Slickens clay with fine gold and hg

Fullpan

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May 6, 2012
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Since some of us seem to have at least a mild case of cabin fever, this's as good a time as any. Years ago ,dredging, I got into
a "hotspot of Hg" which overlayed a false bedrock of dense clay. After collecting some 5 lbs of it , I realized it was entering from
a gulch nearby and thought "Oh, it must be overflow from the small hydraulic pit up on the ridge". The next day I spent 3 or 4
hrs sampling this gulch. Everywhere the water slacked in coming down the steep gulch, there was deposits of slickens-type fine clay
and a handful of this took forever to break up and pan down. But every handful contained tiny BBs of mercury with fine gold, maybe
50 mesh, along with the last of the black sand.

Ok, question is, assuming 100-200 5-gal buckets of this is there, how would a person efficiently process this stuff? Its a mile and a half hike, so big heavy equipment would be too much. Also, the muddy water will draw attention (turbidity) once it reaches
the river. A guestimate on gold/hg per handful is .50 cents.
 

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Per handful? How many per bucket? 100? $50 a bucket. More or less depending on the size of your hand. ;)

Are you prepared to deal with the mercury. Do you use a retort?
 

Per handful? How many per bucket? 100? $50 a bucket. More or less depending on the size of your hand. ;)

Are you prepared to deal with the mercury. Do you use a retort?
The retort would come in as necessary equipment ( at home) once the values
are determined. (got the original five lbs of hg still sitting in a safe place - maybe a couple grams of gold mixed in.) But the clay is the bugaboo i'm worried
about. If it takes 2 days to process 1 bkt - no good.
 

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