I have the fever....but not the location....Im in Minnesota!

[bottlecap]

I have the fever....but not the location....I'm in Minnesota!

Hi guys I have gold fever....bad. I recently went to a gold and treasure show here in Mn and bought a bag of pay dirt, a pan and a couple classifiers, I have panned most of the bag and gotten some great gold out of it, I am hooked for sure. I have been kicking around the idea of diving into this hobby for quite a while and I think it's time to try my hand. After talking to some of the folks at the treasure show I know there's gold in Mn for sure but it seems to be pretty fine gold. Has anyone heard of people finding any flake type gold around here? I would think there has to be a chance that not everything is flour gold but maybe I am just being too optimistic, I am not talking about finding nuggets or anything, just stuff you can see without a microscope.
Doing that first pan and at the end swirling that last bit of dirt and seeing all of that warm colored gold smiling at me in the corner, I can't get enough! The pay dirt I bought was from Alaska so it's really good stuff, I just thought it would be good first time practice and it was.
Also what do you folks recommend for retrieving the really fine gold? I have read a lot of threads on here about it and everyone seems to have a different opinion. I am extremely grateful to any of you that reply and take the time to read this! Thanks!

 

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[bottlecap]

......and my forearms are about to fall off.

 

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[Silversurfer79]

Looks like my first spot! Congrats.

 

[63bkpkr]

"......and my forearms are about to fall off." - LOL!! Yes panning will take a lot out of various parts of the body that's why it is helpful to important to be in shape. The lure of the yellow metal really does call to a person. I moved from the Detroit area some years ago and ended up in NorCal (northern California), heard about this river canyon out of Sacramento and found it. I went in there a lot of years and I plan on going back as soon as I can. I've had 'lot's' of Adventures in there including finding some gold. Keep your equipment down to the simple stuff and practice a lot on technique as well as reading streams/rivers for where the heavies are likely to drop out of the water flow. Explore, do your online searches and most of all just enjoy being out there..........63bkpkr



A smattering of the places I play around in in Norcal

 

[bottlecap]

You must of been at the show in Forest Lake on 3/5. I was there and joined the GPAA by buying a membership kit. I'm expanding my horizons from coin detecting to Gold Prospecting and have connections to both the Iron Ranges in Northern Minnesota and the UP of Michigan. In fact my great-great grampa was killed in the Champion Mine in 1879. Both sides of my family are miners that did prospecting in their spare time. Let me know if you are interested in a prospecting partner. I'm real close to the St Croix Falls area. I was going to buy some of that pay dirt but ended up spending my budget at the Twin Cities Prospectors table. Jim

If you'd like to go sometime shoot me a P.M.! Yes I was at the gold show in Forest Lake, saw a lot of great equipment we can't legally use here. The pay dirt I bought was from the boys out of Chicken, Alaska, seemed to be some really good stuff! I grew up about 10 minutes from St.Croix so I know the area well, even though the river is "off limits" there may be other areas to explore, I know a lot of these areas from my days being a river rat fishing every night and weekend. I currently live about an hour from St. Croix so I am not too close anymore but still drive up on occasion to wet a line or visit the folks. Very cool you have the mining backround that you do!

 

[bottlecap]

There's gotta be a more efficient way to do this! Pan after pan is fine and I don't mind the work but it would be nice to get down to cons a little quicker and maybe set something up in the basement to aid with seperating the fin stuff from the black stuff. I think I might be missing some panning.

 

[BrettCo124]

I have the fever....but not the location....I'm in Minnesota!

There's gotta be a more efficient way to do this! Pan after pan is fine and I don't mind the work but it would be nice to get down to cons a little quicker and maybe set something up in the basement to aid with seperating the fin stuff from the black stuff. I think I might be missing some panning.

Have you ever considered a Bazooka Gold Trap? Not sure if you are permitted to use a sluice or not, but you can shovel dirt directly in to the sluice without classifying anything and it automatically removes the light material and keeps the heavy stuff behind. You can drop the leftovers in a pan and finish that way. Much easier than panning alone because you can continue to shovel tons of material before ever really needing to check it.

I'm new to this whole thing, but have been practicing on the bazooka mini. It's the easiest thing to operate. If you review bazooka sluices, you will find everybody raving about them.

 

[bottlecap]

Have you ever considered a Bazooka Gold Trap? Not sure if you are permitted to use a sluice or not, but you can shovel dirt directly in to the sluice without classifying anything and it automatically removes the light material and keeps the heavy stuff behind. You can drop the leftovers in a pan and finish that way. Much easier than panning alone because you can continue to shovel tons of material before ever really needing to check it.

I'm new to this whole thing, but have been practicing on the bazooka mini. It's the easiest thing to operate. If you review bazooka sluices, you will find everybody raving about them. View attachment 1288207

We can't use sluices in this state unfortunately so options are limited. I know someone suggested the gold hog pan but that seems a little pricey for me although I may break down and get one.

 

[arizau]

We can't use sluices in this state unfortunately so options are limited. I know someone suggested the gold hog pan but that seems a little pricey for me although I may break down and get one.

You might look at the Pyramid Pro Pan. This too is capable of processing a lot of material, as much or more than a sluice some say and it is much less expensive. https://www.google.com/webhp?source...US576&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=Pyramid+pro+pan

 

[bottlecap]

You might look at the Pyramid Pro Pan. This too is capable of processing a lot of material, as much or more than a sluice some say and it is much less expensive. https://www.google.com/webhp?source...US576&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=Pyramid+pro+pan

I was just looking at that one second ago! There were some guys at the gold show that recommended it but I couldn't really see it in action, now that I've seen a few you tube videos on it I think it's the real deal. Would be nice to get some kind of system set up in the basement for finishing material.

 

[bottlecap]

Found a pretty sweet spot tonight, had a small piece of gold in nearly every pan, really small stuff but hard to miss.

 

[motohed]

There's gotta be a more efficient way to do this! Pan after pan is fine and I don't mind the work but it would be nice to get down to cons a little quicker and maybe set something up in the basement to aid with seperating the fin stuff from the black stuff. I think I might be missing some panning.

Thats why I suggested the Gold Hog Pan . it will take you to panning fines , fill a bucket and pan it at home . Do your self a favor , buy the Gold Hog Pan . They tend to make more professional products . FYI , if your looking for a Gold specific detector Check the Makro Gold Racer , or the Notka fors Gold Plus . Makro Gold Racer is coming out with wireless headphones , as an accesorry . A plus in my book .

 

[Capt Nemo]

I think we should stop calling bazookas sluices! They're a self classifying fluid bed!

Gotta keep the wardens scratching their heads!

 

[Silversurfer79]

Couldn't agree more Capt. Nemo!

 

[motohed]

I guess you could stretch it to a self clasifying pan . That may be a long stretch though . LOL

 

[bottlecap]

Can you purchase those bazooka classifying pans anywhere? Seriously though where can you get one?

 

[motohed]

You can watch for them on ebay , search bazooka gold trap and there is a link on the home page of Tnet for them . They are one of our sponsers .

 

[KevinInColorado]

Can you purchase those bazooka classifying pans anywhere? Seriously though where can you get one?

www.bazookagoldtrap.com

 

[B&E prospecting]

Hey bottlecap. I saw the picture of your captured "speck"! It looks nice and yep that's about the size and amount I find in the land of 10,000 restrictions! I was thinking maybe we should meet and compare techniques? And if you can find ur way northward a bit I could show you a few spots I have found. ? In mid June there's a guy I know that wants me to check out his property ( has a creek on it!) around Motley. I gotta tel ya reading your posts has started the fever in me again. I've made a system of classifying and processing about 4 buckets of classified material in under an hour. Might be helpful in your quest

 

[B&E prospecting]

One thing I have noticed is the difference between panning for the specks in MN and some of the techniques in larger gold bearing areas. The biggest difference I've noticed when panning is most teach you to "wash" off the lighter material by slowly allowing water to enter and exit the pan while the material just sits still. This, I feel is wrong, especially in MN- the gold is often times washed out with the lighter stuff because of it small speck size. I have found you should keep the material in a constantly moving state and slowly tip the pan forward while watching how much in ejecting on the pullback of ate swirling motion and ALWAYS keep the material underwater of course. This allows for a great chance that the specks will work their way down to the bottom and trapped in a riffle. I know there are dozens of techniques for panning but this seems very successful for me. I often train people on panning and keep 10 small pieces of gold in a blonde sand mix with some black sand to show the difference panning methods make and most everyone has witnessed missing gold pieces by washing the light material off. It just doesn't get a chance to sink.

 

[motohed]

If you clasify your materials down in size through sieves , you will have better luck with your panning . Fast washing over the the edge of the pan will lose the fine gold you may not see . I'm sure your missing some micro gold .