Paul Nolan, Author at The Ring Finders | Page 2 of 2

Labor Day, Mike was out in the backyard doing a little brush cutting. He and his wife were going to run out and do some shopping. Mike kind of got lost in his yard work when his wife came out to see how long he was going to be. He had just a few more branches to cut from an old Lilac bush. As he cut the branches his wife grabbed the branches and tossed them on a brush pile for him. As they were finishing up they realized that her Diamond necklace was missing. But where? She had put it on an hour or so before she went outside. They scoured the house, garbage, garage, and the backyard, nothing… Frustrated they looked online and found the ring finders and gave me a call. I had been out recovering another ring when they called.  I called them back and made a time to come over.  I stopped by on Saturday afternoon and took a look at the area that was the area in question.  Beautiful backyard with lush green grass backed up to a fairway to a golf course. About 150 – 200 feet diagonal across the backyard to a woodchipped planter that was approx 75′ x 75′ area that towards the back became denser with scrub brush.  This is the area he was working when his wife stopped out to give him a hand.  The grass in the backyard had been cordoned off from the mowers so it was long from missing the last mowing cycle.  So the search was on. I did a primary search on the high probability area – a direct line from the house to the area where the brush cutting was going on. The backyard had several fully mature trees that were about 80 years old. The elevation had not changed much from when the trees began life. This fact came through while checking the area with the metal detector. Hidden targets all over the area to be searched. You could not go 3 feet without having signals going off. This really slowed thing way down. Signal – check depth and 2 inches or less get the pinpointer out and search the grass.  We spent around 3 hours searching with nothing to show for it. We had brought out another necklace and laid it in the grass and it stuck out so well. We could not believe we could not find it.  We decided to call it a night and I would return the next day when we had more direct sunlight to help catch a sparkle.  Sunday at 10:30 I started with a more complete secondary search. First I ran through the complete front yard. Not there. Worked around the side yard to the backyard. I crossed my pattern from the day before moving three to four feet paths from the back of the house to the center of the backyard. back and forth completing the backyard in about 2 hours. I moved to the woodchipped area and methodically went through with a rake and shallow signal -rake to the weed barrier. Again most of the signals were coming below the weed barrier. After an hour I had worked my way to the back of the planter. I was starting to get the feeling that it was not in the yard- I should be able to see it?  As I took a couple steps I caught a sparkle. It had fallen into the crotch of a cut off bush and a small piece of the chain extended just beyond the cut nubs. I could not believe my sore eyes. It’s always the last place you look.  I am so thankful to have found it. I left it in a secure location so the returning homeowner could find where I left it for them. They were so excited and could not believe it was found.  While not being able to see the smiles, I could hear them it in their voices…