History & Geology
California: The Land of Big Nuggets—Part II
January 2018 by Chris Ralph
There are a number of Tertiary river channels in the area, most of which trend south-southwest. They tend to be steep, narrow, and rich with coarse gold.
Prospecting for Surface Flood Gold Placers on Low and Intermediate Gradient Streams
Sample panning is a very important method used to find the richest parts of a flood gold deposit before setting up equipment and running material.Alaska Gold: Lisianski Inlet's First Bonanza
In 1967, a local resident showed me a pouch of small gold nuggets and flakes. Several years later I asked the same person where that gold was found. He responded, “From the streambed below the old stamp mill at Apex.”
The Tombstone Silver-Lead District, Arizona
In 1877, a prospector named Ed Schieffelin discovered silver in “the middle of nowhere” and staked two claims: “Tumbstone” and “Graveyard.” Soon a town and mining district were organized and acquired the name “Tombstone” after making a spelling correction.
It Pays to Know Your Bedrock
On our last trip, we brought ropes and went down the first waterfall forty vertical feet, only to be confronted by a second, sixty-foot-high, overhanging waterfall that emptied into a slot canyon.
Gold Deposits of the Ivory Coast
Ivory Coast has considerable gold reserves, and this nation has the largest area of greenstone belts prospective for gold in the continent.
Sulfides and Intergrain Gold Wire Nuggets
...these nuggets have not traveled far from the lode because the golden wire lattices would have been torn apart or flattened during weathering of rock and deposition by violent stream action.
Calcite and Limestone
The other distinguishing feature of calcite has to do with its chemistry. Geologists sometimes take a small bottle of dilute hydrochloric acid out into the field with them because calcite reacts with acids to make a bubbly foam.
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