Odd day sniping, did I find a vein?

[Wilderness medic]

Went out even farther than usual to snipe for gold today, about another mile past where I usually snipe. I spent about 4 hours busting cracks and crevices that I thought were sure to have good gold. One of them was about 15' underwater at the lowest water level of the year. One spot had shale with a ton of cracks that looked like they would grab any gold that came by. I didn't find a single piece of gold.


Then I came upon a big quartz vein eroded away by the river. It looked a little out of place. There was a pile of loose material on top with gold all over. I've never seen gold just laying around like that. None of it was big, but there was a bunch of it, and it was thicker than your average flake. I spent the next few hours sucking up the lose material and meticulously loosening up some packed in rocks here and there. A bunch of the gold seemed to be stuck in the quartz but wiggled out fine. Some of the gold looked like it was half gold and half lead/mercury(?)


Is this possibly a gold vein? It was a giant quartz vein mixed in with chunks of oxidized iron with clay packed in pockets. Above water was a pretty large slab of vertical bedrock with tons of eroded quartz stringers as well. I didn't find any gold anywhere else in the area, which is unusual.


I had a 2 hour hike out and had to call it a day because the sun was going down or I would have stayed and kept investigating. Possible source or just a random slot that happened to trap all the gold right on top...?

 

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[BillA]

sounds ideal, you may want to pulverize the quartz; look at the quartz contact face with a loupe

 

[arizau]

Do not mix your finds if you suspect Mercury coats some of them since if they are they will contaminate the other gold.

The way you describe having to wiggle gold loose from the quartz could be indication that it is a vein of rotten quartz that is eroding but it's more likely that the gold was just caught in a crack. I would think that if the gold that was wiggled loose is stream worn/rounded then it came from a different source upstream somewhere.

Good luck.

 

[Wilderness medic]

Do not mix your finds if you suspect Mercury coats some of them since if they are they will contaminate the other gold.

The way you describe having to wiggle gold loose from the quartz could be indication that it is a vein of rotten quartz that is eroding but it's more likely that the gold was just caught in a crack. I would think that if the gold that was wiggled loose is stream worn/rounded then it came from a different source upstream somewhere.

Good luck.

Contaminate how? I’m not sure what it is but it was shiny and looks like lead. The piece of gold is half gold and half whatever metal that is.

I’ll try to put up a picture of what I got tonight. I know it’s not a lot for most people but I got 3/4 of a gram out of this one quartz channel and was still pulling out more before I had to leave.

I don’t know much about prospecting but I’m really confused about why out of all the crevices and cracks I checked there was absolutely zero and then that much in one place. And why was there so much just laying on top? It was almost like somebody dumped out their container right there

I didn’t find any gold upstream or to the sides. Jackhammer time?

 

[BillA]

get a loupe, look at the gold bits - rounded or angular is the question
mercury would imply worked gold from upstream, do separate any silvery pieces

yes, you will be busting it out

keep us posted

 

[arizau]

Silvery bits could be pieces of amalgamated (mercury coated) gold. Mercury is considered a hazardous material and it easily amalgamates with gold just by contact making it contaminated. Amalgamation/mercury usage was an accepted way to recover gold back in the day so many waterways have some residual amalgam and mercury lost in the old processes and many prospectors are still finding it today...maybe even you(?).

 

[OwenT]

Contaminate as in the mercury if it is on a piece of gold and then gets put with clean gold, the mercury will spread out and try to attach to any other clean gold it is touching.

 

[OwenT]

Sounds like a really cool find. Just a thought, maybe the other bedrock was softer and breaks off during floods and that might be a reason why it didn’t trap gold? I hope you got a piece of that quartz to crush and pan it.

 

[Wilderness medic]

Contaminate as in the mercury if it is on a piece of gold and then gets put with clean gold, the mercury will spread out and try to attach to any other clean gold it is touching.

And then what? Sorry I don’t understand what’s so bad, does it ruin the gold or just attach to more pieces?



So ideally if it was near the source it would not be rounded, but the pieces would look blunt and broken off?


Not sure when I’ll get back out there. I’m kind of torn. Long treacherous hike, and outside of the one crack I found nothing. Although that is the most gold I’ve found in one day so I should probably go back. You never know

 

[BillA]

mercury is today a moderately toxic contaminant which you do not want messing up your other bits
it is most commonly removed from the gold by heating and 'evaporating'
-> and the fumes are toxic, beware (get someone experienced), and the gold is discolored

you won't know what is there w/o busting it out
take a buddy, camp for a couple of days

 

[Wilderness medic]

mercury is today a moderately toxic contaminant which you do not want messing up your other bits
it is most commonly removed from the gold by heating and 'evaporating'
-> and the fumes are toxic, beware (get someone experienced), and the gold is discolored

you won't know what is there w/o busting it out
take a buddy, camp for a couple of days

Heating it up?? Uh oh. I do that on the stove at home to dry it out. Did I gas my kitchen with deadly mercury?

 

[arizau]

Gold found in or near it's source will resemble the gold in this video. http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/g...-pocket-gold-little-gold-porn-motavation.html. Edges are mostly angular.

Gold buyers often will not buy mercury contaminated gold. Yes, if you mix mercury coated/amalgam pieces with clean gold it will likely contaminate/coat or partially coat the clean gold.

 

[arizau]

Mercury vaporizes above 670 something degrees Fahrenheit so maybe but by only a small amount if your description was accurate and there was mercury to begin with.

 

[OwenT]

If there’s merc on the gold it’s not as shiny [emoji1]

 

[Wilderness medic]

Oh ok. I’m not concerned with it not being shiny right now. Eventually I can clean it up, purify it, and melt it into something right? I’m never going to sell it.

 

[smokeythecat]

One other possibility. In my stream there is a small amount of gold. That being said, I found a silver colored "nugget", small in size. I sent it to have it analyzed and it was 50% gold, and 50% silver. I would have bet on mercury.

 

[Wilderness medic]

One other possibility. In my stream there is a small amount of gold. That being said, I found a silver colored "nugget", small in size. I sent it to have it analyzed and it was 50% gold, and 50% silver. I would have bet on mercury.

I went back and got some more. Picture isn’t that great but doesn’t it look like silver or mercury?

 

[Wilderness medic]

Also found my first nugget(?) Not sure what people define them as but it’s right at 1g.

 

[BillA]

. . . .
I went back and got some more. Picture isn’t that great but doesn’t it look like silver or mercury?

need better pics, streak ?
just "went back and got some more" eh ?
don't stop now

edit: gold is very rounded/flattened, long transport implied
edit2: need better pics (above in doubt)

 

[Wilderness medic]

need better pics, streak ?
just "went back and got some more" eh ?
don't stop now

edit: gold is very rounded/flattened, long transport implied
edit2: need better pics (above in doubt)

Not quite sure I understand.

I’ll try to take better ones but the pieces with the other metal on them are so small.

I went back and spent 9 hours continually picking out gold from cracks. I found a really nice turn that seems to be covered in gold. Hoping to get my sluice back there to run all the loose material once I finish all the crevices.


I also smashed out a bunch of quarts from two places. Where I found al the first gold, and a second quartz being that was up under a boulder in a cave. With my dive light it looks like there were veins of something shimmering. Pyrite? The quartz is heavily oxidized with iron and mixed in with clay pockets. Do I just smash the hell out of the quartz with a hammer and then pan it?


Looking at all the gold it all seems pretty round like you said. After investigating further I’m thinking it’s just a really nice inside turn with bedrock to catch it all in the perfect place...?