Prospecting & Detecting
It's Hard to Find Gold!
October 2013 by Steve Herschbach
...even the best prospectors have times when they do not find gold. It is all about taking chances against tough odds and succeeding.Highbanking on the Feather River
A number of visiting gold miners were quite impressed with our operation and the amount of gold we had recovered in only three hours. No one usually likes digging and slugging buckets all day long, but we actually began to enjoy it after a few good...
The Highs and Lows of Drywashing
We were met with a plethora of mechanical problems with the dry washer and even a few with the excavator that were at times frustrating, but we were in this for the long haul, so we needed to solve these problems and move forward.
Detecting Alluvial Bench Deposits -- Pt II
Walking around the gulch and exploring the upper drainage, picking up different rocks and inspecting them with a good loop, and looking them up in a field guide of rocks and minerals of your region will help you understand how the gold got there.
Gold Prospecting: For Better or Worse
We all love to see that first glimmer of gold when it peeks out from under the black sand in our pan, or feel the weight of a nugget in our scoop when we dig a good target. But sometimes things don’t go quite so smoothly.
Proper Spacing of Placer Sample Sites
The zone of influence of each sample must be carefully considered when deciding how far sample sites should be spaced from each other.
Cold Alaskan Gold—Part I
Crowds may be great for football games or the Fourth of July, but not for prospecting. So, this summer, while thousands of gold seekers were heading to the coast of Alaska, I headed to a remote part of the Interior.
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• Making a noisy dredge more quiet
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The Bawl Mill
• EPA Tries to Intimidate Alaskan Miners
• A Few Pointers About Cracks and Crevices
• Hunting for Gold in the Quartzsite Area of Western Arizona
• The Madonna Nugget
• The Alaska Highway and Beyond
• Partner Withdraws from Pebble Project
• Highbanking at the 144
• Potential Gold at Old Hydraulic Sites
• California State Panning Championships—Foresthill, CA Heritage Celebration
• Prospecting Tales: Forest Service, Fires and Bears—Oh My!
• Melman on Gold & Silver
• Mining Stock Quotes and Mineral & Metal Prices
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Legislative and Regulatory Update
• Research and Fieldwork Yield Some Promising Gold
