Prospecting & Detecting
Prospecting for Gold at Green Valley
December 2012 by Don Robinson
In October, five of us decided to take an exploration trip into an area called Green Valley. This was perhaps ten miles upstream from where we had gone in September and the difficulty was access. One would think that based on the name it was an easily accessible area not far from a nearby town. This couldn’t be more wrong.Fountain of Youth Gold
Across and downstream of our operation was a large pile of huge boulders. It was logical to think that water forces may have deposited gold in and around these boulders. We moved our dredge over and started pulling the rock pile apart.
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.
Volume is the Key to Success
While recovery rates are important, they must necessarily be secondary to the volume of material processed. Running more material at lower recovery rates is generally preferable to increasing the efficiency of the system.
The Hunt for Remote Canyon Gold
A large, 8-pennyweight piece popped out of a very small crevice where the water had been extremely swift in the winter, leaving no visible gravel.
Drywashing Arizona Gold
His findings were not exaggerated—after running 82 buckets of gravels in two days we had a remarkable 27.8 grams of gold!
Detectors Versus Pans
Mike scored the best with a total of one-half ounce of gold nuggets. Tom, Brian and Greg each had pieces in the one and a half pennyweight range. The rest of us had small gold and nothing like these three.
Tips for Detecting Nugget Patches
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