Louisiana
Keys, a phone or a ring dropped in the grass with a crowd all around you
Parade routes, festival fields, tailgates and lakefronts across Louisiana
New Orleans watches its parades from the sidewalk and from the neutral ground, the New Orleans name for what other cities call the median. City Park keeps 50 acres of green space as its Festival Grounds. In Baton Rouge, home football games bring tailgates onto the LSU campus. In places like these, lost keys, a phone or a ring are awkward to retrace, because you were watching the floats, the stage or the game and not the ground.
Ring Seekers is a lost ring and jewelry recovery service that connects people who lost a ring, wedding band, watch, keys or phone in Louisiana with a metal detectorist who can search there. Tell us what happened and where. We find a detectorist who can reach the place, brief them with your map and photos, and tell you honestly if the odds are poor.
A lost phone or a lost ring gets the same care as a set of keys. So do engagement rings, Oura rings, earrings, necklaces, bracelets, chains, Apple Watches, key fobs, metal-framed glasses and hearing aids. Further down the page come the Lake Pontchartrain shore, Lafayette, Lake Charles and two state parks.
A cross street or a field light tells us more than the moment it fell
On St. Charles Avenue the useful facts are the nearest cross street and which side of the avenue you were on. On a festival field it is whatever was fixed to the ground, such as a light pole. Then look through the photos from the day, yours and your friends', for the last one where the ring is on a hand or the keys are on a belt loop.
If it is the phone that has gone, borrow one and follow the phone maker's own steps for a lost device first. Then send us the place, the time and the photos on WhatsApp. Our part is finding someone experienced in metal detecting in Louisiana who can get to your spot.
Areas and towns we cover in Louisiana
- New Orleans and Baton Rouge
- Lafayette
- City Park Festival Grounds
- Audubon Park
- New Orleans Lakefront
- Mandeville and Fontainebleau State Park
- Big Branch Marsh refuge, Lacombe
- Barataria Preserve, Marrero
- LSU campus and the University Lakes
- Girard Park
- Moncus Park
- Lake Charles lakefront
- Cypremort Point State Park
- South Toledo Bend State Park
Parade streets, park lawns and lake shores around Louisiana
St. Charles Avenue, Audubon Park and the lakes beside LSU
The main Mardi Gras route follows St. Charles Avenue towards Canal Street, and people watch from the neutral ground as well as the sidewalk. Audubon Park has a 1.8 mile (2.9 km) jogging path, a lagoon and old live oaks. In Baton Rouge, City-Brooks Community Park has a 50 acre lake, and six University Lakes lie around the LSU campus. More detail is on the page for New Orleans and Baton Rouge.
The Festival Grounds in New Orleans City Park
City Park in New Orleans covers about 1,300 acres, and 50 of them are the Festival Grounds, a green space with lighted fields. If you lost something there, the field lights make good marks, because they are still standing when everything temporary has been taken away.
The Lake Pontchartrain shore at New Orleans and Mandeville
The New Orleans Lakefront gives more than 5.5 miles (8.9 km) of public space along the lake. On the Northshore, the Mandeville Lakefront is a quiet park about a mile (1.6 km) long. Fontainebleau State Park, at Mandeville, spreads over 2,800 acres on the lake shore, with a sandy beach, cabins, campsites and a 4.8 mile (7.7 km) hiking trail. Nearby at Lacombe, Big Branch Marsh National Wildlife Refuge has a half-mile (800 metre) boardwalk on Boy Scout Road. South of New Orleans, the Barataria Preserve at Marrero has boardwalks and trails through cypress swamp and marsh.
Girard Park and Moncus Park in Lafayette
Girard Park is 33 acres with a 1.25 mile (2 km) jogging trail, a fishing pond and a nine-hole disc golf course. Moncus Park is a 100-acre green space in the heart of Lafayette, with trails and a play area. Keys could work their way out of a pocket on a run without making a sound, so tell us the route you took.
A boardwalk, fishing piers and a sand beach at Lake Charles
The Lake Charles lakefront strings together fishing piers, picnic areas and a beach along one boardwalk. North Beach is where the sand is, and Bord du Lac Park and its marina are part of the lakefront too. Tell us which you were nearest to.
Cypremort Point and South Toledo Bend state parks
Cypremort Point State Park has a half mile (800 metre) man-made beach. It lies between Grand Isle and Cameron, and the boat launch by the park entrance is a few miles from the Gulf of Mexico. South Toledo Bend State Park sits on small bluffs that reach out into Toledo Bend Reservoir, with cabins, campsites and a two-lane boat ramp.
What asking us about a Louisiana loss involves
You deal with Bartek the whole way through
Bartek reads your WhatsApp message himself. The questions, the hunt for a detectorist and the updates all come from him.
The spot you describe goes into the briefing as you gave it
The pin, the photos, the landmark you stood by and the time are all passed on in full. Those details choose the few metres that get searched.
Three hours in one spot is not the same case as a ten-block walk
If you stood in one place for a whole parade, the area to cover is small, and that helps. If it could have dropped anywhere on a walk of ten blocks, that is a long shot, and you would hear that from us first. Keys and phones are easy for someone to pick up, so ask the organiser or the park office as well.
Grass in the city, sand and water at the lakes
A festival field, the sand at North Beach in Lake Charles and the shallows of Lake Pontchartrain each need their own plan, so we ask which it was before anything else.
You hear the costs while it is still only a conversation
We explain the costs before any search is booked.
Grass on a parade route and a lake with very little tide
Where the ground is grass
On a parade route a dropped ring or phone can end up in the grass, and the fields of a festival ground are green space too. A small ring could be trodden down among the roots. Clean-up crews follow the New Orleans parades, so check the surface as soon as the parade has passed, then leave the turf alone.
Lake Pontchartrain barely rises and falls
At the New Canal station on the New Orleans lakefront, the mean tide range in NOAA's figures is barely half a foot (about 17 cm). Low tide will not uncover a ring dropped in the shallows off Lakeshore Drive or Mandeville. Tell us the depth you were standing in, ankle, knee or waist, and what you were lined up with on the shore.
Bluffs over the water at South Toledo Bend
South Toledo Bend stands on bluffs over a reservoir, so we ask straight away whether you were on the bank, at the boat ramp or out in a boat.
Louisiana questions, from the parade route to the lake shore
My car keys fell out of my pocket on St. Charles Avenue during a parade. We stood in one place for three hours. Is the nearest cross street enough to go on?
It is most of what we need. Add which side of the avenue you were on and whether it was the sidewalk or the neutral ground. Walk it yourself as soon as you can, because a bunch of keys is large enough to see.
My iPhone is somewhere on the Festival Grounds in City Park. What can I do from my sister's phone?
Sign in at icloud.com/find. Apple's support page says you can play a sound on the missing phone from there and mark it as lost, which locks it with your passcode and suspends your Apple Pay cards. In a Family Sharing group, your phone can also appear in Find My on her device. Then tell us which field you were on.
My husband's wedding band flew off at a tailgate on the LSU campus. We know the place to within two car lengths of grass. Is that close enough?
Yes, two car lengths of grass is a small area to work with. Photograph it from two sides with something fixed in the frame, a tree, a lamp post or a lot sign, and drop a pin while you stand there. Please leave the grass as it is.
One of my earrings went into the lawn at Moncus Park during a picnic. I am looking at a metal detector rental for the weekend. Good idea or not?
For an earring, probably not. Renting a detector yourself can suit a fresh loss on dry sand or a lawn, in a patch you can point to. A detectorist makes more sense for wet sand, water, a large area or a small item, and an earring is about as small as they come.
My Oura ring came off in waist-deep water at the Fontainebleau State Park beach. Will low tide on Lake Pontchartrain show it?
No, the tide on this lake is too small for that. NOAA's mean range on the New Orleans lakefront is barely half a foot (about 17 cm), so low tide will not turn waist-deep water into ankle-deep water. Send us what you were lined up with on the shore and roughly how far out you were.
I lost a gold chain on the sand at North Beach in Lake Charles. We moved our chairs twice. Is that a problem?
Not really. It means three small patches where there would have been one. Place each patch against something that stays put, such as a sign, a post or a building behind the sand, and tell us the order you sat in them.
My bracelet came off at Cypremort Point State Park, between our picnic spot and the water. How do you narrow down half a mile of beach?
By starting from the line you walked, not from the whole beach. The man-made beach is about half a mile long, but your afternoon took up a small slice of it. Tell us where you parked, where you sat and where you went into the water.
Louisiana
A street corner, a lot number or a pier is enough to begin
You do not have to track down a metal detector service in a state you may only be visiting. For a lost ring as much as for a set of car keys, put the place, the time and your photos into one WhatsApp message to us.