The Ring Finders Blog | Page 1081 of 1146

During the last week of July Renee, a mother of a 6 year old son and a new 7 week old who displayed her ring on her big toe, called me from finding my name on the ring finders directory. She had been visiting her sister in Holland, MI and went down to a little beach at Holland Township Park. The water that day was very rough with 3 to 4 foot waves so Renee just stood by the shore and played with her 6 year old son splashing in the water. As she bent over to touch the water her diamond ring fell off. The wedding band and diamond were connected together so it was a little heavier than just one ring and went under the water and sand very quickly with the rough water.

I went out the park the next day but the water was still rough and was hard to find a target let alone dig for it, so I told a teary eyed Renee that I would be back when the water was calm. I went back in a few days but was still unable to find it. I promised Renee that I had a network of detectorist  that would help. I put out a blast email and several people went out over the next couple of weeks to no avail. Then at a chance meeting a friend Dave B. met another detectorist at Lowes and told him the story about the ring and where it was supposed to be. Dave V. went out that night and found the ring. I have been detecting for 40 years and should have known that when the lake is rough and stormy the water rises and when it is calm the water recedes. Dave V. looked in the sand about 2 feet from shore and about 8″ down there it was, waiting for over 4 weeks to be found.

A call went out to Renee’s Marine husband, Teo, letting him know we found her ring and wanted to present it to her. In a couple of days they were going to a Marine family picnic at a park in my town and decided that would be a good place to present it. A video of the presentation was made and there were plenty of hugs and tears including mine. What a rewarding experience to return something that meant so much to a young couple. Semper Fi.

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Three weeks ago Christina and her Marine husband Mike were running their dog in the shallow water at Pinconning County  Park about a mile from their home. Whenever they go down to the water with their dog Mike gives Christina his 14K white gold wedding band with 10 diamonds for safe keeping. Christina put it on her finger and forgot about it when she picked up a clump of dirt from the bottom of the lake and threw it for her dog to chase after. Off comes the ring and on goes the computer to search for a ring finder. Being that it was a 2 hour drive I had to make arrangements to visit them the following day. My detecting friend Dave B. and I talked to Christina and she explained where and how she threw the ring, so we set up a grid in the area which was the size of a basketball court. Once into the water we found that you could walk out hundreds of feet and get no deeper than about 3 feet. The problem was that the deeper you got the silt and clay got mushier. When we got a signal and dug we came up with silt and a big clump of clay to add to the problem when we swept the coil the water turned gray from the silt and clay.

After about a three hour search we told Christina and Mike that we could not find it but because Mike had just got out of the Marines and they were both going to school and looking for a job we wanted to help them. They paid me gas money and I told them that we would be back but the next time it was on my dime.

Last Monday, 2 weeks later, we again set up a grid starting from the deepest part where we were told the ring should be and then searching towards shore. We started at 11 am and slowly worked our way to the shore and at about 5 pm 10 feet from shore I got the hit I was looking for and yelled out to Dave “I found it”.

We went to Cristina and Mikes house and presented the ring to a very happy couple. Another long but fruitful day for thringfinders.

   “remember a ring is not always where the person THINKS it was lost”

Ben was out fishing with a buddy on Lake Minnetonka, they noticed a storm rolling in and decided to search for cover. Lake Minnetonka is a very large lake and it’s tough to get to a boat landing or back to your dock in a hurry. They found a dock that was covered and slipped his boat in and waited for the storm to pass. As he was taking off the securing ropes from the boat to the dock, his Platinum Wedding Band popped off his hand and into the lake. Ben borrowed some goggles and dove down to find his ring with no luck. He searched the internet and found the ring finders web site and gave me a call. We met over at the lake the next day and after 10 minutes of scuba – my trusty Excalibur metal detector got that sweet sound of Platinum. It was a beautiful day and a nice 10 to 15 minute boat ride out to the dive site. His wedding ring has only been on his finger for 3 months, glad we got it back on your finger Ben – Take Care and I hope to see you out on the Lake fishing sometime!

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Katie called me right from the beach where she had lost both of her rings after taking them off to apply skin lotion (if I only had a dollar everytime this happens, I could buy my own island!). After a frantic search by her and her husband, they found one of the rings but the small platinum band eluded them. I met them a short time later to do what I thought would be a very quick recovery. I should never think that as it just seems to jinx me. They never left the area which was only 8′ squared but that little ring wasn’t ready to show itself that easily. A quick scan told me that there was quite a bit of  junk in the sand too. Unfortunately, small platinum reads the same as foil and other tiny junk sounds so this was going to be a bigger challenge than I originally thought. After moving all their beach gear to the side, I got to work listening to the faintest sounds and removing anything that set the detector off. After about 15 minutes, I got a real faint, scratchy sound and figured it was just a piece of foil and scooped it to get it out of the way. Lo and behold, it was the ring! About 7-8″ down in a pile of sand they they had sifted earlier in their search. It all turned out well as the smile indicates. Glad to meet you and thank you for the reward.

J0sh called me saying that he lost his wedding ring in the dry sand at Mission Beach He, his wife, and child were still there at the beach so that is always a good sign when it comes to a successful search. That beach is hunted daily by many others with detectors so time is always important. I hot footed it down there and within 5 minutes we had the ring back on his finger. It was good to meet you and thank you for the reward!