Metal Detecting: Some Coin Statistics

Everyone digs “clad” (how we loosely refer to modern U.S. coins worth nothing more than face value—and sometimes less). It’s money, sure, but it’s also the bottom of the barrel when it comes to “keepers” in this metal detecting hobby.

Perhaps like me, though, you’ve wondered about your most-dug coin or most common date. Or perhaps you’ve been curious to know coin-to-coin ratios from everything you’ve dug.

Well, when I tumbled 5 months-worth of dug-coins this weekend, my curiosity got the better of me. I took the effort to organize 1,029 coins that I’ve dug from parks and yards in Wisconsin and Minnesota to draw out some statistics. Absolutely, these statistics matter…very little. They’re just insights from one guy in the Midwest in 2024. Still, they’re interesting and might offer some insight for you too. So, for that, you’re welcome!

Note: These numbers include no Wheat pennies or silver coins. Just the “trash.”

Total Coins by Date

As you can see in the graph below, 1980 has been my most-dug date with 48 coins or 4.7% of my total. Second place is 1978 (with 44). These numbers refer to all 4 coin-types, though the most-dug specific coin was a tie between the 1968-D Memorial penny and the 1978-D Memorial penny, both with 24. The only other notable date is 2000 which jumped up to 33 total coins after almost 2 decades of slack.

Notice the huge drop-off in 1983? That’s because in 1983, the all-wise government decided to swap out copper in pennies for zinc, a metal that deteriorates in soil and is just plain frustrating to dig. These terrible coins are called “Zincolns” and we detectorists despise them. In fact, there were another 36 pennies that I didn’t include in the 1,029 batch that were so deteriorated that I couldn’t even get a date (pictured).

A Surprising Insight

Interestingly, though, this Zincoln fiasco has given me some insight into another detecting phenomenon—that we find a higher ratio of quarters and dimes from 1965-1967 than from all the later years combined, about 1.5:1 in fact—a ratio that’s insanely different from actual mintage rates.

Quarters 1965-1967 (3 years)	Quarters 1968-2023 (55 years)	Dimes 1965-1967 (3 years)	Dimes 1968-2023 (55 years)
20	204	25	221
1.45	1	1.52	1

Why does this matter? Because it means that the detectorists of yesteryear treated all clad in the late 1960s the way we treat Zincolns today: we simply don’t dig them.

It’s not that people haven’t dropped as many Zincolns since 1983 as they have copper pennies, it’s just that I personally don’t often dig them. When I get a 19-20 tone on my Nox-600 in a public park, I’m far less likely to waste my time digging it, because I already know what it is. The same went for those detectorists hunting silver back in the day: they simply didn’t waste their time on clad.

Total Coins by Type

It won’t shock you that of the 4 common U.S. coin types, quarters are the most worthwhile to dig. Take a look at this chart, though, to see it in perspective.

We all know there’s 25 pennies to a quarter, but for the detectorists, that means 25 pauses, squats, digs, and searches for every quarter! It almost makes it not worth digging any of those penny signals!

Almost.

Of course, those pennies might be wheats or even Indian Heads, so we dig every one of them in hopes that we’re unearthing something of real value. It’s why we’re out there, after all, not (as our spouses might chide us) “to make a living.”

Conclusion

All these statistics tell me that after digging roughly 1,000 holes over the course of five months in which I was moderately happy to find modern change, I’m $86.49 richer for it. That’s almost 10% towards my next upgrade—and with a military discount, we’ll call it 20%. It almost seems worth it.

Almost.

©2024 E.T.

Check out my more notable finds from detecting in 2023:

Spring 2023
Summer 2023
Fall 2023
Winter 2023
Also check out My Greatest Find Ever