Shasta County Gold - What about the creeks EAST of the Sacramento?

[NeoTokyo]

Heya Everyone;

I have been wondering about gold in creeks that are east of the Sacramento River in Shasta County.

A couple creeks that I am talking about are Stillwater Creek, Cow Creek, Bear Creek and Battle Creek.

In some of these creeks there is exposed bedrock but for the most part bedrock is really deep.
I have been told that there is gold in this area but it is very very deep and not worth the time of the average prospector.

I still wanted to look into these creeks next year and figured it would be worth while to ask the other Shasta County prospectors about those creeks too.


Has anyone actually gone up to look for gold in any of these creeks or is it all just word of mouth?


Ray and John I hope you guys chime in on this one too.

Thanks!

 

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[Hoser John]

1,000s-all yuba forks,all american forks,all feather forks,mokuleme,merced,consumes and add in 10s a 1,000s creeks,gulley,ditches,canyon walls as in 56 years a addiction I've gotten righteous gold in the bank from the all and a zillion pics too. I can pick up any jar,continer or box as they are all marked as to year,where,hours to retrieve,current cost of gold to figure out what it cost at the time. Nuttn' better to close your eyes and grap a specimen and instantly transported to a younger much happier time in a gold lust life. Funny to see merced specimens found in 1958 at $45 a oz and now a HUGE at 2 X spot at least $2,000 to $3,000 an oz--wow now who'd a been crazy enough to believe that----me-John

 

[Hefty1]

Hey John....that you far left?

 

[trinityau]

Yes, there is gold in several of the watersheds east of Shasta County. Some carry decent pannable gold and others do throw an occasional nugget. The streams you mention are mostly on private property, at least where there is any gold accumulation. As far as I am concerned I would spend time in areas west and north.

I did not respond earlier to a post about Whiskeytown. The permit for panning is very restrictive and it does not include sniping or anything else. I know two people that are still trying to get out from under the umbrella that enveloped them a few years back. I am not going to argue with anyone about the subject and I will tell you that for sniping (what they were doing) cost them both of their pickup trucks, a measly $10,000 fine due at the time of conviction, interest till paid, and they each got to spend thirty days and nights in jail. Both lost their jobs due to a federal conviction and cannot even go out to pan on ''ANY'' federal land for six years. This same thing happened to someone that was panning material that did not come from underwater. The laws are in place and they are not policies, they are laws. Any one can get on their white horse and trot on up there and try it but be forewarned you get an awakening. For anyone that has been mining within the Whiskeytown Preserve all I can say is that right person just has not come up on you yet and you have been very lucky.

Whiskytown,Trinity Lake, and the Shasta Lake areas fall under different laws than other national land around us. The biggest problem we face in Redding right now is that at some point in time all these new trail systems that they are tying together using BLM, BOR corridors also are being linked to the above areas. When that is complete there is a very good chance that we will not be able to use these lands any more for mining as they will fall under the same laws. This was told to me a senior BLM official before retiring. I have been active in this area all my life and we are losing the battle. TRINITYAU/RAYMILLS

 

[NeoTokyo]

Nice story and pic John, looks like you had a lot of brothers or friends to help ya prospect.

Ray, thanks for the info, I was always hoping that there was some gold there.
As for Private property, I know a couple friends that own land on Stillwater and wanted to try there first. Our old swimming hole was this really cool carved bedrock area that I would think would catch gold very well.
There is an area of Bear Creek that I wanted to try too just under the freeway Bridge and up a bit as it is really rocky and may have bedrock in that area, I have never looked that hard though at it, just swimming.

Which creek do you think has a better chance of gold?

As for Whiskeytown, I stayed in their guidlines for prospecting, only took material within the water with a small scoop but didnt find much, just some dust.
That really is a horrible thing that happened to those guys.

I think they are so ticked off because there are some HUGE holes up there that looks like someone dredged them during the night.
I about slid down into one trying to get out to talk to them, it followed the bedrock on the side down to the low point in the creek, piled up overburden behind it.

Of course they could not ticket me for having a disabled MD and panning within the rules but they still made it well known that they dont like prospectors of any type even with their permits.

The main reason why I bought the permits is so that we would have something to do while the kids were swimming.


Thanks for the replies.

 

[Hoser John]

No I'm the scrawny blonde guy next to baby brudder chugging dirty pan water. I was trying to teach my brothers how to pan as all they wanted to do was play,hoot,holler and scream but my Unc and folks taught me to pan man and away we go. I could walk out the back door of the house(steps still there after B Rec blew it up,burned,and bulldozed into the Merced -visible from Bagby parking lot across river) A huge wash tub fulla the adults tools,grab a pan and a scraper and 100 feet to bedrock. Work a hour or so and down to the Bagby store/po/sporting goods/gas staion/gold buyer sellers. Plop it down on the scale and instant gratification as fishing worms,ice cream,candy bars,comics were mine. Lazy bros no --me YEEEEEES-John

 

[NeoTokyo]

Nice! I kind of did the same thing with Crawdads from a little creek by my house.
I knew a nice Cajun guy that gave me a dollar for large daddies and 50 cents for medium ones.
I would bring him 25-50 every other week or so, I tried to get my sister to help so she could make a little money but she didnt want to.

It was sticky hot work winding through razor grass, muck, trash and sharp things but I loved the instant gratification that plucking each one of those little guys from the creek gave me.

 

[Hoser John]

Neo T--east of I-5 you will stave from barely any deposits and what is, is a no tresspassing. Above Lakehead starting at Dog Creek /Volmers I-5 exit the good open areas start. East or west don't matter then as oro a plenty. Mined Dog,Volmers,Slate ,Boulder,McArdle Flats,Simms on and on and on and on for almost 20 years till insane dredging ban in 1991 from CDFG-thank that lying scum sucking ferret faced dog-STOPHER. With many seasons you could mine easily from mid May-Oct 31 as mother nature allowed. Then we USED to have open areas 12 months a year in dayz of old when miners were bold but dead forever now. John

 

[NeoTokyo]

Ok so I have been looking at the GeoComm site to see where BLM land is and checking out old mines and tailings piles and really any sign of mining.

There are two extra creeks that I wanted to ask everyone about here that might know the area, both of these creeks having mining history but I cant find much info about gold in the creek.

The first is west of the sacramento river, Middle Creek.
Middle Creek flows just below the town of Old Shasta and dumps into the Sac River, there are lots of trails and its BLM land for the most part.
There might even be a burried stash of gold that the Ruggles Brothers burried somewhere out there.

I took a look at this creek and there is a lot of bedrock and the water flows fairly well for a little creek, enough to run my Bazooka.

Does anyone know if this creek is worth prospecting, does it have decent gold and is there any other info that I should know about it?


The Second Creek is Little Cow Creek (And Cedar Creek just above that, it follows 299), this is East of the Sac River by quite a bit.
You take 299 to Ingot.

I have seen this creek too but only from the road when passing by, it is a nice creek and has a lot of year round flow.
It does have a little BLM land but is mostly private.
There are several mines around this area but I can not find any info on gold in the creek.

Does anybody know anything about this creek?

Thanks guys.

 

[trinityau]

Hey Neo, Middle Creek from the Sacramento up to the first bridge is a lot of private property. It also starts to get deep to bedrock in that stretch. The gold is pretty fine also. The area above the bridge is spotty BLM and private property. This was very good ground but has been gone over many times. This area is also still under claim the last time I looked. I have never seen it on Geo-Comm, but it is in the courthouse and has a valid BLM number. The next area is above the bridge on Iron Mtn Road. This is BLM and you may do ok up the canyon. This part of the creek is very spotty but if you find a place where some stringers or pocket line crossed you could get lucky. As far as detecting between myself and probably another ten or so good detectorist's this bedrock has been slammed. It is still worth a try I guess, I would do a bit more research though. This same area between Iron Mtn Road and where it crosses 299 also is a special enviromental study zone. There are also ribbons everywhere indicating archaeological sites and you do not want to be near these. The local BLM will not tell you nothing about this, however, the BLM Rangers have all the info they need to hit someone hard. Remember we are living in a time wwhere it is your resposibility to know what the land status is.

The area around Ingot has some gold, but not enough for me to lose my health over. That ground was opened up so deep in places that you basically have the same occurence that you have on the Iron Mtn Super Fund clean-up site. The ground is leaching liquid heavy metals as we talk. This area is similar to the Spring Creek clean-up area. I had a friend that died from being in the Spring Creek sniping gold years ago. He had so much crap wrong with his body about a year later and the Doctor's had their hands tied. The gold in both places can be really good at times as far as nuggets go but you can make the choice. Any water that you can put a piece of metal in,take it out and then watch it start to disappear in a week or so has something going on.

The other area you PM me about does not start on Swasey, it starts up on Mule Mountain. There is probably some gold to be found but I think it has been hit pretty hard by the locals. If you get the chance to go by the Old Shasta store and catch the locals drinking coffee you will hear afew things.

 

[NeoTokyo]

Awesome info Ray, thanks so much.

I will stay away from the Ingot area because its not worth getting sick over, to me that info is worth more than telling me the pinpoint location of a large nugget in the water. Health first, the fun follows.
I have had heard stories of good gold in Spring Creek but that the water is pretty much death to all living creatures.

Its good to know that the creek has claims on it, I will have to look into which ones are active and which are not so that I dont claimjump by accident.
Thats the thing about GeoComm, it lets ya know where blm land is but doesnt let you know about claim status.

How do I get to the Canyon from the bridge on Iron Mtn Road? Do I take the paved trail downstream from there?
Is that area open to all forms of prospecting or are there claims up there too?

Thanks for the heads up on the E-Study zones.
I will have to stop one of the Rangers some time and ask about which area's are off limits, too bad though as I wouldnt have minded detecting the entire length of the creek to try to find the Ruggles Brothers stash somewhere in the water.
I am trying my best to learn where I can and can not go, I really dont want to tread on Private or Gov't toes.


Thanks again Ray, you are a huge help to this greenhorn.


PS. Whenever is a good time for you I would like to go detecting again, this time without the kids.

 

[Rdg Sluicer]

Has anyone ever tried Battle Creek east of the Hatchery? Lots of bed rock but I am leary about it becuase I have had 0 luck east of I5.

 

[NeoTokyo]

I have thought about Battle Creek but in my searching and asking for questions I have found zero info to support that there is gold there.

The creek is beautiful too, looks like it would be perfect for gold.

The only thing any one of us can do is go up there I guess.