MadMarshall
Hero Member
My backpack sluice has about a foot of black matting then the carpet and riffles...Probaley the standard issue..Anyway I was wondering how many people actually dictate where they dig or if should move ect. ect by what they see or don't see in that black mat in the sluice.. I happened to be sluicing with a guy for a few days and I was doing the digging and he was running the sluice..We spent a week or so sampling the area and making sure we had several dig sites that showed promise in the hope to move as much decent gravel as possable.. Anyway it seemed after every three or so buckets he was telling me that the sampling in spot was a fluke.. and on to the next spot after moving more times then I uasualy do in one day exspeacially after sampling first.. I started asking for a clean out after every bucket from the first hole...Anyway the black mat would show a small piece and some dust..but didn't look great..but after the clean out some nice pickers could be found and more then what the mat showed..I was pretty irritated as we lost 6 or so hours of constant work to be moving dig sites..Just becouse this man couldn't read the material he was running or how the flow in the sluice was.... I think the black mat can be bad for allot of new prospectors!! As I think they put all there trust in the black mat and not the sluice!!!! I do admitt its nice to see the gold sparkle in the sunlight...But don't let the lack of sparkle fool you..know your gravel/dirt ect..is sandy or kinda packed a clay?? All this dictates where it will deposit in your sluice box.... So many factors already when running a sluice do not let that black mat create more...
