on a rock.  He didn't remember it until too many miles of lining the canoes upriver.  That was a sweet knife too.  Maybe one you you all found it...

I had a canoe capsize on the Pigeon river and lost a nice bottle of...  

...firewater.      :smileystooges:   todd

LOL at the shoes!  I once found a pair of smoking hot black high heels way back in the woods.  I had a great time trying to imagine how they came to be there.   :saywhat:  

I have found the remains of turpentine and logging operations, arrowheads, glass electrical insulators, and assorted other cool artifacts from homesteads and campsites.  One of the coolest things that I have found was the top part of an old crock.  Only a little piece was sticking out of the clay.  I dug it out and this was my treasure:

(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v611/dudleyg/reedcamera059.jpg)

Moonshiners?

I found this just north of Mandan, ND where i grew up. I think it is definatly a tooth, but too big for anything that i have seen around there, it is old too. I think it might be an old mountain lion tooth?

I drilled the hole for a necklace when i was a kid, i wish i wouldn't have done that now.

(http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b194/MN_Littles/100_5421.jpg)

I've pulled up a couple interesting things on the anchor rope while fishing. One was a small "rock" that had a near perfect fossilized sea shell. Another was a huge old anchor from I'm guessing a commercial fishing boat. It had to be very old judging from the style and the fact the area hadn't been fished commercially in a good 50+ years.

I seem to find old bottles.  My treasure is an old "Sloans Linament" cork top type bottle found years ago way out from the roads... Also found a "swamp root" Kidney Liver and Bladder Cure cork type bottle.  Many, many insulators of about every color.  I always pick them up for my collection of "stuff"...

In Colorado in the early 80s while half way through a 40 mile week long hike we came upon a abandoned camp miles and miles from nowhere.  Tent was destroyed (by weather) but everything from clothes to camp items were scattered in the area.  I've always wondered what happened to those campers...?

I have also been enjoying this one for several days.

I have found nothing but have enjoyed reading about everyone elses.

Please keep them coming!

We go west every winter for 3 months.  Found many arrowheads, manos, matate's and pottery shards.  We also metal detect. Found several pre-1870's 45/70 and 45/60 casings, mules shoes, pony shoes and old horse shoes.  We find an ocasional military button.  It's always fun as the kids love to go through our "stuff" that we find.

Went to a  world war one encampment and found many rifle casings and some french machine gun casings.  I did locate a 1910 seated liberty dime once in that same location.

We never leave home without our detectors in the truck.  I found an old trappers cabin in the U.P. of Michigan once and found 9 wood ticks all over me during the course of two days so you do have to be careful!

Go to Bear Creek campgrounds near Quincy IL and look up in one of the old cottonwoods in the first campsite to the right. You'll see the "marker" for broken arrow campsite.

TTT

Hey Tom.  I used to hunt Bear creek lots of years ago.  I liked that place.
ChuckC

A grave stone from 1806. I asked the landowner and he said it was a french soldier that left the army after the war for indepedence, become an American  and once farmed that very land. I hunted twenty feet away from his final resting place.

Somebody found $4000 at a book store in Anchorage the other day. As for me I have a hard time finding myself some days. My father has found some pretty neat stuff. He has found several cannon balls, hand fulls of ammo led and casings, an old lever action rifle (all the wood was gone). My grandfather found an old pistol in the middle of a cow path he was trailing his cows down. I think it was a military issue 45 semi auto. My dad was looking at it one day and thought it something look odd. The hammer was locked and rusted back so he put it in a oil bath for a year and finally slid the action back and a live round fell out. There was no clip in the gun, but I guess that could have fallen out over the years being kicked around by cows. Thanks for the entertainment
Olin

Here (in AZ) where I do most of my hunting signs of earlier people are always around.  I think the old adobe buildings and dry laid stone walls give me the most to think about.  I have sat next to them and tried to imagine what they were like when people used them.  I think the walls bring me the most inspiration as they are usually back up in a canyon where there is water year round and sometimes I find rock art.  I have only found 1 knapped head in 26 years here in the southern part of AZ up north there are a lot of obsidian points and flakes.
MAP

Along that same line, Michael, when I was a kid I worked on my uncle's farm a couple of summers near Wilcox, Az. We found numerous metates ( Indian grinding stones). I have seen them now in antique stores for hundreds of dollars. Oh well....

While a friend and I were packing my raft back to the water over a rocky beach on Admiralty Island, I noticed a odd shaped rock. On the trip back to get our hunting gear, I dug out the object, which turned out to be a Native Alaskan stone maul. It was used in conjunction with stone wedges to make Sitka Spruce planks. Couldn't have been used much, as it was in perfect shape. Maybe it was lost when a canoe tipped over?

My wife turned it in to the State Museum. It's the smooth, dark one in the upper left:

(http://i264.photobucket.com/albums/ii185/finnish-archer/Family/stonetools_sm.jpg)

About 15 years ago I was hunting Porter Mt. in Colorado and decided to take a long walk around the beast which is about a 10 mile afternoon jaunt.  Half way around I found a GPS.  Back then few  folks had them.  I am assuming they made it out ok :-)

Also on that same hunting trip I found three different weather balloons, two still had their payload intact.  

The talk around camp that trip was around what I would find next...it turns out almost anything except elk.

Also when I built my house 5 years ago, we found a perfect arrowhead in the yard when we seeded it.  That was extra cool considering we stripped and then replaced the topsoil after building.  Always thought that was the perfect sign.

Quotei

QuoteOriginally posted by Tioga:
 

Quotei often wondered how they get there. sometimes they come to rest along some remote stretch of waterway. just when you think your the 1st person to step here..

I think I may have connected with a primitive hunter from the past. It was a cold January day, with a foot of snow that had an inch of crust on it. Sneaking was out of the question, so I was carting my flinter and quietly working my way up through a small brook that flows from a mountain here in Tioga County. About a mile into the hunt, I looked down and spied what looked like an antler tip protruding through the sandy streambottom.

 Sure enough, it was this antler. The tips had been worked to a sharp point, and the other end was somehow drilled out in an oblong shape.

  (http://i354.photobucket.com/albums/r420/KJH62457/IMG_2235.jpg)

  (http://i354.photobucket.com/albums/r420/KJH62457/IMG_2236.jpg)

  (http://i354.photobucket.com/albums/r420/KJH62457/IMG_2238.jpg)

  (http://i354.photobucket.com/albums/r420/KJH62457/IMG_2239.jpg) [/b]

QuoteOriginally posted by Tioga:

TTT

Love this thread!!!!

On a Friday night after work I drove out to the Mojave Desert to do some coyote hunting. It's a 4 hour drive for me so I got out there pretty late and was only interested in finding a place to sleep.
Pulling off a dirt road to a dirt track I found a flat spot, layed out my tarp and sleeping bag and packed it in.
When I got up the next morning the only thing I was initially interested in was watering the bushes. I pulled on my pants and boots and headed for the nearest bush. While there I looked around to see the sights and the first thing I saw was a woman's shirt on the ground nearby. It was fairly new and not covered in dust or leaves. After finishing my watering I wandered over to the shirt and saw some shoes, then socks, then underwear, when pants. I'd found an entire outfit for a somewhat small woman spread over a small area of the desert.
I was pretty worried about what else I'd find but I looked around for quite awhile and didn't find anything else.
I've always worried about finding a body out in the desert and I was thankful that this wasn't the time to find one. But I still don't know why those clothes were laying out there.

Guy

I was hunting in a deep canyon in Colorado a few years ago and while climbing over several deadfalls, discovered an old 24SRTX aluminum arrow with a Bodkin head stuck in a log. I assumed someone years earlier had stuck it high in the tree and it had died and fallen over.

I was visiting a friend in Utah once and was showing him how my metal detector worked in his yard. He was impressed when I found several coins and a silver turquoise ring. He decided he had to have a metal detector and became an avid user. A few months later, he and his wife were detecting an old homestead site and found a cache of silver coins. There was over $7000 dollars worth including mostly silver dollars with halves and quarters.

In 1997 I enlisted in the Army as a Cavalry Scout. My training was conducted at Ft. Knox, KY. During our field portion, I was digging a drainage trench around my shelter half, when I struck metal about a foot down. It ended up being a old rusted horse shoe.

It was hell smuggling it out of boot camp, with all the restrictions then, but I still have it today. I like to think it belonged to the horse of yesterdays Cavalry trooper. I still have it and display it proudly for luck.

While hunting Ive never found anything of significant value, but have always wondered how the junk Ive come across has gotten there. Makes for some healthy deep thought.

Ive never found a "pair" of shoes either......

Great thread

I have never really ahd the opportunity to find anything of signifigance while hunting but I have had the opportunity to hunt private property with a metal detector near Gettysburg, PA.

The land that my brother and I were hunting was once a confederate hospital, the property still had the original house and barn! The owener told us that they would operate on the wounded soldiers in the house and she showed us where she was told they would discard all the "waste".

After several hits in the detector we found countless nails, a perfume bottle from paris France with a glass topper in perfect conditon. Then we found several knife or bayonet tips. We assusmed these were tips that were removed from the soldiers and discarded. We only found one bullet, we found over three dozen bayonet tips, it must have been a gruesome fight!

My Dad dropped me off the end of an island and we planned to meet at noon. I'd walk the beach and he would fish out of his boat on the lee side.
After a couple miles I saw a black plastic bag at the storm tide line. Almost afraid to look inside thinking I'd find fish guts or diapers or a human head I found four cans of beer. Tasted pretty good to us at lunch I might add.

Joshua

QuoteIve never found a "pair" of shoes either......

That reminds me....I did find a just about brand new Herman Survivor boot out in the middle of nowhere once. Wasn't even close to a trail of any kind. 2 years earlier, there was a fella that just disappeared from the face of the earth from a rented motel room in Tioga County.

 I notified the DCNR and turned the boot over to them. Never heard anything more about it and they never did find the missing person. He's prolly drinking fine wine and eating fish eggs in France.  :confused:

while out on the desert we saw a long pile of rocks.  Assumed it was a grave although there was no marker or anything to indicate thats what it was.  We wouldn't detect the grave but we did around it.  We found 2 45/70 casings the old rim fire type. My buddy then said, Look at all these little nails.  He had about twenty small 1/4 inch rusty brads.  They were found at one end of the pile of rocks.

I said well he must have got two shots off before he was killed him and they buried him with his boots at the end of the grave site.

Thats the only reason we could come up with as a reason for the small large quantity of nails being in one little spot in the middle of no-where.  Funny how ones imagination will run away.

A few years ago I decided to meet up with a few friends after Church service to scout public land that just opened for public hunting a year or so before we explored it...Well I called my friend and he was running a little late so I decided to just start walking in some pines and as I started in I came across what looked to be a 2 foot by 1 foot metal box...I walked over to it and flipped it over and saw it was a safe with no door...I then thought maybe someone had just threw their junk in the woods so as I started walking around I came across another metal box and thought that can't be another safe..Well I walked over and flipped it over and sure enougth it was...Then like most people would do I looked in the safe and saw a lot of money wrappers and a plastic bin and thought someone must of stole these and as I was looking in the stuff I found a handfull or so of coin left in it...I called my buddy a D.N.R. officer and he called the local Sherrifs department and they came out and took the evidence and asked how much did I keep? The Deputy was a young fella that go's to my church and was kidding me ...A few days later I met a Detective who wanted to meet me in the spot I found them...I grabbed my metal detector and took it with me incase they wanted to look for money or whatever might of got left behind...As I walked the area where I found them the detective said"Would be nice if we could find the door to one of the safe's and it should have a serial number and might find where it came from...Well as we talked I was looking around and I saw something metal under some brances and it was the door to one of the safes...He had to leave and asked if I find any more evidence to call him...I grabbed my metal detector went back in and found a spent .22 cal. bullet head and a combination lock that was cut with bolt cutters...He called me a few weeks later and said he found out where the safes were stolen from ...They were stolen from a Super Soda store several years earlier  about 20 miles away and about $500.00 was taken from the safes if my memory serves me right...I thought it was nice for the detective to share with me what he found out...Sorry for the long story....Keefer's <")))><

awesome story Keefer ,thanks for sharing. I bought a metal detector two years ago and been thinking of taking it along to some of the places i hunt but have not done so yet . in fact i only used it once to find my keys in the snow.

I once found a grenade that was a dud hunting at Stewart air force base.  I told the DEC guy where it was but didn't want to touch it.

Charlie

While hunting mulies in the Wasatch Mnt in Utah came upon this little "cave".  Second pic showes a little wood stove and further in there is a five gallon bucket with some cans of food and beer.  futher back there it drops off abouit 10 feet to some old mining stuff under water.  Though it was pretty cool...

(http://i222.photobucket.com/albums/dd238/calebmichael2003/DSC00081.jpg)

(http://i222.photobucket.com/albums/dd238/calebmichael2003/DSC00080.jpg)

 (http://i222.photobucket.com/albums/dd238/calebmichael2003/th_20090919155230.jpg) (http://s222.photobucket.com/albums/dd238/calebmichael2003/?action=view¤t=20090919155230.flv)

Found this thread...

Found myself sitting in an office during hunting season.  :(

The other day I was scouting and working my way up a ridge that has alot of benches on it. I had just about gotten to the top of one of the benches, when a deer jumped up from its bed. After it was out of sight, I went to the bed, which was in a depression, and low and behold the deer was laying on a cheap nylon back pack, an blaze orange hat, a blaze orange vest, and a sack that looks like it had an umbrella stasthed in it. Right beside it, was a dandy fold up camo chair stuffed in its case, and a bag of unopened pretzels. These items had been there quite a while, as the vest was rotted and the hat was very faded and the chair was pretty rusted. Of course, this was on state gamelands, so I naturally had to pack out the litter.  :)    ;)    :p  

 I'd love to hear the story about this find. I can't imagine why somebody would wear these items to the deer woods, and leave them behind like that.  :confused:

This year while hunting the wilderness in the Washington Cascades, I was appointed to be the official balloon finder.  I found 7 or 8 in a weeks hunting, no one else found any.  Couldn't find an elk to save my life, but garbage was aplenty.

I was working my way down a game trail switchback in the Northern California foot hills of the Sierras following pigs. The vegetation was getting thicker and thicker the lower I got. I heard the sound of moving water below me. It leveled out and suddenly the vegetation changed. I found myself standing in a forest of marijuana, 8 to 9 feet tall. I did something foolhearty. I searched out the growers boobytraps and disarmed them. Went down stream and found the logging road and made my way to my truck and called the State Police and told them what I found. They had me show them and when we got there, about 3 hours after I had been there, they found 20 men hurriedly harvesting and trying to get outta dodge.
Anyway arrests were made and the crop was destroyed.
In the woods in Michigan while squirrel hunting I found a Sears & Roebuck 12 gauge pump shotgun leaning against a tree, next to a pile of squirrels skins with heads and guts and flies.
I guess the hunter had dressed out his limit and put in a cooler and something and absentmindedly forgot the gun. My Dad had a shotgun just like it. In fact it was his one of my older brothers was the absent minded one.

I was walking down a deer trail here in the U.P. one fall  quite a ways from the nearest gravel road and found 6 old victor 1 1/2 longsprings. My uncle found a rusted canthook sticking out of a beaver dam here too. Another time I was just setting up for a night time coyote hunt and flashed my light where I was gonna sit and found an "el cheapo" buck knife in a sheath.

I was in a large cypress swamp in North Florida back in the late 70's. I saw something sticking out of a hole full of water. It was a wheel and the main landing gear leg of an aircraft. The water hole was the crater where the plane crashed. Found some more pieces, one had a date stamp of 1941. This was a couple of miles from the closest road.
I called the local FAA office and they had no record of a crash in that area. They said it was most likely an old military training aircraft for World War 2. Oh yeah, there was a real nice rub line about 10 yards from the crash. Never did get that buck!

From last weekend...

My Great Grandfather carved his initials in this tree a few years ago!

It's always nice to see it when I'm hunting.

 (http://i63.photobucket.com/albums/h138/oliverstacy/IMG_0799.jpg)

Josh

Thats cool. One time up near our camp i found my grampas initials scratched into a section corner plate. forgot all about that till your post,thanks.

those screw drivers are MINE / left them there yrs ago

About 10 years ago out fishing and walking along a gravel bar in the interior of Alaska I found a GPS unit laying on the ground with "ADF&G" stamped on it.  (Alaska Dept. of Fish & Game.)  I returned it to their office much to their surprise.  I told the officer, "Since I returned your GPS you should come to church with me this Sunday."  He never came.  I should have had him meet me at church, then give it to him.  Next time....  :)

Summer of 1971, I was just back from overseas---best friend and I were backpacking in the Caribou Wilderness Area (northern CA---no caribou---no idea why they named it that way), appproaching a lake.  Found a pair of green trousers draped on a log across the trail--then a khaki shirt hanging on a manzanita bush.  Then we were greeted by a lovely USFS ranger who had been sunbathing (in a yellow flowered bikini) next to the lake (your tax dollars at work).  Quite a find for a 21 year old ex-booneyrat.

I once came across a whole bevy of nekkid college girls skinny-dipping in a creek near the Foothills Trail near the Chattooga River.  They were pretty funny scrambling for their clothes.   We ended up sharing a camp later that night.  Funny thing, I ran into a couple of them a year or so later at an FCA camp.  They made me swear not to tell anyone about our first meeting.

roger norris 2
a wedgetail is an eagle the biggest one we have in australia

Found a liquid fill compass on top of a fence post in the mountains in Colorado.

QuoteOriginally posted by Talondale:
Found myself sitting in an office during hunting season.   :(  

Been there too Talon..  Thanks for the laugh...