Question about gold turning silver

[lil wayne]

Me and a buddy have been prospecting in east ala and have found a few flakes here and there and I have just been adding mine to a vial I had from when we carried our ol'lady to the consolidated mine in north ga and all of it has turned silver but his still has that yellow glow to it but we have not added the gold we find to his vial only mine so my question is what is making my vial turn silver maybe the water from the creek we are prospecting

 

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[Oakview2]

Some pictures might be of great help. Without pictures, I would gather to guess, some mercury was in one of the vials and is coating your gold. If so, you can try this

 

[Goldwasher]

its mercury. YOU ARE ABOUT TO HEAR ABOUT IT FROM SEVERAL MEMBERS I BET read up on it be careful don't add anymore gold to that vile.It has an affinity for gold and will always migrate in your bottle. So just keep it seperate for now educate yourself on how to safely deal with it.

 

[lil wayne]

So all of the I have been throwing away thinking it was lead could have been gold well it figures. We have found a lot of the same looking stuff in the creek we are working and I dropped a piece in my vial for id later now it all looks the same.

 

[Treemaster]

Most people don't notice the change at first because it does so slowly over the course of Months and even years. But little by little it takes on that stained yellowish shade away until you suddenly notice that it lacks the beauty and shine it once had. IF you have zinc in the water that should be the reason you know.

@ lil wayne

 

[lil wayne]

What made me save a piece is when I hit it wit a hammer it smashed out flat and was still silver with gold looking veins running through out it not like lead. Is it possible for us to be finding mercury covered gold that didn't stick around in the ol timers sluice boxes as we have been thinking from the looks of things his house is sitting on old tailings as the top soil is only about 6inches deep and then it is quartz the rest of the way to bed rock about 4 foot down.
Thanks for the responses

 

[lil wayne]

Zinc see that's what I was thinking maybe it was some mineral or something in the water turning it because the only difference in his vial and mine is the pieces I have added from the creek we work and water from same creek

 

[Goldwasher]

Gold doesn't tarnish. It is mercury that is why it happened relatively quickly. It is not zinc in your water.

 

[KevinInColorado]

Yes lil Wayne, sad to say but you have been throwing back mercury coated gold. Stop doin that!!!!!

 

[oldbrundogg]

Yes lil Wayne, sad to say but you have been throwing back mercury coated gold. Stop doin that!!!!!

Yes I have a little vial of that stuff got it in the
Feather river right next to the hatchery makes me wonder what they're feeding those fish

 

[lil wayne]

The sad thing is we were making jokes about what if and now I am 99.5% sure that is what it is. We have through away several grams of this stuff because it didn't look like gold and then I added the one piece to my vial and well you already read the rest lol oh well glad I ask at least now I know we are on the right track we had about abandoned the spot even tho we knew it held gold.
So does that mean all gold found in this creek will be coated with mercury or just all that's in close proximity to the hole we are working?

 

[Oakview2]

Find the source of the mercury and more than likely you will find gold. That is why the old timers used. If mercury is introduced it will trap the gold. Watch the videos on how to build a simple retort and and you can quickly and safely recover the gold and the mercury for sale or disposal

 

[lil wayne]

Will do we have been studying all we can I have seen the videos and have a fabrication shop in my front yard so looks like I will be building one as soon as I have little bit of free time not spent in the creek or searching for better diggings.
Thank all of you who have took a min to respond L.W.

 

[Goldwasher]

Lil', Oakview is right try and find the source if you can. I have been in a few spots where You pop out bedrock and there are perfect little balls of it in the bottom. I do not mind finding a crack with Mercury in a spot that flows a lot the mercury has a good chance of grabbing fine gold and holding it for you. It was used in creekside stampmills.,and they used huge and fastflowing sluices that sometimes dipped leaned, broke, fell over etc......spilling Gold and Mercury. I have found coated gold and clean gold both in the same spot with no other visable mercury, once gold touches liquid mercury it will alwaysy keep some or all of it. It can also get " Dirty" and lose its affinity. You can " Clean it" . Always keep anything heavy in your pan that you can't identfy, You might not know what you have without some bookwork, ore studying here. Happy Hunting.

The sad thing is we were making jokes about what if and now I am 99.5% sure that is what it is. We have through away several grams of this stuff because it didn't look like gold and then I added the one piece to my vial and well you already read the rest lol oh well glad I ask at least now I know we are on the right track we had about abandoned the spot even tho we knew it held gold.
So does that mean all gold found in this creek will be coated with mercury or just all that's in close proximity to the hole we are working?

 

[kuger]

........all waterways in gold bearing areas have mercury...............below Hydraulic operations more so.They could not control the water flow through the sluices in these operations so they used thousands of pounds of mercury in them...it was not uncommon to have washed out boulders tumble and destroy these sluices releasing the mercury.....Its in the water and you have to deal with it

 

[lil wayne]

Thanks guys looks like its gonna be nice weekend so no time for fabing up a retort this weekend gonna be trying to find all those pieces I tossed back in the creek. Lol maybe I can get some pics and post see what y'all think about our lil set up

 

[oldbrundogg]

Please post pics L Wayne maybe before and after. I've watched some of the videos on YouTube . Not too sure I can fab retort but I'll figure something out. I'm going to try to post a not very good pic of what I found here in Oroville in the river right behind the municipal auditorium . Worked off of exposed bedrock in the middle of the river. Ran maybe 5 buckets through the sluice lots of lead shot also. Have more in the vial this was the second time out there haven't been back yet it is very convenient spot.

 

[KevinInColorado]

You can buy a really good retort here: http://coloradogoldcamp.com/forum/index.php?topic=884.0

It is made by a guy I know and works really well!!

 

[oldbrundogg]

Thanks for the info Kevin but "buy "is a dirty word in my house these days, still might come down to that.I do want to be safe. I do have some wide open space I can use was just thinking about lighting a camp stove iron skillet on top and walking away for couple hours . Not Real safe but now that it's raining fire dangers gone. No hurry it's in a vial put away.

 

[KevinInColorado]

Ya I know how that is, I am really really cheap myself. I suggest you stockpile it separately (always store in water) until you have at least several grams so it is worth the effort to process...or find someone who already has a retort in your area...maybe pay them in beer or something!