Prospecting & Detecting
Drywashing for Fine Gold
October 2017 by Alex Dolbeare
When working fine gold placers with a drywasher, there are some natural variables that can be beneficial as well as others that can be a hindrance to achieving good recovery.
Silverton's Gold
Within this area, about two million ounces of gold and fifty million ounces of silver have been mined. Faults, dikes, veins and fissures that carry the ore form a concentric radial pattern—like spokes on a wagon wheel—around the caldera core.
Underground in the Original 16-1 Mine
These days they employ the use of metal detectors and carefully scan the shattered rocks, hoping to hear that sound we detectorists love to hear.
A Father and Son Prospecting Adventure
As I write this, I am still on a rush from taking my 9-year-old son, Jeffrey, prospecting for the first time this past weekend. It’s not that he hasn’t been along on numerous outings before: this is the first time that just the two of us went out for a day of drywashing and detecting under the desert sun.
Detecting During Summer Heat
This concept of detecting does not always work as we sometimes get a week or so where the temperatures rise to 116°—sometimes more.
Detecting Strategies for Heavily Forested Areas—Part II
Patience and persistence is the name of the game when you are detecting this way for gold, as you will have to do a lot of work preparing the ground to detect with any degree of success.
A Break in the Weather
Back at the entry point of the mine, we took turns slowly crawling down the slope leading into the mine portal with our metal detectors, hard hats and flashlights. The mine was hand dug and is about 75 yards long.
Prospecting Hard Rock
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.
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