First Sluice .. choices choices choices

[425jesse]

The island at the raging is still very accessible, the river is only running at 272cfs. Over 600 is getting high. I was out last February when river was at 1000cfs, and still found a few places to dig.

 

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[LRC253]

Heading to Levenworth next weekend for october fest and hopefully a little fun diggin.

 

[425jesse]

That's awesome. I'm going up to the Stilly on Thursday or Friday. Gonna try to run at least five 5 gallon buckets, and a couple to take home. I have not done much sluicing in the stilly, just mossing, but that has always turned out quite well, so I have to get out and run my Brawn 48!

 

[SLNugget]

I found some good color on Waddell Creek the one time I went there.

 

[LRC253]

I was up riding in the trails there and was told about that creek however didn't know it was right next to my camp site. I ended up digging for a few hours and I came out nearly skunked... I had noticed it was recently dredged in a few areas.

 

[SLNugget]

I went a good ways upstream from the camping area and found a gravel bar that was almost inaccessible on the opposite side of the creek. Just happened to hit some good color on the downstream end of the bar. Olney Creek, though worked by many, has always yielded some color when I dug there. There's an outing at Olney tomorrow by Prospectors Plus. They are leaving from the store in Goldbar at10AM and then returning in the afternoon for burgers and stuff. I am not associated with them except being a member. I am spending most of my time in AZ these days and am only back in WA for a couple of weeks. Having withdrawals so probably going to Olney tomorrow to check out what's happening.

 

[LRC253]

It's been a while so here is my result with the BGT after about 1.5 hours at waddell creek. Not a lot but it was fun.

 

[425jesse]

Pulling gold from Wadell! Way to go!

 

[LRC253]

Been there many times and sadly I haven't done near as good as yesterday.

 

[425jesse]

Is that on the PP claim?

 

[LRC253]

No it's in capital forest. Cant claim this land but it's open to prospectors with the gold and fish permit. I think pp has done outings there though. Thinking about joining but I overheard their claims are dredged out .. not personally verified though; just hearsay.

 

[425jesse]

I was part of their group, but only ever went to Olney creek in sultan. Beautiful place, but seen lots of visitors over the years. I know they have good claims east of seattle a couple hours.

 

[LRC253]

Yea, I'll check them out as I've always wanted to check out the Liberty/Blewett area. I almost went to Olney the other day to take a look, how far upstream did you go? I think PP couldn't claim that land because it belongs to the Weyerhaeusers but they frequent the river because it's so close to them. I could be wrong but I remember reading that somewhere. I also pulled a lr2000 report and doesn't show any placer claims in the area.

 

[425jesse]

I believe you are correct. However it was in their list of claims. Their liberty claims are pretty good

Also check out Washington prospectors mining association. Good place, nice members.

 

[LRC253]

Will do, thank you!

 

[LRC253]

I asked this question in another thread however realized it's a WA State thread and rarely gets read. Another member on here recommended a river close to my work and has found decent flour gold there. Doing some searching on Google Earth I noticed the river dammed up-stream, then after that the river goes into Tiger Pass/snoqualmie forest area where I would think the gold would originate from. By his finding of flour gold does that mean the gold source is downstream of the dam or is it somehow someway getting through the dam? Just trying to figure this out as I read numerous times that prospecting downstream of the dam is mostly pointless. My only thought is the gold was already there before the dam got built and is not going to replenish itself anymore?..

 

[SLNugget]

I asked this question in another thread however realized it's a WA State thread and rarely gets read. Another member on here recommended a river close to my work and has found decent flour gold there. Doing some searching on Google Earth I noticed the river dammed up-stream, then after that the river goes into Tiger Pass/snoqualmie forest area where I would think the gold would originate from. By his finding of flour gold does that mean the gold source is downstream of the dam or is it somehow someway getting through the dam? Just trying to figure this out as I read numerous times that prospecting downstream of the dam is mostly pointless. My only thought is the gold was already there before the dam got built and is not going to replenish itself anymore?..

Difficult question to answer. A USGS Geologic map of the area might help but the best is boots on the ground sampling. Are there tributaries to the river downstream of the dam? It is possible the gold comes from one if there are any.

 

[LRC253]

Difficult question to answer. A USGS Geologic map of the area might help but the best is boots on the ground sampling. Are there tributaries to the river downstream of the dam? It is possible the gold comes from one if there are any.

I'll try to read up on how to correctly read a USGS Geo map. Using Google Earth and the streams/rivers overlay, the dam is only sitting at 541' asl and the river runs to sealevel. There are 6 tributaries that are downstream of the dam however are very small and have a max elevation of 475' asl. Doesn't really make sense to me unless the gold thats there was there before the dam was built. This isn't a big deal other than I'm just trying to expand my education on streams with dams and low elevations.