Can You Detect Watermarks Just By The Naked Eye?

When I was young I would have terrible trouble trying to work out the different watermarks -- for GB, Ireland, Australia or wherever.

But these days I find watermarks really aren't that much of a problem, and I dont even have to hold them against a black surface. I think the reason for this is that I've been looking at many thousands of stamps. Basically its an experience thing.

Right now I'm doing older German issues, where the choice is between 'diamonds', 'mesh (waffle)' or 'Swastika'. I used to find these hard, but they have now become quite easy.

No doubt there will be some wmks that will have me foxed. I have yet to get around trying the old USPS single and double line, but I'm happy to have acquired this skill.

I wonder if other people have had a similar experience? Or are there some watermarks that you still find impossible without a tray and detection fluid?

Often, yes. On yellow or orange stamps it's trickier, and fluid might be necessary, but most watermarks are detectable by eye in good light.

I am able to see watermarks pretty easily for most British Colony stamps. I have twin spotlamps on my desk and put the stamp against black paper.

The ones I have trouble with are some of the New Zealand stamps from the 1930-1950 Postal Fiscal issues and some of the later QEII issues.

I can't see many of those watermarks even with fluid.

Most NSW watermarks are reasonably easy to detect. When you find a stamp from the edge of the sheet that has missed out on the watermark is when things can get complicated!

I was more interested in not whether certain watermarks were easy or not to see, per se, but whether others had had the experience of finding detection getting much easier with experience. I've certainly found this with many countries.

But I still have trouble with those NZ watermarks ... but then again, I havent looked at hundreds of them at a sitting.

Yes, similar,
your confidence grows, then up pops a country like Brazil, and its back to head scratching and the watermark fluid.

Totally depends on the country and issue. Some are as easy as possible and some are extremely difficult even in fluid.

Yes Brazil stamps were hard to see the watermarks and it was the only way to ID them. Same stamps reprint 3 or 4 times with different watermarks. I used so much watermark fluid that since then I buy Zippo lighter fluid which is cheaper. On some stamps it's hard see what is the watermark because of the cancel that is seen from the back of the stamp. Daniel

Some, like Ireland, are so easy. Others are soooooo dang hard. Drives me nuts.

I find German Reich pretty easy, sometimes without fluid. Used US stamps often defeat me.

Don

I find that Great Britain and commonwealth countries are pretty easy to identify but the US Washington / Franklin stamps are a royal pain to find.

Double line Washington / Franklin watermarks are often not difficult. Sometimes on mint examples you can see them by just looking at the reverse of the stamp at an angle. Single line watermarks can be a very different thing, sometimes they only show up at the edges of a stamp. And on orange or yellow stamps it can be all but impossible to see them in any case.