Federal land..

Years ago had a long talk with a county Mountie in a federal park. They can take your car, detector and lead you away in handcuffs..Heres the kicker doesn't even have to be marked so watch where you swing the coil..State land usually has rules and regs posted which vary greatly but Federal land
is a NO-NO.....

I have found that some national forest areas can be hunted, but this is up to the discretion the local governing agent and you must secure his/her permission. Most other areas are a NO go.

Is a National Forest considered a "Federal Park"?
You can use a detector to "prospect" in the National Forest but you have to leave those cans and tobacco tins behind

I hunt federal land (blm& forest) all the time

Yeah be careful on state and federal land...I spent the weekend jin jail once in South Carolina for metal detecting on private property with permission...

They finally dropped the charges after they found out the law did not include private property...but it cost me 1000.00 to get them to admit they were in the wrong...lol

Keith

Federal land is protected by ARPA law. Unless specified/posted as legal, you can get in big trouble on it. In Tennessee, we can hunt a few certain freshwater beaches but everything else is illegal as far as detecting. You can pick arrowheads and such up off the surface but cannot dig or dive for them on govt land.

You can't even have a detector in your vehicle in/on ANY federal land (forest, parks, etc.) where civil war action took place.

They can and WILL take your detector/equipment, your truck/car, take you to a room without a view AND slap up to a $10,000 fine on you on top of it!

My buddy almost lost everything a few yrs back driving around the Smokey Mountains in TN near one of the Battle Fields with a detector in his car - they took him to jail, impounded his car, took his detector/equipment and tried to throw the book at him!

Luckily - he was from MI here and hired a lawyer which helped him to prove he was just passing thru on vacation with no intention of hunting battlefields so they dropped all charges, and gave him everything back

BUT

like Keith said

it cost him like $1000/$1500 to get out of the mess (plus x amount of days in jail) and a LOT of hassle!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/12/2013 02:28AM by MichiganRelicHunter.

Room without a view...I luv it and thanks for the smile.
Years ago came upon a park and started detecting...maintenance advised me it was federal and detector was in car and I was gone...so I came close..
Heed the warnings unless you like rooms without views kind of thing...
Those county mounties, game wardens, fish wardens had more power than me when I was working as they don't need a search warrant...

And to the Republic for which it stands,, one nation, under God, with liberty and justice for all.....

Uh huh, yep.

I'm with ya leggo. Well, ill take my chances but with due caution. Some of the sherrifs around (el dorado county for one) are gettin fed up with the forest service. Here's a quick story happened last spring. Theres a site near me, part blm, part blr. I was detecting and walked out of the woods and there's a ranger (blr) well I had heard the same stories like yall just told, but I'm like well guess ill just walk right up to him. And that's what I did. He asked me if I found anything , and I showed him the powder flask and hatchet. He thought they where neat, we shot the bull for a bit, then he wished me luck, and I went back to it. This is an area that one well known detectorist that yall would know from the forums won't hunt because he's worried about getting in trouble. Maybe I just got lucky, and hopefully yall won't hear me saying I should of listened to ya, BUT I believe if my tax dollars pay for it, and its not Gettysburg or Coloma, then I should be able to detect it. Ray

I spent a good chunk of my younger years in SE Ky, on the TN/VA border (most of my family still lives there). My great gma, whom I had the honor of knowing, was a direct heir to an early settlement that has remained largely unchanged and unmolested due to its secluded location. We are talking school, blacksmith, and housing structures intact with period furniture, stoves, etc still inside... My mamaw (g grandma :-)) Had rights to it in the 50s but she was starting to enjoy running water and inside toilets, lol, so it was donated and is now a Federal Park. A couple of years ago I contacted the Fed. Park office and asked if I could detect the property due to my bloodline connection, with the agreement of forfeiting any historical artifacts. No go... but they would love to interview me about my family's history....darn...wish i would have been into detecting 20 years ago when we used to have family get togethers there, now it's a pay tour only....Here's some info. [en.m.wikipedia.org]) Not exactly colonial but would have been cool to detect! Very secluded and beautiful if anyone is ever in the area I would recommend a visit! But it's really too bad they are so strict on detecting so called gov't land. Would have been ecstatic to have found an old pipe or something from my kinfolk.....

The entire issue is one pertaining to archeological and historic sites. As far as I'm concerned , some unelected bureaucrats negligence in posting an area as such is a far more significant issue than my ignorance in knowing that if by some capricious decision said bureaucrat has decided to declare an area such. If I'm detecting at Grant's tomb I should expect to get some grief but as long as I'm mindful of mining claims and properly marked areas , the forest is an open venue. As long as soil disturbance is kept to the length of a shovel's swing and reclaimed as one goes , even Wilderness Areas are fair play as long as you transport yourself by non mechanical means.
There seems to be a real geographic division about the issue of sublimating detecting rights between East and West especially when it comes to the Northeast and New England. Those guy's get to detect when and where they are told to for the most part. The tactic of "patronizing the opposition into submission" has failed miserably up there. Next thing you know the cops in NYC will be able to pull you over and frisk you just because they can!

( [bigthink.com] )

Here is a breakdown of federal land by state.....had no idea Uncle Sam was so greedy....well ...I take that back.....

Shovelor,
You can be my spokesman!

That's a terrific map Tri.
May account for our jaundice attitude toward the Feds out here.
Like a common disease , the more you have to deal with it the more immunity(or perceived resistance) you build.
Thanx deathray but I just want to detect---although I do find it difficult to resist taking a cheap shot at the Feds

I agree, I just wanna detect, fish, hunt, hike etc . Lost so much. I remember when you could drive anywhere on the California Delta on the levees...now they are pretty much all closed off. Go drive around the National forest (land of many uses, lol) and look at how many 4x4 trails are shut down. Dredging moratorium here in the GOLDEN state..so screw them, ill detect where my tax dollars tell me I can.

[www.edrivera.com]

Interesting read, not sure a good source though.