Magnet fishers are hunting for sunken treasures in Quebec's waterways

Frédérick Hardy reaches back with his left arm, clutching a climbing rope with a heavy magnet on the end.

He throws, hucking the weight as far as he can out into Montreal's Lachine Canal near the Atwater Market.

"It's like playing the lottery. You throw, you don't know what you're going to find," said Hardy.

He's found everything from iron railway spikes to mortar shells. And he's found plenty of loose change, too.

"People are making wishes," he said. "Sometimes the wishes come back to my magnet. Sorry."

Magnet fishing is a growing trend around the world. And based on engagement seen in online magnet fishing communities, page administrators estimate thousands are taking part in the hobby across Quebec.

People usually take it up with hope of finding interesting, or even valuable, objects while cleaning up waterways.

Serge Côté, who lives in Quebec's Saguenay–Lac-Saint-Jean region, has written two books on the subject, including a magnet fishing guide for the province.

In his Facebook group, Pêche à l'aimant Québec, which has some 2,600 members, hobbyists post discoveries like rusted bikes and street signs. There are old springs, bottle caps, tools, washing machines and screws, but also old coins or wagon wheels.

In one recent post to the group, someone pulled out an entire golf cart. The author wrote that police were called and it was determined to be a stolen cart from a nearby campground marina.

Sometimes the magnets find guns, ammunition, phones, watches, safes or bags of money. But, Côté explained, it's not all finders keepers.

He said it's important to contact the police when a gun, or anything that may have been stolen, is found.

When Hardy found a rifle last month, he called the police. He said they told him it was unusable, and he was allowed to keep it. So he cleaned it up and has it on display.

"It's an old Swedish gun," he said, estimating it dates back to sometime between 1942 and 1960.