Pocket Gold

[nickinCA]

I have heard that recovering pocket gold is now one of the top ways to find gold these days. Pocket gold is gold that has eroded from its vein but has not reached the river or stream yet. Has anyone tried prospecting for pocket gold? What if you go to an old mine and search downhill from it? Thanks.

 

Amazon Forum Fav 👍

Family Maps of Hinds County, Mississippi, Deluxe Edition - Grab it through Amazon!

[bug]

Yes but in SoCal

PLL

pegleg its NorCal motherload

 

Amazon Forum Fav 👍

DR.ÖTEK Metal Detector, Waterproof Gold Detector, Pinpoint & Terrain Modes, Professional Metal Detector - Grab it through Amazon!

[pegleglooker]

Ok THANKX Bug.... I was just trying to ties up some loose ends on the ole Pegleg Smith yarn....

PLL

 

[geodesic9]

I'm into my forth quartz pocket and am finding the gold very clean, either arborescent or sponge like. All seams are on the surface, most dug during the 1850's (dated from small amount of trash and pick heads). Tailings have ALOT of gold in them as the miners didn't set up camp, just dug and left.
My question is, does the seam continue down? Only in a very few places have the seams been followed down and not very deep when they are.

No black gold here.

 

[nuggetshooter323]

Bacteria Gold- Gold that was consumed by some kind of micro organism and crapped out. I only know about that one because I saw it on an episode of Gold Fever.

Lesson 2

Here are some of the different forms Gold takes.

Nuggets - a lump of gold in nugget form
Pickers - a small piece of gold just large enough to pick up
Fines - very small pieces of gold too small to pick up
Dust - very very fine pieces of gold
Flour - the finest of all that can still be seen naked eye
Crystalline - one of nature's rarest forms of gold
Wire - a crystalline form of gold shaped like wire
Ribbon - another crystalline form in a ribbon shape
Scales - another crystalline form
Mustard - A spongy type of free gold found in the gossan above gold-silver-telluridedeposits

I am sure I missed some, so feel free to add to the list, add a description if you do, please.

GG~

 

[geodesic9]

You may want to add coral, arborescent and or sponge gold.

 

[Bejay]

A long time ago an old timer in southern Oregon Applegate area took me under his arm and told me how to quantitatively locate pocket gold. A lot of pocket gold discoveries have occurred in southern Oregon. His name was Glen Young. He and his wife lived and mined up in the upper Applegate River drainage all their lives. Their log cabin had dirt floors and they had straw beds....... ate salt pork and beans etc etc etc. I'll have to read this thread and see ifn anybody described the method. If not I'll post it later.

Bejay

 

[Bejay]

OK...so no mention of this method has been mentioned in this thread. I will also like to share that Glen Young was a real placer gold MINER. He was also a graduate in engineering but chose a reclusive lifestyle up in the backwoods of Oregon before any roads (logging) ever came into his claim area. I last visited him in in 1972 when he was 84 years old and his wife had already passed. He had moved his cabin 5 times over the many years of mining his creek....because he wanted to "wash out" the area....sending the material over his hand chiseled bedrock riffles. Enough said....he was a MINER.

Here is how he told me to look for and find "pocket gold".

1. You need a 3 ft shovel with the cross handle grip on the end.
2. You will need a lot of small wooden stakes that can be numbered (using a marking pen or ?)
2. You will need a lot of plastic zippy bags that can be labeled or ? (he used empty canned veggy/bean cans)

One must understand that Oregon has a lot of humus material on the forest floor.
One must understand that this method is used in areas known to produce "pockets" of loose (free) lode gold.
One must understand that the streams/creeks in the area are known to produce placer gold.

So here is how you put all this to use:

You go up on a hill/mtn side and start by digging down the depth of your 3 ft shovel.
Once you reach the depth you take a "pint" sample of the material at the bottom of your hole.
You place a numbered stake at the hole and the sample goes into your zippy bag along with the corresponding number.

You do this all over the hillside...in a grid pattern. One can follow a certain contour interval if one chooses.
You might end up with 100 samples....depending on the size of the area you choose to sample.

Now you go back to camp and pan out each sample.....getting the sample down to the black sand and gold?.
You weigh each and every final sample. You chart this weight according to the corresponding numbered grid you have on the mtn.

You will end up locating an area with the highest amount of "weght" per sample.
Now you will return to the area and begin exposing the underlayment of rock material. This would be basically getting rid of the humus layer.
This will give you a strong likelihood of finding a "pocket".

Many a pocket has been found in the Applegate Drainage. One can do further research on this form of gold in southern Oregon.

Be cautious to NOT stray onto claimed property.

Good luck!

Bejay

 

[MadScientist]

[...] Robert Ballytyne(sp) wrote a great manual I used to sell titles-How to find Pocket gold. [...]

Well, after a bit of searching, I finally found it. It's by Verne H. Ballantyne, and it's called "How to Prospect for Pocket Gold". Thanks, John - you set me on the right path, at least. I found a copy on eBay - looking forward to reading it.