idowa
Full Member
- Jan 21, 2012
- 165
- 74
- Detector(s) used
- Tesoro Lobo SuperTraq
- Primary Interest:
- Prospecting
Well, almost... I decided to go down to Lynx creek today which is about a mile from my house and do some panning. I got to a good looking area and had just set down my gear when an older prospector showed up and said I found a good spot. His name is Bob, and he told me he has his own website, prospbob.com, which I have yet to check out.
He was what you would refer to as a homeless person, but much more interesting than most I've met, and not crazy. He just preferred to camp full-time an go from area to area panning gold. And he was apparently quite good at it! He settled down about 50' from me and began regaling me with fantastic tales of the numerous pickers and nuggets he had gotten out of this area.
A little while later, a clean-cut man and his young son showed up and Bob greeted them with enthusiasm; they were apparently friends and had prospected together in the past.
So, I picked a spot in the creek bed and began to dig, with no color to show for my first few pans. Bob instructed me to dig the material in the bank and said I would get color in every pan. I was very skeptical; I hadn't gotten color in more than a couple of pans in a couple hours of work on prior excursions.
But, Bob seemed oddly believable and and I moved my gear and dug a shovel full of material from the bank, classified it and panned it.
Bob was right! This is my first pan:
I continued digging and panning for the next 2 hours while Bob explained that there was a huge 3-story dredge working this canyon in the 1800's, and the banks along the creek were the tailings piles it left behind. He said it was not very efficient and he regularly finds pickers and decent nuggets by working those old piles.
I got color in every pan for about an hour, then got skunked for about a half hour and ten pans, then I moved over a couple of feet and started getting color again. So, I classified about 3/4 of a bucket of material from that spot and brought it home to run through my Keene A51 tomorrow.
I was very satisfied with today's finds and plan on returning there next weekend...
Here is the creek I was in; not pretty but it has gold:
This is part of the water line that supplied the hydraulic miners that also worked the creek over a century ago:
The bank I was working:
He was what you would refer to as a homeless person, but much more interesting than most I've met, and not crazy. He just preferred to camp full-time an go from area to area panning gold. And he was apparently quite good at it! He settled down about 50' from me and began regaling me with fantastic tales of the numerous pickers and nuggets he had gotten out of this area.
A little while later, a clean-cut man and his young son showed up and Bob greeted them with enthusiasm; they were apparently friends and had prospected together in the past.
So, I picked a spot in the creek bed and began to dig, with no color to show for my first few pans. Bob instructed me to dig the material in the bank and said I would get color in every pan. I was very skeptical; I hadn't gotten color in more than a couple of pans in a couple hours of work on prior excursions.
But, Bob seemed oddly believable and and I moved my gear and dug a shovel full of material from the bank, classified it and panned it.
Bob was right! This is my first pan:
I continued digging and panning for the next 2 hours while Bob explained that there was a huge 3-story dredge working this canyon in the 1800's, and the banks along the creek were the tailings piles it left behind. He said it was not very efficient and he regularly finds pickers and decent nuggets by working those old piles.
I got color in every pan for about an hour, then got skunked for about a half hour and ten pans, then I moved over a couple of feet and started getting color again. So, I classified about 3/4 of a bucket of material from that spot and brought it home to run through my Keene A51 tomorrow.
I was very satisfied with today's finds and plan on returning there next weekend...
Here is the creek I was in; not pretty but it has gold:
This is part of the water line that supplied the hydraulic miners that also worked the creek over a century ago:
The bank I was working:
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