Critical Minerals Update

March 2022 by Chris Ralph

The critical metals are essential to the modern lives we lead. The prices of critical metals are moving up even faster than government published rates of inflation, with little sign of slowing down.

Nome Offshore Dredging Creates Challenges

June 2015
The Alaska state government has been trying to keep up with and maybe even stay on top of the situation by studying the problems associated with rapid growth and how to solve them.

Breaking Boulders With Explosives

January 2022

The process we will be using is called “blockholing,” and it is commonly used at mines and in construction projects to break up oversize material into sizes that can be easily handled.

Gold Dredging on Oregon's South Umpqua

November 2012
Familiarizing oneself with an unfamiliar part of the country is often a requirement of successful gold prospecting. In the pursuit of gold, it may become necessary for a prospector to branch out into new hunting grounds.

Prospecting Hard Rock

March 2014
We panned out maybe three gold pans of the material and we were shocked at the gold that was there. This rock appeared to be rich.

Dredging Therapy

October 2016
The big moment finally arrived. With Norm suited up, I pulled the motor to life and felt instantly better. There’s really something relaxing about the sound of a dredge running—they don’t sound like anything else.

Small-Scale Processing of Hard Rock Ores

December 2014
Depending on the ore and if significant sulfides are present, a hard rock miner may be able to get away with simply using a flux to digest the other minerals that may be present.

Speed Prospecting for Hard Rock Gold

July 2020

An online video gave me some ideas, and with a lot of trial and error I developed a reliable method of panning free gold particles down below 35 microns quickly and easily.

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