Prospecting & Detecting
Detecting: Small Creek Yields Good Gold
November 2016 by Jack Geck
Most of our gold recoveries have been in the cracks of the bedrock. Hot rocks in the form of dikes cross the creek at various locations, causing us to skip those areas.
PLP Update: Back to The 'Swamp' on Behalf of Small Miners
We spent the morning in a meeting with one of the higher-ups at the US Forest Service. I presented him with 412 complaints received from our readers, along with a summary of the complaints to make his job easier.
The Hunch
The mysteries of this spot were only just starting to develop. There is nothing but very bland granite-type rocks here, meaning no bold, favorable indicators.
Mining for Gemstones and Mineral Specimens
It is better in a gem and mineral mining operation that the driller, blaster and mucker be the same person in order to be able to predict placement of the desired mineral enriched pockets.
Digging It Dry
I believe dry washing is an underappreciated prospecting method. There are plenty of places where there is some pretty decent gold to be had, but the spot is a long way from any water and dry processing may well be the best way to go.
Humble Beginnings
Right away I got a target, and it ended up being gold from a nice little bench. With only an hour left of daylight, I continued heading upstream and found five more tiny pieces of gold with my VLF…
Gold Indicators—What to Look for in the Goldfields
Some of the items that I’m going to go over are outcroppings, ditches, exploratory trenches and contacts/surface materials. I am going to speak about each of the above items in as much detail as I can, and then towards the end of this article I will tie them together.
Who Jumped Whose Claim First?
At this point, stress raised my blood pressure and I was figuring out escape routes through the brush, but thought it best to continue the conversation.
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