What to look for along creek/river and embankment for evidence of Gold

[SW Detroit PolishFinnish]

I,m a first timer on trying to locate Gold along a creek/river and embankment.Any help from someone what I should be looking for as evidence { Recon work } before proceeding with any detecting or panning.The Gold found many years ago was in nugget form and found in a cave along the embankment.Equipments that I have are a Minelab Explorer SE, Fisher CZ-7, Minelab Excaliber and a Whites TM 808.

 

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[Eu_citzen]

I prefer to take a few sample pans from probable areas where gold could be hiding.

Or even the "gold line" (Pay streak) I use the black sand as an indicator.

The black sand is just a bit closer to the shore/bank then the gold usually is, so when much black sand has been located (that follows a fairly straight line) that would be the "black sand line".

The gold hides toward the middle of the river seen from the black sand line.

There are no real indicators of gold except for a yellow shiny metal with a density of 19.3.
(or gold ore, or something along those lines)

 

[XT18000]

First; leave your detector at home or in your truck/car. You are PROSPECTING not mining.
If you can walk in the water ( if it's not to deep ) look at the bank from the water surface
to the top of the bank for any sign of a layer; such as different colored sand/dirt/clay/gravel etc.
any place you find one of these, dig a sample right where the layer's meet. You want the stuff
that is right at this point. Get about 1/2 a gold pan of this and pan it down to the point there is
only about two or three tablespoon's left and check for black sands and ANY gold ( no matter what
size it is ). These sample's should be taken from the inside bends of the creek/river not in the straight
runs. Also from any behind any large rock's that are in the same area's. Gold travels the inside bends
not the outside ones. Get your sample from as deep as you can under the rock's if there is not to
much current. When you are digging down for the last shovel full try to keep it flat as you raise it
to keep as much as you can ( use a long handle #2 pointed one ). I assume you know how to pan
the right way? If you are not sure then get a few small split shot and practice at home until you can
pan it down (use a tub to pan into and not loose any of your split shot ) and keep all the shot in your
pan. Also keep your eye's open for any exposed bedrock and take sample's from ANY CRACKS that
are in it; especially those that are cutting across the creek/river. This will get you started in the right
direction. One last thing; LOOK FOR GOLD WHERE GOLD HAS BEEN BEFOR, not someplace where it
has not!

 

[SW Detroit PolishFinnish]

Thanks XT18000! I forgot to mention that its in my home state of Michigan but not in the UP where Gold is normally found and has been comercially mined.Its way down below the mitten and never comercially mined.I,ve just started to walk along the embankment, had to first do almost 2 years of research to zero in on the location and whereabouts of the findings over 150 years ago, it started with about 50 miles and I got it down to within half a mile.On one side of the creek the embankment rises, up to almost 15 now while the other side its almost even with the creek.Water is very shallow in some areas that its not above your ankles.Alot of gravel on the high side while kinda of sandy, blackish sandy on the other side. Never panned before but I have some experience with beach sand that I swirl around in my plastic noodle strainer to find rings.

 

[XT18000]

If you expect to find very much gold you need to get a gold pan and learn how to use it.
If you can't find it with a gold pan chances are you won't find it unless you are in an area
that has big gold that you can pick up with a detector.Sounds like you are in a old flood plain;
is there any round river rock in that high bank? Want to find gold? SAMPLE SAMPLE SAMPLE!!!!!
Is there a good mix as to the size of the rocks ? Are they well mixed or are they stratified ? This will
tell you a lot as to how this material was deposited and if any gold in it is scattered all through it
or if it will be at only one horizon ( as between a layer of sand and a layer clay ). The finer the gold
the more distance it has traveled ( very fine may have traveled as much as 200 miles or more )
and this may mean as much as 12000 colors to a sample ( that's why you must sample with a pan)!
Not to get discouraged; if there is enough of it in that deposit it can still be worth mining if you go
at it right.

 

[aarthrj3811]

The best way to check a stream is in the winter time or when it is super high from the spring run off. This is the only time gold will move. Take some photo’s and mark the spots so you can return to them. Look for boulders or anything that would create a low pressure area. Return when the water is low and you should be able to compare photo’s and tell where the gold should be. Every one says to look on the inside of the bends. Unless you can guess where the high water was you can’t tell if it was an inside bend or a rushing straight flow where nothing had a chance to drop out of the flow…Art

 

[SW Detroit PolishFinnish]

Tell you guys what I,m planning to go out either tomorrow or thursday and will take some photos for you and post them on here.Theres Giant dead Oak trees around , looks like the area hasn,t changed since the 1750,s.There are piles of Gravel, { washout deposits from the creek with a few Giant clams spread evenly on top } well rounded and with many different colors, light grey, reddish,pink,black and other colors.Another thing I forgot to tell you is that these caves/mines were already there when the settlers moved to that area.Old abandoned Indian Mines, of course after we pushed the Indians out of there land and put them into reservations.My sister told me that there are Indians from the original Shawnee tribe living there and have festivals in and around the town, don,t know if asking them would be a good idea.On my mothers side of the family she supposebly had someone marry a Potawatamee Indian back in the 1850,s when he came over from Poland.I don,t think I spelled that right.

 

[aarthrj3811]

Looking forward to you pictures. I prospected around St. Clair Michigan for a few weeks. Yes there is gold there…Art

 

[SW Detroit PolishFinnish]

Was suppose to go out today but a friend of mine wanted to go out Saturday so will post them Saturday or Sunday.Boy!!! wish I was living in south Texas, can you imagine all the stuff { coins,jewelry etc} thats going to wash up on Galveston and Padre Island beaches?

 

[EggyOG]

You guys are giving great advice, the problem is it doens't apply really well to the particular area he is in. 12 small colors in a pan is considered a jackpot in the glacial till of the upper Midwest. The terminal end of a morraine that is bisected by water is about your best bet for decent amounts of gold.
Most of the gold he will be looking for has been carried several hundred miles be glaciers thousands of years ago, it is either ground into powder, or it started out as small specks of gold in a chlorite schist (greenstone) in Ontario and was liberated by the glaciers and deposited as dust when the glaciers retreated. This gold was concentrated slightly by the runoff from the glaciers and continues to be moved around if it happens to be where a river is currently flowing. The problem is his gold has had 12,000 years tops to be concentrated by geological forces, so most of it is still scattered everywhere locked up in the glacial till.
Run a bulldozer through the river where you prospect, do this 5 or 6 times scraping all the way to the bottom-now stop the water flow so it doesn't restratify the sediment- now tell me where the gold is. The gold that isn't in the termination of your bulldozing (the pile) is scattered among the material that slipped by, with no rhyme or reason as to its location. Thsi is about the only way to describe what he is up against. It is not an impossible task, but luck plays just as much of a roll as anything else.
The advice that does hold true is where to look within the waterway. Gold acts the same in a Midwestern stream as it does in a Western stream, it's just that it is usually smaller and their is less of it.

 

[aarthrj3811]

In Michigan you may want to look for Blue Clay. Look at farm equipment tires and construction equipment for clues as to where the blue clay may be. If you find Blue clay the gold will be on top of it. Just like on the west coast the blue clay came from the tuff (Volcanic Ash ) which may of come from the oldest Volcanic Eruptions in the USA….St. Clair County has a lot of Blue Clay……Art

 

[SW Detroit PolishFinnish]

OK guys didn,t go out today, Ike was in the way!!!! That ankle deep stream of water is probably over waist high right now.Listen, I,m well aware that our gold in Michigan is called Glacial Gold, where, its simple enough { have a History degree and took many courses about Michigan and the US, Geological and Historical} scraped off from the Canadian Shield up north { your gold deposits in the Carolina,s { 1799 gold strike } are also Glacial.Yes if they were on the bottom being pushed and crushed for that many miles, specks,placer etc but you also had gold thrown up on top or near the top and given a wagon ride down to Michigan,Ohio,Virginia and the Carolina,s, these of course were not specks or placer size but more like golfball size or larger.The reason I,m in this area and a first timer to prospecting/hunting natural gold is first the location, its alot closer than driving to the UP,second the TYPE OF GOLD FOUND THERE back on that date and third, to answer the question is it TRUE and why wasn,t it commercially mined, well actually have that last half of the last question answered.Its amazing what info you can get from newspapers and magazines over 160 years old.Did anyone know that there was a tsunami here in lake Ontario back over 160 years ago,

 

[aarthrj3811]

Did you know that gold was formed millions of years before glaciers came to Michigan. Did you know that after the glaciers retreated gold was them free to move around subject to the laws of nature. Did you know that gold will move downward until something stops it. I can’t say for sure, but I would bet that most of the gold has moved since the glaciers retreated. You may want to study how gold moves in high water…..Art

 

[EggyOG]

Yes, I know gold was formed millions of years before glaciers. As far as gold moving around subject to the laws of nature, 10,000 years is a drop in the bucket of geologic time. The majority of the catastrophic water events that would have had a significant effect on the gold happened with the glaciers, not after the glaciers.

The majority of the U.P. gold isn't even visible to the naked eye, I challenge you to spend a day at the Ropes, Michigan, or Superior mines and find any gold at all. You will find gold in the creeks, but it is generally flakes and flour. While it is possible for large gold to have been carried by the glaciers, there wasn't that much large gold to carry. most of the load deposits to the north of MI were gold contained in greenstone belts that yielded large amounts of gold in the form of flecks. Furthermore, much of the larger material carried by the glaciers ended up in mid to southern Indiana and southern Ohio. Learning in a classroom is wonderful, but it is no substitute for actual experience in the field.

I love your enthusiasm, and it would be great if you prove me wrong but I'm pretty confident that you are chasing a fool's gold story. Best of luck to you. If you are indeed chasing these "golfball" size pieces of gold, you may as well forget the pan and grab the detector...any detector will find that size nugget.

By the way, the gold in the Carolinas is not glacial gold, unless glaciers managed to push mountains with load veins all the way down there.

 

[SW Detroit PolishFinnish]

Well I have the muscle,{ Hey working out at Powerhouse comes in very handy in this field } stamina,time and protection{ NRA,Hunting and collecting military is handy to, mostly for the southwest Detroit area LOL!!!} for checking out the area, nobody else unknown to me is going to be there.Glaciers have gone down past Ohio and Indiana, not in the last Ice Age but from the numerous ones that existed before that.Judging from questions and answers I,m getting here and from other folks in professional fields around the state, I got the area to myself.Hey If I find Gold I,ll take some pics and post them on here.If not than nobodies lost, at least I would of answered the question what happened and why wasn,t it commercially mined but my gut feelings that some kinda of Gold is there.Begining to find traces of human artifacts thats certainly well over 100 years old so things are looking up.