mding for gold incolorado ?????

[suprdave]

planning on spending a month in Colorado and was wondering where you can md for gold. are all the old mines in the back country legal to hunt or do you need to get a permit or someting. ill be near Taylor Park and tin cup where we atv and i pass all the abandoned mines and would like to try my luck. Suprdav

 

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[jmoller99]

Those places are usually still owned by someone. Tracking down claim ownership and getting permission may be pretty hard to do. The GPAA claims in Colorado are good places to start (if you are a GPAA member).

What ever you do, do not collect relics from any these areas - the BLM people can (and will) confiscate your metal detectors and fine you. Looking for gold or silver is fine, but not relics over a certain age. If you hunt on private property (with permission), you can collect relics.

You may want to talk to some people in the various prospecting or metal detecting clubs in Colorado (I am a member of the Colorado Springs GPAA) and find some people to detect with, or get some pointers on where you can look.

Anywhere along a river in the Colorado Mineral Belt, where you see huge piles of rounded rocks (like the stretch between Breckenridge and Fairplay), the river was dredged for gold. Those units dug down to bedrock, but, there was not enough water to wash off the clay and many nuggets encrusted in clay washed right thru the Trommels. These areas are also claimed, but there are places you can get access to (either by paying or knowing people with claims) that are worth your time. There was even a dredge that ran up around Tin Cup (I have not investigated it, altho I have been to that area many times).

There is a lot of fine gold in Colorado (30 mesh and smaller). There is also a lot of Silver Ore that was cast aside when the value of silver dropped in the late 1890's - often you will find it in tailings dumps. Its worth more now than then. It never hurts to know what you are looking for. Your gold detector will work on finding silver Ore. A few pounds of that might make you pretty happy along with any gold you find.

Carry a gold pan to sample with anywhere you go.

The picture I attached shows gold from where a dredge ran near Fairplay (on a Claim I had access to). These were all embedded in clay blobs. The largest is 2.2 grams. Found with a Whites GMT.

 

[Hoser John]

There is a Colorado based forum GoldDredger.com that has site specific information. You get many more posts and help in a site specific forum. I am definately NOT saying nuttn' bad here as some really great helpful folks BUT terms,covenents and conditions change extremely fast in this insane environutz litigaseous world we now live in. Bad deal when a fella has 1 week vacation a year and the lousy BLM closes a area-just happened to GPAA claims near Denver as just 1 of a 100 examples. Been on Marcs great forum for almost 20 years ,biggest and best but for all examples you need site specifics--so hope you have a ball and a Merry Christmas to one and all-John O

 

[russau]

Merry Christmass to you John and i hope the very best claim you find big gold on is the very next time you go out!

 

[suprdave]

thanks for all the info guys , ill start looking into getting permission early before i get there so i dont waste my mding time . sure would like to find a nugget. Suprdave