Prospecting & Detecting

When we got set up and I started to swing the coil over a small mound, I got a good signal, faint but repeatable.

What do you do when you’ve located a promising deposit of gold or gemstones, but it’s trapped in solid rock?

I cleared the connector by poking a small Phillips screwdriver through it. To ensure the bore was clean, I dunked the connector into some water and then blew it clean with my shop air compressor.

I have a bunch of ideas about what to do in the near term and then other thoughts about what things might look like a few months from now when I hope the situation will look a lot better.

While sitting there, I wondered if I should go over the hole again. I did and got a louder signal that turned out being about another twelve inches deep.

This second trip down was a challenge. It started in Colfax on the Stevens Trail, where the distance to the river is four miles with an elevation drop of about 1,000 feet.

Many miners know that lead is very commonly associated with silver values, but the truth is that it is also associated with gold values in many locations as well.

The first and most important thing of the sampling process is to try to be as unbiased as possible. There is a natural tendency to select rock that looks the best—even unconsciously.

BLM stated we had 30 days to amend our claim so that it fit within one 40-acre square or we would forfeit the claim.

I looked over and saw Ben on his knees, digging at the edge of the Manzanitas, almost underneath them. I thought back to the previous weekend when we were planning this trip—that day had been a “Ben day.”

If you are interested in researching mining claims for any purpose, you will first have to decipher the BLM’s LR2000, a Rube Goldberg database seemingly designed by a 1980s Soviet-era computer hacker.

If Epd is larger, then the compressor will be spinning faster than the manufacturer’s maximum specified RPM and might destroy itself. If this happens, then the compressor again might not produce enough air to support a diver. Neither is a desired outcome.

The first time I found gold in the creek here is when I decided to try a new place to drywash on a hill not far from the dirt path I was on.

Even if you are not ready to cash in right now, it might be good to evaluate your options and make a plan of action so when that day comes you know exactly what to do.

After finding little specks and occasionally little nuggets all season, I had finally reached something economical and interesting! This had never happened before along the Pellice Valley in Italy.

Every time we prospected here we found gold, sometimes some really coarse flakes, but no large nuggets (yet).

Some of the gold is placer that was beat up as it traveled; however, quite a bit of the gold is pocket gold that is running along the surface in this area.

In this continuation of the Midwest gold series we are going to take a look at the states of Iowa, Missouri, and Kansas, look at possible locations within these states to find gold and talk about areas where gold has been found in the past.

So let’s dive in and see what I can do to convince you that this is the year you should be out staking your own claims.

There weren’t as many pieces of gold, but what I did find was bigger. As I worked my way down towards the spot that I had been working the first three days, I noticed a large crack that crossed the river.