The father-son duo spent years combing this bit of Pennsylvania wilderness with high-end metal detectors, drills and other tools to prospect for a fabled cache of Civil War gold.

I’m sure we all have, at some point in time, gone out detecting and ended up not having the success we thought we would have. Here are some helpful game-changers that work for me and may work for you, as well.

Pumps can be set up quite a distance away horizontally from the sluice, even hundreds of feet. It will work so long as there is sufficient water at the source where the pump is located. Vertical distance is more of a problem than horizontal distance; 30 to 40 feet is the maximum vertical climb for most pumps.

This article will hopefully provide a few constructive hints on how to use your downtime during the cold winter and the wet spring to best prepare for the upcoming nugget-hunting season.