Prospecting & Detecting
The Basics of Permitting and Bonding Your Mining Operation
December 2020 by John Norman
With the recent surge of interest in gold projects, it’s about time to revisit a subject that strikes fear into the hearts of small-scale miners: Permits.
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.
Finding Gold in Tailing Piles
Old mine workings and tailing piles can represent opportunities on many levels, from the chance to simply find a nugget on up to the commercial reworking of the old tailings for profit.
Following the Clues
It took me awhile before I finally got a nice mellow signal. My nugget turned out to weigh in about two dwt (pennyweight). Over the next few hours, we all picked up a few more nuggets apiece.
Q&A With Detector Designer Dave Johnson
...it’s been a little known secret that one man was involved in designing many of the most respected very low frequency (VLF) nugget detectors on the market. Dave Johnson has designed gold-oriented detectors for Tesoro, Whites, Fisher and others for more than 25 years.
Fells Flat Gold
My wife Fran and I were brushing and repairing the road to our claim when we were interrupted by a fellow in a pretty yellow Jeep heading out to the local town of Quincy, California.
Following Clues to an Old Mill and Vein Strike
My last update on this adventure was in the April 2012 issue and involved our search for the northern extension of the Cedarberg Mine. At that time we had found it and we were in the process of returning for some detecting when Mother Nature struck with a late rain and snow storm.
Carr Fire Gold
After burning more than 350 square miles, the Carr Fire near Redding, California, was finally out. Luckily our home was spared, and I had the opportunity to go metal detecting in burned areas previously too overgrown to access.
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The Bawl Mill
• Legislative and Regulatory Update
• Ask The Experts - Is this prospect worth sampling?
• Ask The Experts - Can you recommend resources for southeast Alaska?
• Ask The Experts - Can I pay someone to research a claim for me?
• Ask The Experts - Do larger detector coils see deeper nuggets?
• Reading A River: Understanding Erosion and Gold
• Plotting and Persistence Lead to Big Gold
• Using Countercurrent Material Flow to Improve Gold Recovery Efficiency
• Gold Prospecting for Better or Worse: The First Year Is The Hardest
• Mining In The El Paso Range of Southern California
• Tips and Tricks: A Dredging Tip for Clearing the Tailings Pile
• The Kern River
• Melman on Gold & Silver
• Mining Stock Quotes and Mineral & Metal Prices
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