Looks like mercury

[CO2]

The silver mass closest to the air bubble in the photo came from Cherry Creek has some interesting properties. First, it readily adheres to this high-purity placer (see the gold flakes sticking out), second, it can split apart and then recombine, third, it makes the gold plus itself slide around the pan much faster than the gold or the iron. In the blue bowl it will spin round and around picking up gold flakes and periodically it will slam into other minerals and drop some flakes before continuing to spin around the bottom of the blue bowl. It doesn't seem to stick to the lead flakes like it does the gold. My vote's on this is mercury.

 

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[goldenIrishman]

Yup. Looks like a little chunk of amalgam. Keep it separate from the rest of your gold. I've got a vial for "contaminated" stuff and it gets fed from time to time.

 

[mikep691]

The oldtimers used to put a drop of mercury in their black sands, roll it around until it turned yellow. Then heat it until all the yellow dust was free of the mercury. It's not safe to do unless you do it properly. Use a retort system, sealed heated vessel that allows the mercury to vaporize, then rise and cool become a liquid metal again, and drop in water. It's safe as long as it's stored in water. Read up on it and always use protective gear. If you're not sure, don't even attempt it.

 

[KevinInColorado]

Quite sure that's mercury coated gold (which technically isn't amalgam but that is what people call it). You'll find this here and there in all the main waterways in town. Keep separate like others have said and when you have a few grams, find someone with a retort you can borrow. Have you thought about joining a local club? You can find help for stuff like this in the ranks of your local club.

Foothills Prospectors is free. Gold Prospectors of the Rockies is cheap and has lots of active members...

 

[mikep691]

Good idea for your gold after the retort: give it a vinegar bath...

Makes it all shiny and yellow.

 

[LP13]

Has anyone played with Gallium? I have seen it stated that it acts a lot like mercury and can fill the same role but is not toxic like mercury. I know that some are now using it instead of mercury but I don't know how well it works yet. I guess I might have to try it myself and check it out.

But it occured to me that if there are people now using gallium instead of mercury, then it might also show up in the streams (though it's not toxic like mercury) and wondered how best to tell the two apart. Especially when stuck on gold where it's hard to tell how dense it is. Gallium is about half the density of mercury I think.

Also, though not a lot of people know it, mercury ore (usually cinnabar) can convert to metallic mercury in the oxide zone of ore bodies (the layer near the surface where the rock is broken up and air can get to it) and thus enter the environment without the assistance of humans. I think miners have taken too much heat for a lot of mercury that's there due to mother nature and not mining activities, at least in this country.

 

[arizau]

According to wikipedia Gallium does not occur free in nature. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallium

My daughter (Material Science Engineer) did LED research with a Gallium compound then later worked in a LED production facility. That is the extent of what I know about it.

 

[KevinInColorado]

Gallium is a solid below 85F so it wouldn't be useful in mining. I also see no info on it amalgamating with gold or coating it. So, no, don't think so.

 

[chlsbrns]

Gallium is a solid below 85F so it wouldn't be useful in mining. I also see no info on it amalgamating with gold or coating it. So, no, don't think so.

Maybe they meant Bismuth amalgamite. It can be used instead of mercury.

 

[CO2]

I have to say that's that's a really toxic vial for how little material is in it, what with the lead flakes in there. I think I pulled more lead out of Cherry Creek than gold so with the mercury it's like I'm doing the city a service with my shovel. I had never seen mercury coated gold so what really surprised me was how much it changed the behavior of the gold - adding a more dense metal to already dense gold makes the two slide around together like they were both less dense than iron - no wonder it's called "quicksilver". Then sometimes the gold will separate cleanly upon impact. It's like a toxic little love affair really.

Thanks for the info on what to do with the mercury. As for gallium, I think you can use it to dissolve gold, not leave it intact. Apparently gallium can destroy solid aluminium. Seems like a pretty serious metal. As for the mercury in the environment, I like your thought on natural releases of mercury into the environment, but really the coal burning industries release 100,000 pounds of mercury into atmosphere every year and that's only half of the annual human introduction of mercury into the environment in the U.S. Poor Alaska over there is getting Asia's mercury blown over: Mercury from Coal

Kevin my first day at Arapahoe Bar I talked to a pair of old-timers and one asked me if I had joined a club yet, I said I hadn't. "Don't," he said. Then he muttered something about how it used to be in the 1960's, and shortly thereafter the both of them left. So that's my experience with that.

 

[GoldpannerDave]

Gallium is a solid below 85F so it wouldn't be useful in mining. I also see no info on it amalgamating with gold or coating it. So, no, don't think so.

But Kevin, on a hot day, it would melt. Shoot, hold it in your hand and it melts. But it could only be useful when hot; not in water since its temp, even on hot days is usually cooler. However if it doesn't wet gold, it would not be handy, liquid or not. I need to do so experiments on it (maybe tomorrow, maybe Friday). I will let you all know what I find out.

 

[Bonaro]

Yep, thats HG amalgam. Where I am currently working I pull about 3-4 grams of gold and a oz of mercury per day. It sure makes it easy to recover all the really fine gold

 

[Goldwasher]

Mercury acts on aluminum....leave it in a sluice...you get holes...

 

[LP13]

I was not actually thinking of using it out in the stream, but using it for final cleanup of the cons in the lab. I was considering using it as a sink or float system where anything lighter stays on top the liquid gallium and things heavier sink in it. Since gallium has a density of 5.9 the magnetite and sulfides in the cons wouldn't sink in it, where gold, silver, lead and other dense metals would. Heating the gallium and the cons to 85F+ won't be a problem really. Any old hot plate would work.

 

[GoldpannerDave]

Yep, thats HG amalgam. Where I am currently working I pull about 3-4 grams of gold and a oz of mercury per day. It sure makes it easy to recover all the really fine gold

Wow, you must be close to a mercury outcrop (deposit) or either the old timers lost a lot of their mercury into that stream.

 

[KevinInColorado]

I was not actually thinking of using it out in the stream, but using it for final cleanup of the cons in the lab. I was considering using it as a sink or float system where anything lighter stays on top the liquid gallium and things heavier sink in it. Since gallium has a density of 5.9 the magnetite and sulfides in the cons wouldn't sink in it, where gold, silver, lead and other dense metals would. Heating the gallium and the cons to 85F+ won't be a problem really. Any old hot plate would work.

Cool idea!!

 

[GoldpannerDave]

Maybe they meant Bismuth amalgamite. It can be used instead of mercury.

You mean bismuth? Yes*, but it melts at a considerably higher temp than room temp or Ga; over 270 degrees C (nearly 520 degrees F) so you cannot put it into a plastic gold pan and collect the micro gold with it like you can with Hg. However, some bismuth alloys do melt much lower, around 60-70 degrees C. However, the one at 62 degrees has indium in it which is rather expensive. The other has lead and cadmium in it, both toxic metals. Usually getting toxic metals separated back out is a pain in the neck.

*I understand it can be used to alloy with gold, but I have not tried it and don't know if there are other difficulties in addition to the temp. If you heat black sands/gold in the molten Bi without knowing what they contain, please do it with proper safety precautions to prevent toxic/noxious fumes from ruining your day.

 

[Bonaro]

Wow, you must be close to a mercury outcrop (deposit) or either the old timers lost a lot of their mercury into that stream.

I am dredging at the site of an old stamp mill and they had an amaglamation plant. Go upstream 200 yards and you find almost no HG.

This is one cleanup. Look at how fine some of that gold is after the HG was removed.