Placer Claim Mined Out?

[desertgolddigger]

I belong to a local club that owns a claim. This club has had this claim for many years, and acquired it after the old timers had mined it previously, and others after they commercial outfits closed up.
I walked quite a bit of the 160 acre claim, and noted that just about every wash had been worked. Most of the surface nuggets has also been detected by those with gold detectors. In other words, this place has been picked over and over and over.
But I m a stubborn type of person, and I figured, just watching how people ram their puffer and blower drywashers, that some gold was just being blown through them. maybe not much, but some small stuff that never got a chance to settle behind the riffles.
I know many of you would never go to the effort of digging for three to four hours through the tailings in these washes. Again, I'm a bit stubborn, and anyway, I just wanted to have some fun locally, instead of driving 300 miles roundtrip to something that gives a little more for less effort.
I've spent the last three weeks, digging a few times a week along about 30 yards of wash, and have recovered just about a gram of gold. That might not seem like much, but I have only dug up 5 grams, not counting this one gram in almost 20 years out here drywashing in the desert of southern California.
As you would know, things always seem to go wrong. My gas powered blower motor decided it was time for the repair shop, and haven't heard from the shop in two weeks. So I purchased a WORX WG521 corded electric leaf blower to use with my Royal Large drywasher. I'm using a portable generator to provide the power. And it actually is working better than with my old gas powered blower. I have to run the blower on the lowest speed, or I just blow everything through the riffles. Results are very good, as I am getting gold specks so small that I will have to use the Blue bowl in order to recover them.
I'm not only getting a little gold, I'm having some fun, and I am getting a good workout. I've lost 10 pounds since I started. So things are going well.
I'm still digging test holes around the old time hard rock mines in the hope I will find where the gold has drifted downhill below these mines. So far just a couple specks here and there. I figure I just have to move laterally one way or the other before I get something better Of course, I' don't really know if the old timers stripped the hillsides. Even if they have, they apparently aren't as thorough as I am. I hope that I may be lucky and find a larger piece of gold that the old timers, previous placer miners, and detectorists have missed.
Hope everyone is having as much fun as I have been having.

 

Amazon Forum Fav 👍

Cry Of The Eagle: History And Legends Of The Cherokee Indians And Their Buried Treasure - Grab it through Amazon!

[russau]

Yes a "filtered" in / out vent fan is must for power supplies . the heat that's generated will ruin / burn up electronics !

 

Amazon Forum Fav 👍

Agony and Death on a Gold Rush Steamer: The Disastrous Sinking of the Side-Wheeler Yankee Blade - Grab it through Amazon!

[Assembler]

Yes a "filtered" in / out vent fan is must for power supplies . the heat that's generated will ruin / burn up electronics !

Best to add a large heat sink and fan if you can for the heat build up.

 

[desertgolddigger]

Best to add a large heat sink and fan if you can for the heat build up.

When the units are in use, the lid will be open so I can access the displays and controls. I think the fan will be good, as both units also have automatic fans for cooling. That was one feature I looked for.

 

[desertgolddigger]

I had my weekly trip out to the club claim. I did placer mining in the main wash, getting about the equivalent of eight five gallon buckets of 1/4 inch and smaller material.

I just finished processing 1/8 bucket of 120 mesh and smaller, getting maybe a few hundred specks of various sizes, though mostly 500 mesh and smaller. The material was half of that sifted material I classified out of one five gallon bucket.

This confirms that at least the very tiny gold is still in this wash.

I've yet to run the larger material. Need to finish sifting the other buckets with the 120 mesh screen before running that larger material through the drywasher.

Almost 20 years ago, someone in our club said that a very large pile of dirt and rocks was the result of a miner going out and gathering a truck load of gold bearing material, and processing it at this particular location. The pile is the size of a three bedroom house with garage.

I finally decided to stop, and get a half bucket sample, screened to 16 mesh. I ran this material through my 120 mesh sifting screen, and sluiced it. I really wasn't expecting anything, but ended up with hundreds of more than likely 500 mesh gold and smaller. So, I now know of another source of this tiny gold, and I don't need to wear out chains getting it. It'll just take some elbow grease.

I'm hoping to build my earthquake platform for sifting material into 5 gallon buckets. Hopefully the next time I go out,
I can stop at this huge pile, an relax somewhat, while the super sifter processes some of this huge pile of dirt.

 

[russau]

is that pile "three bedroom house with a garage " in move in condition ?

 

[desertgolddigger]

is that pile "three bedroom house with a garage " in move in condition ?

The pile is the size of such a structure. It's about 12-15 feet high also. All I know, according to that one club member said, is this person would load up his pickup truck and dump this material at this location. I've no idea where he got the material, or how long it took to create a mound this size. I guess years. Kind of think he slowly strip mined an area, and wanted to get the picked over material out of the way on the way home.

Once I finish my super shaker, I'll go back, and fill up the truck with 75 minus material, to get an idea just how much gold is in ten 5 gallon buckets, to see if working this mound is worth the effort.

 

[russau]

Yep , I don't blame you for that ! @We had a club member that went to one of the S. Eastern gold mines for a outing with our club and he bought and brought back a truck load of material and dumped it in his yard to work. As far as I know he's still digging into that pile !

 

[desertgolddigger]

I went out to do some more digging in that huge dirt pile. The results are a big bust. Looks like my first sample was just like always, got lucky and found the only rich pocket of gold. I got zilch today, and won't be going back. Yes, there's gold in that huge pile, but not enough to be worth the effort.

I'll return to our club claim as it does haver gold, though not a lot. But not a lot is still better than zilch.

BTW, that huge pile has quite a few much smaller piles scattered within a hundred yards. Some have, over the years, gotten shortened or sliced into small piles, as the fllod plain they are on, has eroded them down. I guess that in a few hundred more years, maybe all these piles will be flattened by Mother Nature,

 

[arizau]

I went out to do some more digging in that huge dirt pile. The results are a big bust. Looks like my first sample was just like always, got lucky and found the only rich pocket of gold. I got zilch today, and won't be going back. Yes, there's gold in that huge pile, but not enough to be worth the effort.

I'll return to our club claim as it does haver gold, though not a lot. But not a lot is still better than zilch.

BTW, that huge pile has quite a few much smaller piles scattered within a hundred yards. Some have, over the years, gotten shortened or sliced into small piles, as the fllod plain they are on, has eroded them down. I guess that in a few hundred more years, maybe all these piles will be flattened by Mother Nature,

Maybe sample around the base of the piles. Erosion may have done some reconcentration for you.
Good luck.

 

[desertgolddigger]

Maybe sample around the base of the piles. Erosion may have done some reconcentration for you.
Good luck.

I may go back someday, but getting, basically nothing isn't something to get me back soon. I'm getting much better from the one vertical mine shaft waste pile I've been working. Occasionally I find a piece of ore that basically doubled what I generally get in one day.

Stoll looking for an actually gold source no one else has found. I wish my weird ability to find a patch of good gold helped me do that. But the way things happen is I find something, and when I go back, that's all there was. Done that dozens of times. It's frustrating.

 

[russau]

Good Luck DGD , your day is coming!

 

[desertgolddigger]

Good Luck DGD , your day is coming!

Yeah, I certainly hope that sixth sense I seem to have for finding pockets of gold eventually leads me to a nice big hard rock pocket. I'm going to go out into that flat wasteland I mentioned in an earlier post, and walk around. I'll do some sampling where b the rock seems a bit odd from all the surrounding rocks.

 

[arizau]

Yeah, I certainly hope that sixth sense I seem to have for finding pockets of gold eventually leads me to a nice big hard rock pocket. I'm going to go out into that flat wasteland I mentioned in an earlier post, and walk around. I'll do some sampling where b the rock seems a bit odd from all the surrounding rocks.

Anomaly..land. Go for the gold!
Good luck.

 

[desertgolddigger]

Made it out to the "Anomaly Land", as Arizau named it. I started right next to the main roads, sampling the washes.

I also was curious about a big outcrop of dark rocks/boulders. I sampled quite a bit on this little (100 foot diameter) mound.

I noticed the blackish rocks were just loaded with Pyrites. I've read the sometimes gold will be found associated with these Pyrites. I toted back some of these, as well as some whitish hard material that was embedded just below these blackish rocks. Will need to soak them clean, and then look through a loop. Will let you know the results.

I finished sluicing the dirt material I dug up. This material was gotten from ten test holes on this mound and the two associated washes. It was loaded with lots of flaky Pyrites, and a load of very small gold, probably averaging 300 mesh, though some was in the 100s range.

So, it may've been an eventful day, depending on the results of the rocks I brought back.

All that walking back and forth definitely pooped me out. Time to rest a bit.

 

[desertgolddigger]

The results are in for my possible hard rock mine. I processed six rocks (Gabbro) about four inches in diameter.

The picture shows the results. Is this a good result?

 

[ConceptualizedNetherlandr]

The results are in for my possible hard rock mine. I processed six rocks (Gabbro) about four inches in diameter.

The picture shows the results. Is this a good result?

Depends on how much that gold weighs. Gabbro has a SG of 2.86, so the weight of your 4" diameter rocks can be easily calculated. Then you can think in terms of ppm. gm/1000kg, or oz/ton.

 

[desertgolddigger]

Depends on how much that gold weighs. Gabbro has a SG of 2.86, so the weight of your 4" diameter rocks can be easily calculated. Then you can think in terms of ppm. gm/1000kg, or oz/ton.

Too technical for me. Let me say, I usually get half this amount of gold from 2/3rd bucket of milled material from my club claim old timer mine dump. This is about eight times that amount, if I ran the same 2/3rd bucket of the Grabro.

I will do another two to three tests, maybe 2/3rd bucketiron just to see if that eight times the amount does pay off.

These rocks are coated in fine iron (black sand) and are only located where I took my samples. It's almost like they got splashed by this iron, then solidified. I'm going to sample the Grabro that aren't coated to see if the gold is in with the iron coating.

Just no math please. I go by what I think is a good result. Most of you gold mining professionals would probably turn your nose up at my find after doing the math. Finding any gold that's not associated with a mine is quite something where I mine, as just about everywhere has been scoured. It's quite possible someone found this, did the math, and left.

 

[Assembler]

Depends on how much that gold weighs. Gabbro has a SG of 2.86, so the weight of your 4" diameter rocks can be easily calculated. Then you can think in terms of ppm. gm/1000kg, or oz/ton.

Some people may not care to do much math to figure things out. With this being said one could process say a cubic foot (or given size volume) of one type of rock and gravity sluice and pan out the results as a bench mark.

The minerals locked up chemically is not with in reach of many people except on a larger scale with a lot more investment for a reasonable return.

 

[desertgolddigger]

Some people may not care to do much math to figure things out. With this being said one could process say a cubic foot (or given size volume) of one type of rock and gravity sluice and pan out the results as a bench mark.

The minerals locked up chemically is not with in reach of many people except on a larger scale with a lot more investment for a reasonable return.

I know what everyone is saying. This is the first source of gold inside a rock that I've ever found, and it just excited me. I'd finally found something, even if it isn't all that much.

I'm guessing I got about 1/50th of a gram from 10 pounds of rock, I might get a few grams per ton. But I doubt there's that much good gold bearing rock at this location.

I haven't gotten through the overlying dirt, so I don't know if there's a gold vein below all this loose material.

When I sluiced some of this dirt, I got a lot of tiny gold, so I'm not sure just how much gold is available. All one can do is dig around, and hope.

Remember, I'm doing this for the pure enjoyment, not to make money. It hopefully keeps my interest in something, and keeps my body and mind healthy. I just don't want someone telling me what I get isn't worthwhile. It is when it comes to health.

Anyway, I won't be selling this gold. I'll be willing it to my grand niece and nephew, as well as all other property I have. I'm hoping they will put it in a bank account, and let it grow, versus what a lot of young people do, and buy a cell phone, or some other useless thing.

 

[southfork]

I know what everyone is saying. This is the first source of gold inside a rock that I've ever found, and it just excited me. I'd finally found something, even if it isn't all that much.

I'm guessing I got about 1/50th of a gram from 10 pounds of rock, I might get a few grams per ton. But I doubt there's that much good gold bearing rock at this location.

I haven't gotten through the overlying dirt, so I don't know if there's a gold vein below all this loose material.

When I sluiced some of this dirt, I got a lot of tiny gold, so I'm not sure just how much gold is available. All one can do is dig around, and hope.

Remember, I'm doing this for the pure enjoyment, not to make money. It hopefully keeps my interest in something, and keeps my body and mind healthy. I just don't want someone telling me what I get isn't worthwhile. It is when it comes to health.

Anyway, I won't be selling this gold. I'll be willing it to my grand niece and nephew, as well as all other property I have. I'm hoping they will put it in a bank account, and let it grow, versus what a lot of young people do, and buy a cell phone, or some other useless thing.

When your crushing rocks for fun and health it looks like a good day to me. My jaw crusher makes it more feasible to crush random rocks for prospecting I can go through a five-gallon buckets worth fast if small enough. Then into the chain mill to powder up. Some of those random rocks can carry big surprises Happy Mining.