What to look for?

[Tommi]

Hey guys and girls,

Just wondering how do you know a gold field? What do you look for?

Lots of quartz? hard rocks? soil colour? mountains? hills? flats?
I'm from the gold country but I can't see it
(Australia)

[Eu_citzen]

What do you look for?

Placer gold, gold ore etc. If others have found gold there, if you found gold there and so on.
If gold has been found there that is the only sure way to tell if there is gold there.

[dave wiseman]

Tommi,out in the bush the look for quartz and ironstone rocks,reefs,leaders etc.Read the books and histories of the area you want search in.Get on the aussie gold forums,Read Ion Idreiss,the late author and prospector.Great info available at the Gold-net australia ssite though the forums been closed for years,the archive is fabulous.http://www.gold-net.com.au/.....msngold groups is a good and kind site......finders has the blokes in the know but are a little rough.........Dave

[Tommi]

Thanks guys

I've found a place TONS of quartz but it was a old quary though I never herd of anyone finding gold there.

I got an old book, however shows some maps which I can't make out

[nero_design]

Ah. I'm in NSW but you should contact your local Prospecting supplies store and ask them for maps for the local gold fields. Generally speaking, you'll find gold where others have found it first.

In Australia, the gold fields were usually well processed by early Prospectors and they've left behind a lot of evidence of their activities. One of the places to look are the old "Mulloch Heaps" which are the piles of dirt left over from when they dug into the earth to get to the gold bearing strata. Again, if it's a well known place, the odds are that other detectorists will have been there before you although each person can miss nuggets by approaching them from the wrong angle with their detector so you may find nuggets on well explored ground.

* Gold is usually associated with quartz reefs although not all quartz reefs contain gold.
* Gold also forms into nuggets via other processes - it can "cluster" together over millions of years to form a variety of shapes.
* Often the quartz will break down over time and all traces dissapear leaving just the gold behind.
* There's also talk these days about some gold deposits being formed by specific bacteria which is interesting.

Gold is heavy so it tends to fall through the soil until it reaches bedrock or harder stratas. It also falls into cracks and similar areas after being washed there via erosion. Again, there's a lot of books you can buy and internet sites that you can visit to see what sort of gold was found in the regions you can access.

Some picture links posted below which I've taken recently showing what the Gold Fields near here look like today. Each picture shows areas sporting holes and signs of diggings from the mid to late 1800's. This is the sort of thing you'll probably come across in one form or another. Each is from a different town.

http://www.pbase.com/nero_design/ima...7/original.jpg
http://www.pbase.com/nero_design/ima...6/original.jpg
http://www.pbase.com/nero_design/ima...1/original.jpg
http://www.pbase.com/nero_design/ima...5/original.jpg
http://www.pbase.com/nero_design/ima...8/original.jpg
http://www.pbase.com/nero_design/ima...1/original.jpg

When you've spent more time with detecting, you'll learn to tell where the best spots to detect are situated and which plants will offer clues as to where old hidden mulloch heaps lie. Vegetation and even the dreaded iron junk can all be useful clues for you. I would strongly suggest a call to your local Prospecting store or look up information online. Just being a kilometer off can mean you're wasting your time in an area.

[Tommi]

Thanks for your reply nero_design!!
I've been mainly doing research on relics and shipwrecks, so I don't really have any idea about gold prospecting, lately I've been going to an area rich in iron and quartz content ... so much so the land is dark orange / red and I was thinking about gold being found on quartz reefs...
Tho none of the area to my knowledge and research has had any gold mining.

I love the photos.... I found some places that look exactly like what you showed me.