The dreaded request

stuartbush

New Member
What is it that makes Farmers so against history and the hobby of metal detecting. I live in West Yorkshire and have been detecting on beaches for almost 20 years but trying to get permission on local land is impossible. Unlike some people who no doubt extract the urine when it comes to allowing a detectorist on your property, i`m not one of them and i know it`s easy for me to say that but you all have the option of allowing a trial period at which point you can say P*****F. I `ve been in the IT industry for 20 years so i`m sure there must be some of you decent chaps out there who need help with laptops, desktops, broadband etc. So here`s the trade off, a one month trial detecting on your land with all finds shared, big or small in exchange for any IT service you require. All i`m interested in is history, not treasure hunting and the permission is solely for me and me alone, not several people or clubs, just me.
 

czechmate

Member
Mixed Farmer
What is it that makes Farmers so against history and the hobby of metal detecting. I live in West Yorkshire and have been detecting on beaches for almost 20 years but trying to get permission on local land is impossible. Unlike some people who no doubt extract the urine when it comes to allowing a detectorist on your property, i`m not one of them and i know it`s easy for me to say that but you all have the option of allowing a trial period at which point you can say P*****F. I `ve been in the IT industry for 20 years so i`m sure there must be some of you decent chaps out there who need help with laptops, desktops, broadband etc. So here`s the trade off, a one month trial detecting on your land with all finds shared, big or small in exchange for any IT service you require. All i`m interested in is history, not treasure hunting and the permission is solely for me and me alone, not several people or clubs, just me.


Have a look at the Brexit boards. You’ll see half the farmers are nutters.
 

stuartbush

New Member
REALLY!!! What the hell gets into peoples heads for gods sake. It really P*****s me off when i read things like this, it really does.
 

Clive

Staff Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Lichfield
What is it that makes Farmers so against history and the hobby of metal detecting. I live in West Yorkshire and have been detecting on beaches for almost 20 years but trying to get permission on local land is impossible. Unlike some people who no doubt extract the urine when it comes to allowing a detectorist on your property, i`m not one of them and i know it`s easy for me to say that but you all have the option of allowing a trial period at which point you can say P*****F. I `ve been in the IT industry for 20 years so i`m sure there must be some of you decent chaps out there who need help with laptops, desktops, broadband etc. So here`s the trade off, a one month trial detecting on your land with all finds shared, big or small in exchange for any IT service you require. All i`m interested in is history, not treasure hunting and the permission is solely for me and me alone, not several people or clubs, just me.

what annoys me most about metal detectors is they think their wanted ads are "agricultural matters" !

Thread now moved to the correct place
 

JCMaloney

Member
Location
LE9 2JG
What is it that makes Farmers so against history and the hobby of metal detecting. I live in West Yorkshire and have been detecting on beaches for almost 20 years but trying to get permission on local land is impossible. Unlike some people who no doubt extract the urine when it comes to allowing a detectorist on your property, i`m not one of them and i know it`s easy for me to say that but you all have the option of allowing a trial period at which point you can say P*****F. I `ve been in the IT industry for 20 years so i`m sure there must be some of you decent chaps out there who need help with laptops, desktops, broadband etc. So here`s the trade off, a one month trial detecting on your land with all finds shared, big or small in exchange for any IT service you require. All i`m interested in is history, not treasure hunting and the permission is solely for me and me alone, not several people or clubs, just me.


I know several farmers/landowners, some are deeply interested in the history of their land. One chaps family have owned the land since 1653!
Others are interested in more specific periods of history. One chap is fanatical about flint tools and dismisses Medieval coins as "that tat" !!
So I would suggest you read and learn a lot from this forum about agriculture, technology & the small windows of opportunity we have to persue our hobby, and what farmers are up against.... weather, payments etc etc etc.
Remember you are asking for access to somebody's factory/office etc. Be straight, be honest... the worse thing that happens is you catch them on a bad day and they say "No". That doesn`t mean you condemn "all farmers" as being against history/detecting.
Remember the hobby doesn`t do itself a lot of favours and the wrong `uns make more headlines than the mundane rest of us.
 

Goweresque

Member
Location
North Wilts
All farmers i have met have been really decent people, it just appears they have met the wrong detectorists. Unfortunately the few spoil it for the real history hunters like me.

Remember there's what, 150k farm businesses that farm most of the land in the UK, and some of those may be owned by the same people/families, so less than that number of landowners. And there's pushing 70m people in the UK. So pretty much every farmer/landowner will have been asked multiple times about metal detecting, many will have had illegal detecting happen on their land. And the people close to large urban populations will have had people asking on a regular basis. So its not surprising you don't get welcomed with open arms, you're just the latest in a VERY long line of people wanting to do the same thing.
 

wanderer

Member
What is it that makes Farmers so against history and the hobby of metal detecting. I live in West Yorkshire and have been detecting on beaches for almost 20 years but trying to get permission on local land is impossible. Unlike some people who no doubt extract the urine when it comes to allowing a detectorist on your property, i`m not one of them and i know it`s easy for me to say that but you all have the option of allowing a trial period at which point you can say P*****F. I `ve been in the IT industry for 20 years so i`m sure there must be some of you decent chaps out there who need help with laptops, desktops, broadband etc. So here`s the trade off, a one month trial detecting on your land with all finds shared, big or small in exchange for any IT service you require. All i`m interested in is history, not treasure hunting and the permission is solely for me and me alone, not several people or clubs, just me.

It's very hard to get to know a farmer well enough to gain trust. The media is full of stories about nighthawks thieving from farmers and that sadly tarnishes everybody.

I've recently moved to Norfolk from down south and had some great finds on estates there where they were initially deeply suspicious. I located a Roman villa nobody knew about and all manner of items of history relating to their land which we both 'shared' and enjoyed. A display case is a great help and of course the honesty to show everything you find.

Farmers are a great bunch... but woe betide anyone who tries to take the pee and it seems too many detector owners tend to do so.
 

Luken

New Member
Hi StuartBush and all,

I just done a Google search and stumbled across the forum and read the topic.

It is a tough one trying to gain new permissions, having moved to Cambridgeshire approx 5 years ago and being a detectorist for 18 years I had to pretty much start again finding new land to detect.
It did take some time but after speaking to various people in my local village they gave me some details to go on, not all proved to be successful but I did manage to get lucky and was granted permission on one site. After building up a trusted relationship with the farmer he recommended me to another and so on and things have moved forward. It helps I'm an electrician by trade and often carry out jobs labour free on the farm and associated properties. Some are really keen to know what is unearthed and the research I carry out others no interest whatsoever.
Trust is a big issue in my opinion, once you start to show them everything, junk or coins etc and recording items found with all correspondence with the FLO they soon realise you are genuine. Everything I find stays with the estate presented yearly around Christmas time with a bottle of wine, whisky or whatever they drink. It's soul destroying getting a 'no' but my advice is keep trying and 1 permission could lead to more :)
 

Goatherderess

Member
Location
North Dorset
I have a local club a few times a year detecting on the farm. I love to see the finds and they send everything off to the finds person at Dorchester museum to record them. Waiting for them to find the hoard.....
 

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