Starting New

[RandyTheKid]

Hello everyone! My names randy, I'm starting my very first gold prospecting adventures and journal. Hopefully somebody will follow my prospecting progress journal and enjoy the adventures with me. Now let's begin with me sharing some important information so that you know my plans and what I'm doing.

Starting this week after the snow melts ( It's a super wet snow and should melt pretty fast.) I plan on going prospecting from now until the end of summer. Here's the catch though, I live in an area that doesn't produce natural forming gold. I live in northern Kentucky, between Louisville, Kentucky and Cincinnati, Ohio right on the Ohio river. There hasn't been any reported or documented reports of anyone finding gold here but I'm 15 to 20 minutes away where gold has been found. I'd like to be the first person to find any! After doing hours of reading, watching videos, and practicing panning with buckshot I'm ready to start my adventures and projects.

The gear I will be using:

My gear will be stored inside my camping backpack.
One big green gold pan.
One medium black sized gold pan.
One small green gold pan.
One 1/2 green classifier.
One full sized shovel wooden type.
One small shovel.
One hand shovel.
Pickaxe,
Crow bar.
Screwdriver flat head.
Two spoons.
Two five gallon buckets.
One plastic potato salad container.
One coffee creamer container. (For arrow heads)
Sniffer bottle.
Tweezers.
Magnifying glass.
Magnet inside plastic bag.
Gold container.
Gloves.

That's the list of things I will be bringing along with me on my adventures. If I end up bringing anything else I will update the journal. Please feel free to add anything that you suggest in the comment section. Because your suggestions and knowledge is important to me and will be incredibly useful along this journey.
Now let's go ahead and look into some of the locations I will be visiting and doing prospecting to find the gold.

My first place i'm starting is right behind my house about a ten minute walk. It's a little creek that floods an awful lot. I will spend the day digging and panning this little creek. There may or may not be any gold in this creek. If I don't have any luck there I might get lucky and come across an arrow head.

The next location is still pretty close to my house, about a 30 minute hike. This creek is a little bigger and has a faster flowing water. This creek would be a more ideal location to start panning and finding the gold. I put this one latter one because the cold weather and I don't have muck boots.

George's creek is a huge creek that connects to the little Kentucky river. Excellent location to find arrows heads also.

The little Kentucky river has some pretty shallow spots and lots of gravel bars. The little Kentucky connects to the Ohio river.

The banks of the Ohio river have some decent locations I could check out.

There's about a handful of creeks around me that I could check out and possibly find something. That's about it for the locations and things. Please comment your opinions and thoughts. Let's move on to the project's that I have planned to build to can help me along the way. I want to build a sluce box that I can take with me while prospecting. The other thing I want to build is a hand suction device so I can suck material out of the water. That's about it for now. I will update often with progression and finds.

 

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[63bkpkr]

Hi RTK, your first trips will give you some idea of what gear you may need more than other items however, I would suggest you weigh your pack once you've gotten everything gathered together. All of those items add up quickly! Mining equipment is generally heavy and at times has sharp edges that will rip right through a backpack. Wrapping sharp or pointed items with a simple rag is usually enough to eliminate holes in packs as having your equipment fail is no fun near or far from home our your car.

There is a lot of information on the internet on how to Read a River or Stream, understanding the information could be helpful to you. First and foremost, enjoy your time while you are 'out there'!................63bkpkr

An after thought: are you a good swimmer and are you familiar with the types of snakes in your area?

 

[RandyTheKid]

Hi RTK, your first trips will give you some idea of what gear you may need more than other items however, I would suggest you weigh your pack once you've gotten everything gathered together. All of those items add up quickly! Mining equipment is generally heavy and at times has sharp edges that will rip right through a backpack. Wrapping sharp or pointed items with a simple rag is usually enough to eliminate holes in packs as having your equipment fail is no fun near or far from home our your car.

There is a lot of information on the internet on how to Read a River or Stream, understanding the information could be helpful to you. First and foremost, enjoy your time while you are 'out there'!................63bkpkr

An after thought: are you a good swimmer and are you familiar with the types of snakes in your area?

I'm an excellent swimmer during the summer when the water is warm. The creeks I shouldn't have to worry about because they're ankle deep in most places. As far as snakes we rattlesnakes but I don't worry about them, but I use caution when I see them.

 

[craig82]

Hi Randy. I'm a newly registered member here but I've been lurking these prospector blogs for a long time. Love reading through other's adventures out in the field and learning from the way they work. Best of wishes with your new journal, heavy pans or skunked; I can't wait for the coming updates!

 

[KevinInColorado]

Have fun and “heavy pans”!

 

[gold tramp]

My favorite on your list the coffee creamer container for arrowheads.
Gt.....

 

[Clay Diggins]

I admire your sense of adventure. I love Kentucky, I attended Western Kentucky U for 2 years. Crawled through a lot of caves while exploring. But I learned something all those centuries ago. In Kentucky the land owner owns the bed of the stream (with the exception of the Ohio river).

You can float those creeks but any gold, minerals or artifacts you might find belong to the owner of the land. Those gravel bars are privately owned. Essentially anywhere you might want to explore is already private property. Digging wherever you please could have unwanted consequences.

Lucky for you Kentuckians are generally really friendly people and they will, for the most part, be happy to let you use their lands for your adventures. Just be smart and caring enough to ask first. You will make some friends that way and you will avoid the chase through the woods for 20 hours while a friendly local tries to kill you with his hunting rifle. (Yeah I'm speaking from first hand experience)

I hope you have a great summer and get lots of treasure. I envy you for having a whole summer to explore in that beautiful country.

Heavy Pans