Beach Mining for Placer Gold

June 2019 by Rob Roy

What I saw was a beach area that was just completely covered in black sand. Rubbing my hands close together like a kid in a candy store, I could not wait to get set up.

Pumping Water With Solar Power

March 2019

Solar energy can be used for any size placer or hard rock mining operation. It is most practical for small and longer-term operations provided your mine is not located in a dense forest.

Dry Washing to Capture Fine Gold

November 2013
There may be lots of smaller gold I cannot hear with a detector, but it looks just fine in my pan once it is out of the crevice.

Coprolite—A Prospector's Tale

February 2014
Gold nuggets come in all forms, but I never expected that dinosaur nuggets would too, and at a decent price.

Gold Placers of the Kenai Peninsula, Alaska

January 2014
The biggest obstacle is that like many streams on the Kenai Peninsula, high water during the summer months from snow melt and rain can make dredging nearly impossible. The best dredging is in the colder months of the year.

What Have You Got to Lose?

November 2016
It’s accepted knowledge that wet methods will recover more fine gold than dry methods and processing the gravel as a whole will get more gold than only using a metal detector. The question is how much more?

Detectors: Past, Present and Future

June 2016
Detectors were invented long before I was born, but it was in the 1960s when they started to become an item popular enough to power a fledgling industry. The key development was miniature transistor technology replacing the old fashioned tube technology of the 1950s, making lightweight, affordable detectors possible.

WWII Vet & Prospector Still Going Strong

July 2011
Lately I’ve been having success utilizing two types of detectors in succession. The first is a pulse induction (PI) detector with a blanket-style antennae, and I follow it up with a very low frequency (VLF) detector.

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June 2019 (Vol. 88, No. 10)   • The Bawl Mill   • Legislative and Regulatory Update   • Ask The Experts - Can you provide information on gold in Ghana?   • Ask The Experts - Geophysics and gold deposits   • Ask The Experts - Do these items qualify as mechanized equipment?   • Ask The Experts - EPA Method 6020 testing   • Ask The Experts - New detector or stick with the old?   • The Value of Old Patches   • A 'Rare' Opportunity for America   • Tips for Cleaning Gold Nuggets   • How Long Does It Take to Find and Recover An Ounce of Gold?   • Gold Prospecting for Better or Worse: In A Tight Spot   • Detecting Wet Ground Yields More Fun Than Gold   • Over The Divide: Jim Straight, 1930-2019   • Reno's 1872 Time Capsule Includes Gold Rush Lore   • Melman on Gold & Silver   • Mining Stock Quotes and Mineral & Metal Prices

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