Discovery ch. Gold Rush Alaska

To all you detector people.... and I am one of you now.. after retiring from mining...

I love your passion for detecting......it's awesome...and I certainly do not want to offend anyone....or step on anyone's toes here... but in a commercial operation such as they are attempting to do on the Alaska show...detecting before production will do very little to tell you WHERE to start and WHICH direction to go.....especially on the kind of river course they are on...and the where to start and which direction to go are the two MOST IMPORTANT parts of a successful commercial mining operation...

If you study the few glimpses of the river they allow the viewing audience to see..... it is reasonably wide and fast flowing.....which means there have been in the recent past some serious run offs from storms and spring thaws....and the drop angle of the bedrock is somewhat steep....causing a higher water pressure...

Most of the big gold is going to be on the bottom... not near the top... it appears most of the property has about a 15 to 20 foot dig to bedrock....at least from what I have seen of the show... maybe it's even deeper..don't know yet..

Here is an example of my point I am trying to make....... and it is a real life example at that...I worked a channel in California once, which was about 75 feet deep in river gravel...(I've worked some deeper than that..to as much as 125 feet deep too)... from top to bedrock... And at the bottom, from inside rim to outside rim, (the rims are old canyon walls that once contained the river when it was alive)...it was a little over 300 feet wide...and at the top, it was over a quart a mile wide.....do the math and calculate the volume of sand, gravel and rocks in that river bed....and starting with sand and a few pebbles on top...all the way down to bedrock, the rocks got bigger and bigger to where mostly they were 2 to 4 feet in diameter sitting on bedrock with the heavier sand and pebbles in between them.....and with some huge rocks going over 15 feet in diameter.... what was amazing, was these big rocks, these huge ones were as smooth as a babies butt all over, and I mean all over.... no one place wasn't as smooth as the other...and yet these huge rocks, these boulders, as it were, were sitting on bedrock...and all the gold was within 2 feet of bedrock... just imagine how much water volume and pressure was needed to loosen 75 feet of river gravel up and roll these huge boulders over and over....so where will the gold be... not on top...but on the bottom.....Even though this is a smaller channel on the show, than my real life example... the principals of water flow, pressures and specific gravity apply equally...

After I had faced off the channel and knew where all the gold pay streaks were, only after that, did we start mining....and we ONLY used the metal detectors to insure we weren't leaving any gold behind in or on the bedrock...once a section of bedrock was exposed and cleaned.....

So you ask, why do we find gold on the surface along such rivers and river banks when we pan... because you are panning or sluicing "float" gold.. gold small and light enough to be brought to the surface during high water events....this surface gold is a picture of lays deep in the gravels on or near bedrock... but the real gold is on the bottom....always has been and always will be...and a MD will not see a single nugget or even a small group of nuggets 20 feet down through wet, moist dirt....

As far as the families are concerned.... most of you're right.... leave them home until you are producing gold in quantities to support the extra mouths to feed and emergencies....However... as stated in another post... my wife would join me, once I got a camp built.. and then she was one of the hands... fueling the equipment..greasing the equipment... doing some of the cooking, (although I always hired a real cook).... and she operated either the excavator or the loader...keeping the gold bearing gravel going into the wash plant...she paid her way just like anyone else who worked the mine...she did it by contributing to the overall success of the mine... as a worker... she became an asset... not a liability....(see attached pic)

Just some thoughts from someone who has been there and done that...


Klondike....
 

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Thank you so much Klondike for your experienced input :icon_thumleft:

I hope you were not under the impression that I was recommending nugget shooting as anything but a way to pass time during downtime from the real mining.

Not in any way shape or form to be meant as a source of income or to locate a pay streak.
Just felt I should clear that up.

I would advise to detect the tailing piles every so often though.

Say your wife sure does look like she enjoys operating that excavator :icon_sunny:

GG~
 

Hey GG......

No problem...I didn't mean anything by it either....other than just trying, like you, to clear it up...

And yes...tailing piles are a great source of gold nuggets.. remember, the top of the tailing piles were taken from the bottom of the river, near bedrock... and of course, you'll want to search where you see lots of fine dirt... which would most likely normally be sent out the sluice box as silt, but because the dredge operator "hogged" the system.. this dirt/clay..or actually mud at the time... when out the tailing conveyor...along with nuggets and rocks...

When you get to or into bedrock...you may find nuggets like these...which, in the pic below is about 2 pounds worth of natural gold nuggets.... the second picture is of gold found nearer to the top of a channel... see the difference... the pan of gold, while looking inpressive is only about 3 or 4 ounces, if I remember correctly...the point is, there are no real solid nuggets...just flakes and fine gold...not a 2 pound hand full of beautiful nuggets...

And yes... My wife loves mining with me... her favorite piece of heavy equipment to operate, is the excavator... she is a real trooper...and loves the adventure just like I do....

Klondike...
 

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Now That's what I'm talkin' bout :hello2: :notworthy: :headbang:
Thanks for sharing those photos.

Awesome nuggets :icon_thumleft:

Could you imagine the happy dances if Todd, Jack, Dorsey, Harness and Greg recovered something like those! :laughing7:


GG~
 

GoodyGuy said:
Thank you so much Klondike for your experienced input :icon_thumleft:

I hope you were not under the impression that I was recommending nugget shooting as anything but a way to pass time during downtime from the real mining.

Not in any way shape or form to be meant as a source of income or to locate a pay streak.
Just felt I should clear that up.

I would advise to detect the tailing piles every so often though.

Say your wife sure does look like she enjoys operating that excavator :icon_sunny:

GG~


Exactly what I meant as well,I would be darned if I would be idle!!!
 

If they found gold right away they wouldn't be able to keep the show going as long, have to draaaaaggggggg it out.
 

I don't do this to get rich, however I would not complain too long if that happened. :tongue3:
I do this to live. :thumbsup:
 

I know exactly where their gold is. It's quite simple, really. They call it Murphy's Law.

The entire accumulation of paydirt is smack dab under those buildings. :sign13: :icon_scratch: :help:
 

WOW KLONDIKE! Nice pictures of your finds and great info. So truely if one is to find any real gold in a gold bearing area is to get deep into the bedrock. So now I am learning something new!

So basically all the creeks as well that have placers in them, actually has better deposits deeper in the creek bed just like the rivers then.
 

Klondikeike, Reading an existing river is one thing. If we could just read those rivers buried thousand of years ago. :icon_scratch: What a blessing that would be.
 

Actually GC...

The nuggets and the pan of gold came from rivers in very high elevation...2 separate rivers... (nuggets at 6,500 ft elevation and the pan of gold at 5,700 elevation)...buried by lava flows and no longer running water....these both were high hanging channels from the Tertiary time period.... when the rivers were running north and south rather than east and west as most are now running in the west...

And yes it takes time and experience to read a river, especially one that is covered up and no longer running water..... that is why I always either sample drill on a grid....or ... dig a cross sectional ditch...or maybe even 2 or 3 ditches to be able to "see" what the river was doing when it was running water....

Klondike....
 

Klondeike, you would be one to sit around the campfire and break bread with. Lots of knowledge in that head of yours. :thumbsup:
 

Yes TheHarleyMan2,

The gold gets bigger as you go deeper into the river channel..... I do not remember where I read or heard the following, but somewhere I found the info, that a simple 1 ounce nugget of gold, laying on bedrock will move approximately 1 foot in distance down river, while rocks and boulders the size of pickup trucks and cars will move 2 to 3 miles down a river...all within a 100 year time period.... That is how heavy gold is when submerged in water.... so naturally, the heavier particles of gold will migrate to the bottom of a river and stop migrating at the last solid layer or rock surface it lands on...

I have done well, in my old days of dredging, of which I used to do so many, many years ago....when finding gold on a "false" bedrock...which is usually made of a hard clay layer....yet this clay layer is some distance from the actual bottom of the river...

And once you make to the bottom of a river... clean the cracks out well and deep... as the gold will migrate deep into the cracks as well......I have found 1/2 ounce nuggets, 1 to 2 feet below the visible top of the bedrock of a river.....

You ask, How can this be...? All things contract and expand with temperature... as the seasons change, so does the water tempature....and so the cracks open and close ... as well as the cracks open and close as earthquakes occur, changing the pressures on the cracks... and as cracks open...they often will stay open until the next large earthquake occurs.....which could be 1, 2, or 3 or more hundred years later...and they act like riffles in a sluice box..and as gold drops into the open cracks, the dirt is displaced and the cracks will eventually hold more gold than what is on top of bedrock... I have found gold as deep as 4 feet deep into bedrock.....THE GOLD WILL CONTINUE TO MIGRATE DOWNWARD UNTIL IT CAN NO LONGER MOVE ANY MORE...with the heaviest gold going to the deepest part of the river....and the lightest gold to the highest part of the river...

The old timers knew this very well.. I have walked many an old miners tunnel, tunnels dug in the early 1850's..where the tunnel was hand dug, being 3 or 4 feet deep into hard bedrock...and 3 to 4 feet into cemented river gravel...

Attached is more gold from a "hidden" channel.... and this was only a small portion of the box... but a real nice protion...this channel had NO NUGGETS... just lots of small fine gold.... Not every gold bearing river will have nuggets.... more rivers will have smaller gold than those who do have large nuggets....This was a nice clean up.....none of my photos are "touched up" of altered..they are the real deal...

Klondike...
 

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WOW Klondike, that photo looks awesome!!!! :icon_thumright: :icon_thumleft: :icon_thumright: :icon_thumleft:

Thanks for the info!

How can one actually know the depth of the bedrock before and without having to dig several plus feet to know? I think you had mentioned in a previous posting that you dug one time to bedrock, and then broke through that and dug to another bedrock layer. I am just curious as to how to determine without actually digging to find out. I know some cases may vary depending on terrain and land type.

I know over time the course of rivers and creeks change over time, (heck look how the Mississippi River changed courses over 100 plus years), so it is easy to determine the old course it once was flowing.

I know with creek/rivers, heavy rainfall, floods, etc, remove earth and river/creek bottom asnd and gravel, trees, etc, and shoves it downstream. I did read in part of my study that in creek/river beds, that make bends that if a river/creek curves to the left, then turns back to the right look to the opposite side of the bed where sand/gravel make a bank/beach sorta, (where the water flow current is slowed down on that area), for gold and vise versa if you know what I mean. I will have to get my book out and find what it is actually called.
 

Right TheHarleyMan2,

Thanks for the note and kind comments...

As a river turns back and forth....draw a line from the out flow inside curve to the inflow inside cure of the next turn...and if gold is present in the river, or creek, the pay streak will generally lay in a path near this imaginary line...

Short of drilling, digging or dredging to bedrock....or possibly using seismic reports.... you usually can only find bedrock by actually seeing it....

Sometimes, you can see exposed bedrock along a moving creek or river..and visually you can measure the distance from the exposed bedrock to the top of the surrounding soil...

When you see a sand bar or some other natural collection of rocks, sand and debris in a river... is a sign that the bedrock has made a sudden change, either up or down...usually up... from the surrounding bedrock....when this occurs, this is a natural collecting area for gold as well... a good place to start prospecting...

Good luck in your prospecting...

Klondike...
 

Traveller said:
I know exactly where their gold is. It's quite simple, really. They call it Murphy's Law.

The entire accumulation of paydirt is smack dab under those buildings. :sign13: :icon_scratch: :help:

Too Funny. Murphy being a miner himself you are probably right, but that's another show. :laughing7:
 

episode 6



I can't believe how easily they gave up on the wave table. Then they decided to pan the concentrates using complete novices. No telling how much gold they missed! It just looked to me like they were in too big of a hurry to do a proper job of clean up.

That model wave table sells for around $5,000.00 and the old man was ready to toss it. :o I've never used one but I can relate to the difficulty in getting any fine gold recovery tool adjusted properly, just from my experience using a blue bowl and a spiral wheel.

Knowing it was going to be used on tv the dealer should have been on hand to see it was properly set up or else had a factory rep there. :dontknow:
Glad they sent the women and kids home though. And can you believe the hissy fit thrown by Dorsey and Remsburg :laughing7:

It really is like a train wreck......It hurts to watch, but you cant take your eyes off it. :tongue3:
GG~
 

GoodyGuy said:
episode 6

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MTv7khbOJQ

I can't believe how easily they gave up on the wave table. Then they decided to pan the concentrates using complete novices. No telling how much gold they missed! It just looked to me like they were in too big of a hurry to a proper job of clean up.

That model wave table sells for around $5,000.00 and the old man was ready to toss it. :o I've never used one but I can relate to the difficulty in getting any fine gold recovery tool adjusted properly, just from my experience using a blue bowl and a spiral wheel.

Knowing it was going to be used on tv the dealer should have been on hand to see it was properly set up or else had a factory rep there. :dontknow:
Glad they sent the women and kids home though. And can you believe the hissy fit thrown by Dorsey and Remsburg :laughing7:

It really is like a train wreck......It hurts to watch, but you cant take your eyes off it. :tongue3:
GG~

It also looked like the vial of gold they did produce was about 50% black sand. They didn't do a very good job of panning.

The one interesting story they shared was about the guy who had recovered 700 ounces of gold from his cleanout many years ago (he lived in the area). They found him dead that night and his gold (worth about $1M today) was nowhere to be found. Forgive me if I messed up the numbers. I'm doing it from memory. But you get the idea.
 

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