Question on choice of location

junkless

Full Member
Nov 4, 2012
115
40
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
Hello!

I've lurked the gold sections of TN for some time and now I seek your assistance. I'd like some help picking locations for my future panning missions.

My focal point is around our cottage located in North Central Wisconsin, not far from Wausau. The state of Wisconsin has glacial gold deposits and that is the trail I'm on. See, our cottage is located on essentially the border line for where the glaciers last stopped. South of us is flat plains farmland. North of us is nothing but lakes and rough terrain. Our lake is about the last lake from what turns into a huge glacial drainage basin. Please excuse my terminology, I'm not geologist.

I'm thinking our lake was covered by the leading edge of the glacier. When the advancement stopped, it melted and dropped all the heavies in place, or not far down stream. Our lake bed is nothing but gravely rock and sand. Huge boulders are scattered throughout our property and to the north. The south end of our lake is capped by a bluff/ridge which is about 50ft above water level. There are rock piles which come up from the bottom of the lake in varying spots. Most lakes around us and to the north are very similar. The landscape south is much different.

You can see the large basin area on the attached picture. That big flatish area to the East, slightly North, and South of Gleason was an area that the glacier did not touch. You can see the well defined border lines of the glacier if you look West of Gleason and east across the basin. The areas with all the lakes was covered in glacier, flat area in middle was untouched and became drainage area. Just for clarification, this is information told to me from a friend who took geology classes in college. I've done some reading and it appears correct. Not saying I know much about this but the logic checks out so far.

map.png




Do you think I should focus on the lake bed seeing that it's lower than the surrounding area?

Would there be a more likely chance to find larger pieces as the glacier probably melted directly over our location? Thinking it might just have dropped down the heavier pieces as it went.

Or, is my best bet to focus on the drainage basin area? There is a lot of public land around there with streams and such but nothing too big anymore. I'm thinking I'd have to find where the larger streams/river were formed after the glacier melted to find the highest concentrations.

I'm positive I'll find gold but my expectations are very low. It's more a chance to stick it in the face of all the people laughing at my "gold in wisconsin" theories. We all know the glaciers brought some gold in. Seems I might be in a good location to find some of it, that's all.

I'll be working with minimal tools and even less knowledge. Any help is greatly appreciated.
 

Upvote 0
Hey good luck with the gold.
Heres how you start, make sure god HAS been found by others in the area you are looking at.
Step 1 find fractured bedrock, bedrock near the stream with cracks,
Step 2, use a screwdriver and other metal implements to dig the gravel out the cracks,
Step 3, pan out gold nuggets.
 

well I don't agree with Grizzly your in WIS you will have glacial till as you said. it can be any were from 5' to 100' deep. you have to take a chance and look at the lake's edge or in creek's,stream's, river's but look for bed rock or look in moss and under tree roots to start.

Good luck

Bill
 

Thanks for the responses. I'm not sure if we have bedrock anywhere close to the surface in this area. I've found some geological surveys but it's hard to understand as it talks about a large portion of land and not isolated areas like I'm concentrating on.

My biggest questions are regarding the bottom of our lake. Like I said, there are "rock bars" which come up from the bottom. Our lake has a lot of natural sediment (muck) but once you go deep enough it's nothing but gravel. On some of these rock bars there are large boulders. Also, there is a mix of what appears to be "tumbled" stone and jagged stone. What I'm getting at is it sure seems most of the rocks in our area were once in suspension within the glacier and settled once it melted. It doesn't appear they were all washed there from the movement of water. Not know how deep bedrock is below our grade is obviously a problem. However, could the gold have stayed relatively close to the surface if it didn't get moved/sorted from the flowing water action? Are lake based rock/gravel bars a good place to search?

I know I'm asking questions that can only be solved by panning but we are locked into winter now and speculating is all I have until April...
 

I'll try to help you out here with some pics in other posts look for why didnt i fine any gold I have a post there with pics of the creek that Im working the rock bars are all glacial till with alot of snowy, smoky, rose and clear quartz and other minerals. all so look at my post 4" over/under dredge build there is a pic of mine of the kind of gold that you will be looking of its not going to be big and chunky like out west but you might find one or two if your lucky but most will be from 1 mm and smaller to flower gold. it wount be that ez you'll have to work at it and dig if all you a doing is panning. I paned over 1 yard of mat and didn't find one spec of gold till I started running a highbanker combo that I built and ran a 2" nozzle on it.

good luck

Bill
 

milwaukee resident willing to travel on my vacation time

Hi I read ur area and sounds like ur on the right track. I mainly just dig n prospect. I have been to nugget lake a few times and u can find gold there within 5 shovels but I am looking for fellow prospectors to go with because it's pretty boring alone. U cant use anything power or even a little pump in Wisconsin. So it takes a little elbow grease. But I have a nice stream sluice w top of line matting from gold hog. I have to figure out to post pics of my vial of gems and gold. I have the fever even in this winter we have.
QUOTE=junkless;4271601]Thanks for the responses. I'm not sure if we have bedrock anywhere close to the surface in this area. I've found some geological surveys but it's hard to understand as it talks about a large portion of land and not isolated areas like I'm concentrating on.

My biggest questions are regarding the bottom of our lake. Like I said, there are "rock bars" which come up from the bottom. Our lake has a lot of natural sediment (muck) but once you go deep enough it's nothing but gravel. On some of these rock bars there are large boulders. Also, there is a mix of what appears to be "tumbled" stone and jagged stone. What I'm getting at is it sure seems most of the rocks in our area were once in suspension within the glacier and settled once it melted. It doesn't appear they were all washed there from the movement of water. Not know how deep bedrock is below our grade is obviously a problem. However, could the gold have stayed relatively close to the surface if it didn't get moved/sorted from the flowing water action? Are lake based rock/gravel bars a good place to search?

I know I'm asking questions that can only be solved by panning but we are locked into winter now and speculating is all I have until April...[/QUOTE]
 

If there are any streams running into the lake. I would start testing there. Has to be the same gravels as the lake. Look for round boulders. As they have moved long distances. And may be coming out of ancient stream beds. Test areas were gold likes to hide. Behind large boulders and low pressure areas. Good luck. Hope this helps.
 

Top Member Reactions

Users who are viewing this thread

Back
Top