Questions

[Maxlfty]

This is place close to me. It has a half dozen parallel trenches. So I'm assuming it's a ground sluice operation.
There are cobbles stacked on the edges of the trenches, and a large pile of tailings at the lower end of these trenches. With visible bedrock in places up top.
The question is " the cobble that is embedded in the banks, are they natural occurring? Or are the trench walls just a continuation of tailings piles?

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[arizau]

What a neat find!
My guess is that it is natural since there is dirt between the cobbles and the cobbles are of varying sizes. Seems to me if it was waste material that it would be mostly cobbles like the stacks created by an old dredging operation or other trommel reject material.
Is it open or on a claim or some other type of closed area?

 

[Jeff95531]

I was thinking the same thing. They ran out of gold and moved on. Definitely worth taking a pan to it tho. Who knows why they stopped.

 

[Maxlfty]

It's BLM that has been removed from mineral entry. I used the gold bug and was pulling square nails out by the handful.


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[arizau]

Closed to mineral entry usually just means no claims but otherwise open to recreational mining and it sounds like that may be what you have in mind. I'm pretty sure you don't need any advice - but - I would be sampling especially up hill. I imagine the old timers already cleaned the trenches pretty well but who knows what they may have missed there too. Have you seen any evidence of any recent activity by others?

 

[goldog]

Looks like good dirt. Dig dig dig.

 

[KevinInColorado]

Looks like remnants of hydrauliking to me. I've had success finding gold in a place like that from dirt right in the wall where you see those nice rounded cobbles. Also at the uphill edge of the old workings where they ran out of water pressure and couldn't go further up hill. There's a place very similar to this in Summit County CO that I talked about last September in my prospectors journal.

 

[Hoser John]

Err on the side a caution as them lousy square nails are now artifacts and and collecting a crime. Always answer to Ranger ain't found nuttn' yet and still lookn'. John

 

[triple d]

John you always hit the nail on the head. Alway like your input. And advice.

 

[Maxlfty]

I didn't know that about the nails, thanks for the information. I'm going to look at kevin in colorados journal.


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[Buckshotnc]

The first picture looks to narrow to have been hydraulicked, however the last picture looks possible since it is wider, I'm baseing this on what I have on my property here in Western NC regarding hydraulicking. The dirt mixed in with gravel & cobble would appear to be natural as someone else said. I'm of the opinion the narrow trenches could possibly have been parallel veins and were dug and sluiced so any or all of the area is possibilities, so keep an open mind when testing.

 

[BurntBear]

I would definitely pan some of this material.

 

[arizau]

Err on the side a caution as them lousy square nails are now artifacts and and collecting a crime. Always answer to Ranger ain't found nuttn' yet and still lookn'. John

Yep. Carry your trash out but leave any artifact you find on public land, that is over 50 years old, there (I think that is the law). I've heard that the law has been interpreted here to even include old cans and the like. That sounds unreasonable and is heresay about a local detectorist who was cited.

 

[ConceptualizedNetherlandr]

I ran in to an old prospector who had twisted up his ankle and wanted me to help carry him out. Told him, sorry you are considered an artifact :P

 

[fowledup]

Yep. Carry your trash out but leave any artifact you find on public land, that is over 50 years old, there (I think that is the law). I've heard that the law has been interpreted here to even include old cans and the like. That sounds unreasonable and is heresay about a local detectorist who was cited.

Knew I was an antique but now your telling me I'm pretty much an artifact, and if I get hurt out playing, conceptualizedNetherlandr will leave me for the buzzards- Great, really living the dream now!

 

[dave wiseman]

Can't tell from the pics,but with all the square nails..long tomming is a possibility.

 

[2cmorau]

Metal Detecting Laws And What You Should Know. <-------good reading

don't remember where i read this , think it might have been ICMJ or detecting mag, but a man was charge with a fine of $50,000 for finding and keeping chards of chinese pottery, while out metal detecting, challenged the citation don’t know the outcome

 

[Goldwasher]

Looks like ground sluicing to me also.... Hydrauilic mines are more of a pit with a downhill opening or tunnel or raceway that held the sluice. Finding square nails is a good sign to me it means it hasn't been detected well by someone with skill and patience. If you are not on private land just put the "artifacts" you find in a pile and leave them. If asked you didn't dig them. It doesn't look like it was hit by the Chineses either. If it had been you would see more organized trenches and walls almost like artwork....and you woukdn't be likely to find un processed material like that. Unless they did decide it was to barren to work. Your gonna have to sample and decide.

 

[NeoTokyo]

Max invited me out (But we didn't meet up unfortunately) so I wandered my way along the middle ridge and found a nice spill of 4" long square nails. All were no more than an inch under the grass, really weird being so shallow. I put them back.
All around that spot were shallow trenches.

 

[Maxlfty]

We will re schedule for a future date. Gonna rain.
If you continue down the ridge you will run into a old granite quarry. It's kinda cool, there are wedges stuck in the Rick.


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