Farmington Canyon (UT)

[Dallasb84]

Spent the whole day panning up there today with my dog! Beautiful, nice clean water. I did not poke much around sunset camp ground. I did not find any gold or black sand all day. I worked the culverts, streams banks and what looks to be some concrete structure with a spillway.

Started as far downstream as I could and found some promising spots. Dug on the bank and in the rubble. Could not find black sand.

Found no gold in the culvert. Cleared the rubble at the mouth of the big culvert and still found nothing.

Moved on to the concrete structure at a different spot and started up stream. Dug around a fallen tree ball. Dug the bank and dung a bend. Nothing but mica and fools gold. I did however find copper and what looks to be silver specks.

Worked the concrete structure and scraped up the moss the water was running over. Nothing. Worked the lip of the spill way by slightly diverting the current with loose boulders and started clearing out loose rocks and small boulders where the water enters. I dug an arms length pit until I started getting some nice mud. Worked 10-15 pans and found more silver, lead and copper. Found some weird mineral that looked like a heavy grey metal with copper inside. Found a bunch of lead shot and some really big lead slugs. No black sand here either. I left the rocks for the next guy as the hard work is pretty much done if someone wants to try their luck. I moved on uphill and found a few small spots and nothing changed.

Went all the way up to the communications tower and panned some of the dirt up top. Found very small traces of black sand and the. A weird thing happened. There was very very fine white sand. And one small silver spec. Don't know what it is.

As dusk started approaching I headed to the cliff to take a look at the geology. White quartz veins run between layers of shale and sandstone conglomerate. Most of the Quartz is decomposing. There are also pink Quartz outcroppings that are rich in iron and are rusting. I did not see any signs this mountain and canyon is producing anything but sand erosion.

That was my day. I will not go prospecting here again. It is worth a visit just don't waste your time looking for minerals. There is so much damn mica coming out of the Mountain it is not funny. I tried 3 sides. I do not recommend.

 

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[KevinInColorado]

Good field report even if you didn't find gold. The fine heavy white sand could be tin oxide as that is white and also quite dense.

 

[BagLady]

Welcome to the neighborhood. Better luck next time.

 

[Dallasb84]

Yeah it was a bummer. I dug the heck out of that spillway. I mean... If there was anything there it should be with the lead and in the moss right Oh well, it was a perfect day either way. I only took one scoop out of the big culvert... It has a 10' long gravel mud bed at the discharge.... I just wasn't geared for all that.

 

[utah mason]

You should check out gold panning in Utah by Allen chensworth. Definitely worth a read.

 

[utah mason]

Good field report even if you didn't find gold. The fine heavy white sand could be tin oxide.

I end up with that quite a bit. I have wondered what kind of sand could be so heavy to just sit with the fine gold.

 

[KevinInColorado]

You should check out gold panning in Utah by Allen chensworth. Definitely worth a read.

His book is the best! Get it!

UtahMason, some of the silver stuff you find is probably electrum. That's a thing up American Fork Canyon, it's a blend of gold and silver. When I prospected there, I confirmed what it was via chemistry and celebrated!!

 

[arizau]

I end up with that quite a bit. I have wondered what kind of sand could be so heavy to just sit with the fine gold.

Could be a tungsten mineral which are pretty high specific gravity. There were tungsten mines in Farmington Canyon according to what I found in a google search.

As a side note.....There were active placers here in S. AZ near Arivaca during WWII for tungsten minerals since it was a strategic metal. An old Mexican American man who was one of my mentors told me years ago that he and some of his family, etc. placered for wolframite, scheelite or whatever (?) during the war and sold it by the pound.
This is the general area he described. http://www.mindat.org/loc-35251.html

 

[Dallasb84]

I figured it as silver. If it is electrum that's cool. I actually had a full bottom pan of goldish and whitish fine sand. I looked at it under a magnifier and it didn't look like gold to me. Half of it would move half wouldn't. I am pretty sure it was lead or silver to be honest. Tin oxide does sound right. I'm no expert, especially in this area, but the geology on this hill doesn't seem to point to the right direction. I've panned some some unlikely places and found gold. I'm really looking for lode precipitate or alluvial placer. It's just easier to stay on when located and enjoy the hobby. Farmington just has so much mica.

On a side note, when I was on top of the mountain looking down at antelope island with delta off in the distance something just clicked in my brain. It may be possible the heavy minerals were cleaned off this rock already. By natural erosion. Hence the no black sand in my concentrates. Where lode gold reportedly is found in Utah is often in ore and deep down. I'm just speculating that the natives and Spanish may have been able to get most of the placer that leached out already. Like I said I've panned all over and found gold. There was no trace I could find in this canyon. Im gonna go to the other side of the range and see if things look different. If I do decide to look here again it will be much lower on the mountain.

The presence of iron and copper in the quartz was intriguing. I took some picture at the top or the mountain and would like to share in case anyone would like to visit this place. It's breath taking. What hosting service is recommended for these forums?

 

[utah mason]

His book is the best! Get it!

UtahMason, some of the silver stuff you find is probably electrum. That's a thing up American Fork Canyon, it's a blend of gold and silver. When I prospected there, I confirmed what it was via chemistry and celebrated!!

Thanks Kevin
I'll take a closer look at my cons next time. Wife gave me the day off tomorrow, so I'll be heading back up there. Found a nice little spot a couple weeks ago. Hopefully no one else finished digging the corner out for me. Probably not though, it was a good walk through some thick brush with plenty of poison ivy. Spent about two and a half hours after work. 2nd run for sniper.

 

[wtetro]

Dallas, I used to live there and frequented Francis Peak. I've panned up and down, and no gold ever found its way in my pan, even from the creek to the south on the bench beyond Lagoon. If you want gold and in a short drive, hit up American Fork Canyon above Tibble Reservoir. It's small, fly poop, but there's gold there. Dig behind tree stumps on the down stream side, all layers have flood gold. Also, move up the creek and you'll find tons of moss to pan out. Another place to hit would be horseshoe bend at the Green River south of Vernal. PM me if you need additional info, good luck.

 

[UTAvalanche]

If I may add a little more information on the canyon.

There are at least 5 mines and probably more in Farmington Canyon. 1 is about a mile up from the bottom of the canyon on a sharp switchback. Another 1 is at the bottom of the canyon just below the Sunset Campground and above the waterfall and across the river. There are also 2 more unnamed prospects that probably have been closed by now. About 3/4 of a mile above the Sunset campground just below the road there is the:

Lucky boy prospect 1
Location: North side of canyon just below the road.
Ore: Chalcanthite, Chalcopyrite, Gold, Malachite, Scheelite.
Other Minerals: Copper, Gold, Silver, Tungsten

Lucky Boy Prospects 2 & 3
Location: Just below Prospect 1
Minerals: Tungsten, Silver, Gold, Copper

Morning Star prospects 1&2
Location: Located on south side of canyon across from Lucky Boy prospects 2 &3.
Minerals: Copper, Gold

The black sand is buried at least 1 1/2 feet down and deeper. There is some gold mixed in with it but not a lot. The gold is deeper. Also they dredged out the holding pond some years back and piled up a mountain of material that had settled in the bottom of the pond. The gold that settled in the pond over the years is in that big pile. I haven’t gotten a lot out of it but there is gold in there. At the mouth of the canyon the road cuts through some of the ancient river deposits. Check the larger rock deposits and also the little gully along side of the road below them. The rain water washes down across those deposits and if there is any gold it will collect in those little gullies. I use a Vortex mat finishing sluice for working the material and find that it seems to work the best. This is definitely a Gold Cube type canyon. Hope some of this is of interest.

 

[Dallasb84]

Thanks for the tips wtetro! I'll check AFC out tomorrow.

So... It's not exactly gold related other than I expected to find gold and got lead but... Here it is anyway.

I got curious to at least identify the metals I collected and yes it was indeed lead. Well, I collected some topaz last month at Topaz mountain and decided to combine my most worthless specimens into an ultra worthless piece!
I gathered up some sand and a bit of tin foil and melted the lead on the stove...

I know what you are thinking.... LEAD! Omg! Well, lead vaporizes at a pretty high temp so it's actually pretty safe as long as you know what you are doing.

Anyhow, I gathered up some sand and some topaz bits and made a naturally unnatural topaz lead nugget. Looks pretty cool I must say! Regardless if it is just bullet bits and crap topaz at least my GF will enjoy it. Maybe she'll show it to her friends who think I'm a kook for digging holes and searching for treasure. That'll show em!

 

[wtetro]

I've been out there to Topaz Mountain too. I still have a huge chunk of rhyolite from there. Watch for scorpions there, they're everywhere. Also, west on that road, there is an old mine with fluorite i think all over the ground in the dump piles and apache tears a little more down the road from there. While in AF Canyon and digging, check the rocks, there are a lot of fossils there, mostly shells cast into the rock, but pretty neat to find if you're into rocks too. I also heard Willard Canyon had gold, but I never checked. Might be worth the hike to see, especially now since the creek should still be running. Let us all know what you find. And we're all kooks for this hobby...everyone else who doesn't do it thinks do, until we show them the shiny yellow metal, then their tunes change. Keep digging.

 

[stephen583]

Nobody finds it all. Geologists estimate only 50 percent of the placer gold in California was found during the Gold Rush era. That means 50 % of it is still there. Recently in September 2016 a tourist found a gold nugget the size of his palm just laying in a shallow creek in central California. He wasn't even a prospector. In 2012 a youngster found a nugget the size of a marble at Lynx Creek Arizona (again according to the story, just laying a couple of inches under the water). Lynx Creek in Arizona is one of the most heavily visited recreational prospecting locations in the entire lower 48 states. So if everybody had "cleaned it out" that nugget shouldn't have been there.

BTW. As a note, try Rose Creek right over the hills next to Lynx Creek. The property on Rose Creek is owned by a city councilman who was a prospector himself. You can stay on Rose Creek, prospect and camp there free of charge as long as you like. I was there two years. Bill actually built himself a small A-Frame shack with solar panels and lived on Rose Creek for more than 5 years. The councilman has put local law enforcement on notice the prospectors are not to be messed with unless they misbehave. It's a really nice place to camp. A convenience store is a quarter mile walk down the highway, as well as a prospecting shop, and Rose Creek Park is a short walk up the creek, where there are restrooms, electric outlets, Wi-fi and water fountains. Every weekend in the summer, a Flea Market opens just past the park where you can pick up camping and prospecting equipment, a cheese burger and fries and cold beverages at the diner.

If you're good at digging to bedrock, you'll get about $50 dollars a day with little effort. I only worked about five hours a day and took the rest of the day off. Concentrate on the feeder creeks running into Rose Creek from above, not the creek itself and look for the blue clay. Bring a breaker bar and a sledge hammer, the gravel is solid and the big rocks are everywhere. The color is about two feet down. You can also try the banks of the creek, but you won't do as well. That's where most of the tourists dig. Around 5 PM a fellow pulls up by the bridge and honks his horn. He pays cash for whatever the going rate is for gold that day. IMHO There is no better spot to take the family for an Arizona gold panning/sluicing vacation experience. Say hello to Bill and the rest of the gang for me. The four of them usually congregate at the big pool to speed wash their dirt in the afternoon.

From what I read about early Spanish gold expeditions in North America (the records can still be found today in Seville Spain), the Conquistadors had mixed results. Extensive mining operations were established in New Mexico, Arizona and Colorado usually exploiting conquered Indian tribes and using them for slave labor. Aristras used by the Spanish for grinding gold out of rock are found in national and state parks in all three of these states. However, the Spanish actually worked very few mines in North America. They mostly concentrated on the most productive areas where the local Indians could be easily subdued.

Many Spanish expeditions met with total disaster rather than success. Case in point the tragic explorations of Cabeza de Vacca. In certain regions where gold was known to be found, the Native American tribes proved too fierce to be conquered and enslaved. In Cortezs' journals he recounts where the Indians ran back and forth across the musket fire of his soldiers for sport and shot arrows while running hitting men in the neck from a distance of 50 paces (far beyond the effective range of unrifled muskets).

Long story short, I rather doubt the Conquistadors "cleaned out" anything other than a few areas they could reach, and even then.. nobody finds it all.