Working tailings left by hydraulic mining

[macjorg]

Brand new to this hobby. Started in my garage with "pay-dirt" bought on e-Bay and panned it out in the utility sink. Found the two bucket method on you-tube and then built a Miller table from another video. All three work and I have a little gold. Drove down to the Snake River one day and took a bucket home from the "beach" river too fast at that point to do more. Got a flake out of it. Then went overboard and bought a placer claim near Idaho City Id. Lots of tailings there that I think were the result of hydraulic mining as they are at right angle to the creek and some distance away, 150 feet in places from the present creek bed. Also on the hillside there was a ditch, on the contour, partly filled in with trees/brush growing in it. I'm using a highbanker on the bank as FS does not want me running water directly back into the creek. What I'm asking is advice about where best to get material to wash? Move the rocks on the tailings and get the fines or? Any and all help greatly appreciated. Ed

 

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[arizau]

In my opinion regular prospecting logic is out the door since, if it is tails, it has already been washed with little to no opportunity to re concentrate as was the original deposit. I would start at the bottom of the edges just in case rain or water from the original process flushed the fines out of the mixture. What ever you find will probably be totally random. A metal detector may yield some larger pieces with less overall effort. I would also try to find natural gravel deposits to work too. You might find where they left off or some that they missed. Your description sounds like they were working an elevated bench (part of an old river channel).

Good luck.

 

[Hoser John]

Look for the biggest deepest ditch worn into rock. They only got some but not all by a long shot. Sample it along its' coarse to see what size classification they used. Then sample the head of the op as where they stopped you want to start as in days of old a ounce a ton was mandatory to keep working and today less is a bonanza. At the head the classification was done so all the oversized gravels and GOLD was dumped. Have a ball as prospecting is indeed fun-John

 

[Reed Lukens]

I was supposed to be there up stream this summer but it didn't work out. In some places it's only a couple feet to bedrock. Go into the river, find bedrock and see if there is gold. Lots of good claims there and bedrock is shallow enough. If the rocks come out of the creek and you are in the water, you will be fine. The FS can't tell you not to work your claim in the river especially when there are a lot of dredges in use there. You need to find out what hasn't been worked already by previous owners. This video is from your area and shows how we work the creek. Lots of rain and it was a cold summer so dredging wasn't easy this year.