Finally back at it. Panning the creek here once again.

[therobertsmith]

After a nice neck surgery and a new plate and screws I can finally do a little panning. Still hurts after a hour of doing it but I am out of the house. So, being sidelined for 2 months I have done a ton of reading from USGS reports of the Kings Mountain area to local area. So my questions.
At certain areas the soil is very very red almost blood red and you can smell k that has a major quartz vein through it as well. Collected some nice pieces of q

 

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[therobertsmith]

Stupid phone cut me off. But I have some nice quartz pieces from it. I have panned the red dirt and it looks nice but I can only do so much as of now and all the work panning kills my hands, back and neck. I have also panned just above the area and it is heavy in black sands and nice clear quartz that look like diamonds, would be nice. So, I go behind the house and pan. Now I am getting black and blondish sands and balls of reds that can be broken down.
So the red balls could they contain gold? Also, the blondish sands worth keeping?
I have found flower gold but still trying to figure out how to get it separated from the rest.
Worse part now is the darn snakes. Had one come at me yesterday and he got the chop before the pistol.
Sorry for the long post but it has been awhile since I have been on here.

 

[therobertsmith]

One last thing. I am finding a ton of grey shiny metal. It is heavy as it stays with the black. You can see this stuff shine bright in the sun. Plus, I also have a lot of material that has been heated or pressured together. They look like rocks that you can easily spot as not natural. Very nice looking. One last thing and I am done. Some of my quartz is about 4 inches wide and the top or bottom is smooth but under 10x they look like balls. Could this just be from the cooling period or something trapped during this period? I hate to break the stuff down because it is so awesome to look at. Just trying to figure if the tons of quartz and rock are worth keeping space in the garage. I need to get some pics up.

 

[russau]

a picture is worth a thousand words. are they bendable? or break apart?

 

[bobw53]

I have found flower gold but still trying to figure out how to get it separated from the rest.

Classify and pan, CLASSIFY being the important part.... I bought a miller table because I couldn't figure out how to pan out that small stuff...
Now the miller table is just sitting there gathering dust... You CAN get that little stuff separated in a pan, and once you know how to do it, and
get a little bit of practice, its actually pretty quick, I find it takes longer to classify the material than to pan it...

These videos will eat up about an hour of your time, but they are informative... There are also tons of other instructional vids on youtube..
Techniques are all similar, and I'm sure they all work, just need to find out what is best for you.
http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/panning-gold/459664-art-gold-panning.html

As for the quartz, a Falcon MD20 will tell you really quick, but those aren't exactly free... I've always got a 60X currency microscope in my pocket to check out rocks that I
can't stop picking up... They are dirt cheap on e-bay, get a few because they do break. The microscopes are also great for checking out the super fine, sometimes not
even visible gold in your pan... It makes those tiny little pieces of flour look like a big fat pretty nugget.

And of course, you can always just crush and pan.. A dirt cheap crusher can be made with a few pieces of pipe from down at the hardware store.

 

[arizau]

A previous post suggested you may live in NC. Here is a list of gold occurrences there. They are listed by county. Mineral Location Search

Are you sure the "grey shiny metal" is metal? If it shatters when struck with a hammer it isn't. Quartz without visible gold is just pretty rock unless they are pretty enough to be collectable by someone. If they contain gold and it is not visible somewhere on the surface then the only true way to determine that is to crush and pan them (mentioned above).

Good luck.

 

[therobertsmith]

I do need something stronger than a 10x for sure. They just seem to hang out with the black and blonde sand. Not big maybe finger nail clipping sized. The one thing I have noticed is some quartz I find seems to maybe have this same material between two section or a broken off piece that shows it.
I appreciate all the great info. Sorry it took a while to respond back. I was in the creek working
I will post some pics up soon if my wifi hold up. Living down in a holler makes reception tough.

 

[therobertsmith]

Sorry guys using a cellphone for pictures is horrible. Will try again shortly.
Trying to figure out the veins between it. Also used my wifes flour sifter as a classifier today. I just need to pan it down. Hope she doesn't need it again