Gold is where you find it. Like to hear from everyone their favorite places to prospect. Tell your stories about your favorite places to set up and start mining gold. A stream in Montana I did some panning and sluicing had pretty fine gold down low in the creek 10 or 15 miles up stream where it got narrower and faster with large boulders I found less gold. A nice gravel bar on an inside bend was my favorite spot. The deeper I dug the bigger the flakes became. From ultra fine to decent flakes. How many miles do you cover on a particular stream when prospecting before settling on a place to work? Anyone here ever find any gold veins, gold in quartz veins or deposits?
Nothing beats a good day prospecting especially when you find a good spot.
Favorite areas to prospect gravel bars, ancient river beds, etc.
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ProspectingAK
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Re: Favorite areas to prospect gravel bars, ancient river beds, etc.
I tend to target high benches away from the creek when prospecting. That way I can elect to machine mine it if it tests good and not have to worry about riparian boundaries.
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Lanny
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Re: Favorite areas to prospect gravel bars, ancient river beds, etc.
I love to hunt bedrock anywhere I can find it relatively close to the surface in gold country. Having said that, the gold isn't always there, because at some odd times, it's been held up in a layer above the bedrock with the underlying bedrock barren. But, the general rule holds true often enough, that if there's a proven goldfield, I head for its bedrock whenever I can, whether that be with the detector or with sniping and panning tools or when sluicing. I'm an equal opportunity bedrock miner.
To elaborate, I can't seem to beat the good recovery ratio of gold extracted from dirt any other way . . . Bedrock is like the prison built for gold; once the gold's been incarcerated, it's held there until someone or some force busts it out.
If prospecting in areas where it's deep to bedrock, then my next choice would be gravel bars. Where the gold is fine, the top six inches or so of the bar where rocks fist-sized or larger congregate is where you'll find it; but, where the gold's coarser, the digging has to go deeper hoping there's an underlying layer of clay, etc. that the gold will hit and stick.
Nothing beats virgin bedrock in an ancient channel (one that's gold-bearing), as there's no trash to worry the detector, a truly pristine nugget-shooting environment. Only some hot-rocks to cause occasional problems or some mineralized sections of bedrock for mischief, but the lack of trash is heaven.
I had an old-timer tell me once that his favourite places to detect were high up on bedrock rims (located in canyons above gold-bearing streams), right on the edges of the cliff drop-offs as any gold that scuttled down the mountainside would hit that solid flattened edge and have a good chance of slowing down enough to get trapped: he did very well . . .
All the best,
Lanny
To elaborate, I can't seem to beat the good recovery ratio of gold extracted from dirt any other way . . . Bedrock is like the prison built for gold; once the gold's been incarcerated, it's held there until someone or some force busts it out.
If prospecting in areas where it's deep to bedrock, then my next choice would be gravel bars. Where the gold is fine, the top six inches or so of the bar where rocks fist-sized or larger congregate is where you'll find it; but, where the gold's coarser, the digging has to go deeper hoping there's an underlying layer of clay, etc. that the gold will hit and stick.
Nothing beats virgin bedrock in an ancient channel (one that's gold-bearing), as there's no trash to worry the detector, a truly pristine nugget-shooting environment. Only some hot-rocks to cause occasional problems or some mineralized sections of bedrock for mischief, but the lack of trash is heaven.
I had an old-timer tell me once that his favourite places to detect were high up on bedrock rims (located in canyons above gold-bearing streams), right on the edges of the cliff drop-offs as any gold that scuttled down the mountainside would hit that solid flattened edge and have a good chance of slowing down enough to get trapped: he did very well . . .
All the best,
Lanny