Underwater Sniping n00b sharing some vids and my story. :)

[NeoTokyo]

Heya Everyone;

Brand new to the forums and about 3 weeks new to underwater sniping.

I have tried panning several times as a kid and prospecting is rich on both sides of my family though I NEVER had any luck at it.
I only ever found a few specs of micro gold, would get frustrated and run off to fish or swim.
So I have had the basic panning equipment my entire life, just never really did anything with it.

My first ever gold nugget was a small jelly bean sized nugget given to me by a nice man out on the American River by Colfax Ca some 15 or so years ago when I was a boy.
I think the road was Iowa Hill Road just off hiway 80, there is a campground down there too.

I held onto that nugget for about 5 years till I lost it, or my father got ahold of it.

Fast Forward to 3 weeks ago and several failed panning trips in between and you find me surfing around on YouTube.
I was not looking for prospecting video's but I clicked mindlessly on a related video (as many of us do sometimes on YouTube) and it was the "Gold Sniping New Zealand" video.
I dont know why but that video sucked me in and for the next couple hours I was watching all the sniping, panning, sluicing and dredging video's I could.

I then started researching this area, coming to forums to see what tools you guys use and I even called BLM to figure out where I could do it.

I then put together my bag of tricks starting with snorkeling equipment and a few basic tools (I will have my complete tool list at the bottom) and we headed out.

When I went out I just randomly plopped in the water where I found some bedrock, it wasnt too long after that I started to find gold - WOW! I thought and was instantly hooked.

I took home several nice sized flakes my first day and went back out the next.

My second day I found a very nice Nugget, a little larger than a Gold Fish Cracker but the same shape.

Its been about 3 weeks and we have about 15 grams of non-nugget gold, I dont know how much weight we have in nuggets but its pretty decent.

We are 100% addicted now and wish the water would stay calm and swimmable all year round.


I would like to hear from other snipers out there and if you have any hints or tips for tracking down nuggets.


Gear:

US Divers Mask, snorkel, flippers. (Hers)
Oceanic Ion 3x Mask, snorkel, flippers. (Mine)
A few flathead screwdrivers from short to 3' long
1/4" squared 12" long flathead prybar
36" Wrecking Bar
Rock Hammer with 1" Flat spade end (Estwing Geo hammer soon to come)
Assorted Tweezers
Gloves
2" trenching spade
Small scoops
Hand broom
Bazooka Gold Trap Sluice Box (Miners version)
2 large Garrett pans
1 small 8" blue Keene pan
2 sniffer bottles
Coleman MAX LED and Bubba Flashlight's
Stanley LED Underwater Spotlight (520 lumens)

Now for some videos.

I am only going to link up my last 4 vids but you can go to my channel to see the rest. CrainRacing - YouTube

Thanks.

-Eric-

 

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[gold nuggets]

Nice gold!! It doesn't seem to make any difference what
color pan you use, gold always looks good in them.
Gold Nuggets

 

[delnorter]

Nice gold Eric and good video. Could you take a short clip of the equipment you use? I'm going to try sniping over here in the Smith River along the north coast. I've never snorkeled before, but I'm going to try it. Do you and your wife use wetsuits?

Thanks Eric,
Mike

 

[NeoTokyo]

Thanks for the kind welcome.

I am very happy with my take, according to the local shops I seem to be doing better than most.
I think I am just making up for all the years of not getting anything though. :P

Mike, I can take a short vid later of my equipment and post it.
For the most part it was all really cheap and almost everything was bought from people on Craigslist keeping costs way down.
I dont think I have even $350 dollars into my gear list and it is setup for two.

My gear list also doubles for panning/sluicing/Crevicing/Digging so a pure sniper setup will be much cheaper.

As for wetsuits, we dont have a setup yet but I have been thinking about investing in a pair for the winter.
The creek that we snipe stays nice and calm all the way till Spring Thaw and rain storms at which time it floods.


Thanks again everyone and I will keep the video's coming, I should have underwater video's soon.


-Eric-

 

[TAKODA]

I can see being pretty happy with those results .
Especially that 3 hour take . Nice shine .

 

[Hoser John]

A associate just got a good article in the latest ICMJ on sniping for the novice with plenty of good info. John

 

[NeoTokyo]

Ahh, I will have to read it, everything helps for us new guys.
I am not familiar with them though, do you have a link or know where I can pick up the magazine if printed?

Our little hole is played out now and I moved on yesterday into a small channel where the bedrock made a V shape going with the flow of water and at the front juts up to make a drop into the V.
It was packed with large boulders, the largest I moved was around 200lbs on land but in the water it was easy to move.
At the bottom was dark claylike material that when disturbed turned the water milky, it was also mixed with red mud.
The red mud may be from a small landslide about 1.5 miles up but otherwise there is no red mud around this part of the creek.

I got some good color (About 40 flakes for an hour and 30 minutes) from that area, still have 3/4 th of the way to finish in that area, I started at the back.

I also worked a deep rotted out quartz hole in the bedrock prior to hitting the channel.
Before opening it up at the top a bit, it was about the width of a Pepsi Can but opened up to about the size of a small coffee can and about 12" deep.
It was filled with black sand, rotting quartz and small rocks but I only found 3 small flakes in it. It was such a prime hole too.
Should trap something next year though.

Still doing good and having fun.

 

[NeoTokyo]

I made a new video of a nice nugget I found the other day.
Any idea why it is stained a reddish brown?

Enjoy.

 

[StevenHavillJr]

I have watched these from your channel earlier but uhhmm.. how about some area visuals of you working the area and panning your findings? regardless nice amounts of gold you found, I hope to be finding some myself sometime soon.

 

[NeoTokyo]

I can grab a couple visuals for you guys, I just do not usually bring my phone or camera down with me because I dont want the off chance of one taking a swim.

I do have an underwater dry case coming for my phone so I can try to get a few underwater video's before it gets too cold to skin snipe, I dont think I will be investing in a wetsuit this year.

Thanks for watching.

 

[NeoTokyo]

I have a new video for you guys and gals and a couple neat finds.


I moved downstream a bit today and found a really nice series of drops around the bend with very VERY light overburden, between .5" - 6" and for the most part, lots of gold inside little holes, cracks and jutted bedrock.
I also found several nails and sinkers which I am always happy to find because when I find those I find gold.


Enjoy!

 

[blynch35]

wow thats some nice stuff, wish i had bedrock were i go so i could try that out.

 

[NeoTokyo]

Bedrock is a beautiful thing.

If you can find yourself a boulder and move it you might be lucky enough to find a good hardpack that collected some gold, we find hardpack in cracks and holes in bedrock often that usually has good gold in it.

 

[blynch35]

i think when i get my bazzoka im going to go up in the canyon here and hit some bed rock there and there are tons and i mean tones of huge boulders i know there has to be alot of gold down there you would need dive equipment and a dredge but could clean house. the kern river is loaded with gold just put it this way i have only had maybe 2-3 pans come up with blanks there is almost three or four colors in everything. seeing all you gold has really got me thinking about hitting up all those cracks i found one last year i started to clean out i found a little gold but man this thing was 4 feet long about 5'' wide at the top at about 2 feet down i could hardly get my 1/2'' sucker in it and it goes alot deeper. i was thinking about how the old timers used to light fires on the rocks and throw cold water on them to brake up the rock might be worth trying i dont know but i still think about that dang crack.

 

[Lanny in AB]

Nicely done on your thread so far. I enjoyed watching the videos--I know you'll enjoy chasin' the gold.

And about your stained nugget--it might have been sitting against some iron for a long time, and the iron has completely rusted away, but the stain will stay on the gold. Or, it could be your nugget was at one time trapped with a heavy deposit of iron pyrite that stained it. Anyway, good thing you didn't chuck it!

All the best,

Lanny

 

[NeoTokyo]

Glad you guys like watching my vids, there isnt a whole lot of exciting footage yet but my underwater case is due to be here in Friday so I will finally get some underwater footage for you guys.


Here is a quick video of another one of my finds today.

 

[blynch35]

that is cool looking nice find, hope there is more

 

[NeoTokyo]

Yeaaaaahhhh, i didnt go up for two days and someone went up there and scooped all of it out and broke the quartz down more.
Though nothing else that I could see was done to the area, overburden was the same and I didnt see any material moved from the banks.
So I guess they just came in and saw the glinting quartz and went WOW and grabbed it.
Its ok though, I think I got the best chunk.

 

[NeoTokyo]

Here is my first TRUE UNDERWATER sniping video.

I bought a DryCase a couple weeks back and it came the other day so I rushed down with my HTC EVO 3D snug inside and hopped in the water.
The video is short on the dive side because I forgot to charge my phone, but there will be more video's.
Let me know how you like it.

 

[Goodyguy]

Liked the video!
There was also a good article about underwater sniping in the latest issue (Sept/Oct 2012) of "Gold Prospectors" magazine

GG~