prospecting

[tweeta_bear]

is it fair to say that most of the high mountain have fissures in them? is it also fair to say gold follows water? with these questions in mind if i find an old dried up creek bed coming down off the mountain and i dig in the right spot i can get what im looking for or has it nit made it down off the side off the mountain yet(ie not reach the creek yet)?

 

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[Jason in Enid]

Seeing such a small portion, it's kind of hard to get a full feel for it. There is an outside bend gravel bar on the right side, which is odd. Why is it there? Is there are long straight run causing the pile up at a sharp bend?

It's very hard to read elevation changes in the pic, but try to get a feel for the river flow when it's running 10 feet or more higher. Read THAT river, not the little one flowing in the pic.

The gravel bar of points 6 and 8 looks very substantial and I would try to get as deep as possible in your test holes.

Lastly, look where the boulder fields are. If the current drops those there, there should be enough flow to be carrying larger gold which will also try to start dropping in the eddies.

 

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[tweeta_bear]

its a mountain canyon. i took a few mor pics to show dwn stream a lill and up stream a lil. its s windy like that the whole way up/down the canyon.

 

[fowledup]

Zoom out the picture and mentally fill the valley with roaring flows of gold moving water. Look for the spots where raging pinch points would have opened up and lost their gold moving energy, dropping the gold. Look for the obstacles that would have stopped and caught that moving gold- bluffs, benches, bars, low points, natural "sluice bars", etc. Now use the common generalities you've read about where gold should be and apply that to the big picture not the current picture. If you apply those generalities to the river as it is now you will be prospecting where the majority have already been. Gold is old and slow, think old and slow.

 

[tweeta_bear]

ok ive got 2days of fun coming up. tomorrow and Saturday its suppose to be in the 90's. if you would like to look it up its huntsmans gulch in clear creek below blackhawk and central city colorado. its said that over 200,000 ozs was taken out of the area. (back in the day) i see guys up there with the smaller dredge machines all the time... ask kevincolorado.

 

[fowledup]

Now that I've seen the new pictures I would go to the rock faces on the river bank in the middle picture where the river takes a hard left. I loves the cracks! I'd imagine the dredgers and "bedrock sluicers" have hammered the obvious spots. I've always done my best on cracks and crevices. They will replenish themselves and there are more cracks that have never been touched then gravel bars any day. The secret to cracks is don't quit till your scraping the rock at the bottom. Most quit way too soon. I believe it's Hurthawks who has some really good videos on crackin.

 

[tweeta_bear]

yay! i went threw my concentrates from my trip to the mountains. i posted that i didnt find any color when in fact i did. didnt find much but every lil bit counts right? oh boy do i get excited at even the smallest pieces. im now trying to run threw my head how im gonna do this all winter. i guess mayb i should invest in some fishing waders.

 

[DesertNuggets]

yay! i went threw my concentrates from my trip to the mountains. i posted that i didnt find any color when in fact i did. didnt find much but every lil bit counts right? oh boy do i get excited at even the smallest pieces. im now trying to run threw my head how im gonna do this all winter. i guess mayb i should invest in some fishing waders.

Awesome! We all start somewhere.

 

[KevinInColorado]

Alrighty then, that's some progress!

 

[tweeta_bear]

ima spend the next 2days up clear creek.

 

[A_Sly1_U]

I have the same app. It's called digger's map. For $20 you can search for lots of different metals and minerals. Together with the satellite map feature and the gps on your smart phone it makes finding sites real easy. Only problem I had was not having service in the mountains to load the maps. That was remidied with an app that lets me download maps in advance. I'm not sure where they get their information...maybe from the USGS minedat...but it's a really cool app.

 

[tweeta_bear]

Seeing such a small portion, it's kind of hard to get a full feel for it. There is an outside bend gravel bar on the right side, which is odd. Why is it there? Is there are long straight run causing the pile up at a sharp bend?

the gravel bar on the outside bend is actually a 15 or 20 foot drop from the road to the steam and its not really gravel they are large jagged rocks. we set up the sluice @ #1, #2 is a pic of the hole we dug. we also dug against this bedrock. and we got another bucket full from the top step of the waterfall. it was funny my boy said " it dont look that high in the pic" i said "come on ive already been up there by myself with the bucket and the shovel"

 

[tweeta_bear]

oops i did something wrong there.

 

[johnnysau]

Might save ya some time and effort, don't really see from research where gold is around the area you are at, go where gold has been found before if I am looking at the right spot. Research could probably put you on some better ground. Not sure where your based out of. I think thorium is the mineral around your area now. Just saying

johnnysau

 

[tweeta_bear]

i live in denver colorado and try a search blackhawk, central city and Idaho springs colorado. OH there is gold there... try a search of "the glory hole in central city"

 

[johnnysau]

I agree there, I was looking up huntsman gulch it was taking me down to powderhorn county.

 

[tweeta_bear]

try to search gilpin county colorado.

 

[tweeta_bear]

i dont get it they say dig to bedrock? we where going to dig behind this huge rock and the hole behind the rock would have been over our heads.

 

[tweeta_bear]

this is a pic of where i was panning in 1880.

 

[DesertNuggets]

i dont get it they say dig to bedrock? we where going to dig behind this huge rock and the hole behind the rock would have been over our heads.

Just depends on the area. Some places bedrock is already exposed and easy to work and other places its 20 feet deep and impossible to work.

 

[KevinInColorado]

i dont get it they say dig to bedrock? we where going to dig behind this huge rock and the hole behind the rock would have been over our heads.

In most of Clear Creek Canyon, the bedrock is 40-80 feet down under the gravel so it's not an option! The per things to remember are they dredged almost the whole creek back in the day and turned everything over...but did a poor job of catching the smaller gold. Second, the road construction thru the canyon meant they moved the creek around quite a bit so....rather than trying to over analyze the creek, just get in there and sample pan the areas that are hard packed and tough to dig. If you find easy diggings, you are in a modern day tailings pile most likely and won't find any gold to speak of. Also remember that most casual miners there don't bother to go far from the access points and easy spots...you may have to scramble a ways along the creek to find the least worked spots. Good luck!