Prospecting & Detecting
Back to Basics--Finding Gold With a Pan and a Sluice
April 2019 by Chris Ralph
Don’t hunker down and just keep digging in one spot where there is very little or no gold—if you don’t find it, you’ve got to get up and move on!
Cold Water Gold
It was June 2011, and my wife Fran and I with Grandson Lucas and good friend Ernie Cruz were attempting to get to our gold mining claim on the Middle Fork of the Feather River about ten miles from Quincy, California. Rain had poured down in the previous few days and the road in a large number of low places was under water. Following two hours of slugging through the mud...
The Rest of the Story—Detecting With Ray Mills
Ray followed up by detecting the same area and I was happy to see that he did not find any good targets in the same line. So far so good.
Gold Prospecting for Better or Worse: All Work and No Pay
At first we decided to see what the flat by our camp would produce where the old-timers had worked it with their Pelton wheel and dragline buckets.
My Lucky Month of March

Strategies for Detecting Heavily Pounded Areas—Pt II
Look around for areas where you don’t see detector holes or drywasher piles and try your test hole at these spots to determine depth to bedrock.
How Far To The Gold?
…in spite of the fact that the well-pounded spots probably don’t have much gold left, I see all too many prospectors hike down to a creek or other spot at the first place the road comes near it just because it’s the easiest access point.
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