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This one was found by a hunting partner... 3.5 ouncer

I've also detected some big gold nuggets with ironstone. Hope you enjoy the pictures!

It's been said "iron is the mother of gold". I've found several gold/ironstone nuggets in Arizona. My camera won't download pictures to my computer for some reason. So I did these on my scanner and if you look hard you can see the gold is stuck to the rare earth magnet. Some of the nuggets show very little iron on them but all nuggets are magnetic except the one at the lower right. I guess it must be hematite and the others are magnetite.

I'll bet it cost as much to feed the cat as the detector cost!

Wow Fred, now that's a big cat!

Yup don't be stupid, The Gila Monster is also protected by federal law. Lil bro just wanted to move this one off the road so he wouldn't get hurt, don't worry both monsters are safe and sound. Just to give you an idea of the size of this gila monster little bro is 6' 5" 330 lbs.

Nice gold Lunk... congrats! I hope there's lots more nuggets for you!

Fred, are you running with audio smoothing off? If not that will definitely help out with the questionable targets, so will running in normal ground if possible. Most of the 25 nuggets were very obvious targets that were missed in the difficult mode, a few were soft subtle targets I had to scrape down to hear as obvious targets. If I'm in a known patch I'll do whatever it takes to run in the normal mode with audio smoothing off, that may not be possible in some areas but as shown in Jason's video there's a big difference between the two ground modes. I also proved it to myself by going back and finding the 25 nuggets missed detecting in the difficult ground mode. Thanks again to Jason for taking the time and effort to make the video!

Thanks gentlemen, Spencer, I'm not sure about how many hours it took to find the nuggets. it's a 2 1/2 hr drive one way where I do most of my detecting so it doesn't leave a lot of time left to hunt. Jason, some of these patches have deep ground and I've found big nuggets at depth with every big aftermarket coil made. I think there is more bigg'ns Also I re-hunted some of these areas that I already covered in the difficult mode and I forced myself to detect them in normal and I found about 25 more nuggets that were missed with the GPZ in the difficult mode. Thanks to your video showing the depth difference. I did have to dig a few ironstones and mineralization but it was worth the trouble, there were two patches that normal just won't work and I switched to difficult.

Nice gold I hope there will be more for ya. Fred I just plug in my headphones and go, it helps me concentrate on finding gold with less distraction going on around me.

Very nice gold Jason congrats, also thanks for doing the video that shows the difference between hunting in difficult vs normal. It forced me to take another look at normal and increased my nugget finds. Take good care of yourself the gold will still be there after you heal up.

GPZ nuggets so far, all from old hammered patches, all from Arizona. 77 nuggets, the biggest is 2.2 dwt, total weight is 21.2 pennyweight. Enjoy the picture!

Nice nuggets, if you're digging bullets in a gold bearing area it's only a matter of time before you dig a bigger nugget. If the area is known for big gold just stick with it... it will come. Good luck!

Some of that 20% depth lost in difficult mode is made up with audio smoothing off. I'm waiting for the big coils to come out and start the learning game all over again.

Thanks for the video and very nice nugget Jason. I wish I could run those settings down here where I hunt. The mineralization is so high in some areas you dig false ground noise with those settings not to mention the ironstones and hot rocks in some places are loaded. I should try normal ground again and turn the sensitivity way down and see if I still get false or ghost signals. .

4 years ago I found a big 1.5 ounce nugget with a hole in it, yesterday I found the twin to it in the same patch with the GPZ. Solid gold nuggets with holes in it are pretty rare. They are just like father and son, just like twins Danny Devito and Arnold Schwarzenegger. Well they're kinda like twins... aren't they? I'm worried the GPZ has reduced me to a crumb chuncher.

AjR these nuggets were all found in the lower desert of western Arizona. Hawkeye, all of the nuggets give a clean pure response, the nugget at 1:00 O'clock above the token gave a squiggly response just like a bent nail I had dug the day before. So the shape of the nugget can change the sound the detector makes but I think they were just to small or to deep for the other detectors used. Lunk, I really enjoy using the Zed, I just wish it wasn't so heavy. Hey Fred, The day we found this patch I was hunting with my buddy that used a GB2 and he was a 24/7 pro with it. The area was so hot it absolutely render his GB2 useless, I had found about a dozen nuggets including a 1.5 ouncer the first day and he got skunked. I even let him move in my area where the big nugget was found. Over time about 40 nuggets were found with the modded 3500's and the GB2 finally found 2 little dinks many days later. The ground with the striped iron rock and ironstones and high mineralization was just to much for his GB2. I'll need to PM you the settings I used on the GPZ, there just to secret to discuss on a open forum. Just kidding... Just one big change. High Yield, difficult ground, audio smoothing off, and now the big change. I turned the SENSITIVITY DOWN TO 10 and if I rubbed the coil on the bigger ironstones I could get a very soft signal but really had to try had to get it. Thanks Steve!

All 48 nuggets found with the GPZ on old worked out patches, total weight is 12 pennyweights. I worked a old patch today that has some very nasty hot rocks that gave all the previous detectors loads of trouble. They have black iron stripes or streaks and also some solid ironstones. The 7000 just purred through the worst this patch had to offer with no complaints. The 6 nuggets found in this area were loud and clear... notice the one at the lower left has a defect in it. Almost forget I found a tax token today. I guess some poor guy came from Oklahoma came seeking his fortune in Arizona and lost a tax token, he probably went home broke and busted and nugget less. Why couldn't it have been a $5 gold piece instead of a worthless 5 tax token.

Mark is lucky to have to have someone like you to teach him about finding gold. How did they come up with calling it the Extra Deep gold mode, I don't understand the thinking?

I've only tried Extra Deep once with a quick test on a 1.5 ounce buried nugget. At 18 inches High Yield hit the hardest with General next and Extra Deep was the worst of the three gold modes so I've never used it again for hunting. Maybe the nugget wasn't big enough??? I should try a 6 ounce nugget a bit deeper but I think it would be the same outcome. When Fred asked me what settings I was using on the GPZ I shared what I was doing and told him to stay out of Extra Deep. I wonder how many guys will have to re-hunt there favorite nugget patch now? I do know of a couple of washes loaded with ironstones I'll try extra deep on. As far as the Minelab video it just doesn't seem right to have guys that have probably never found a nugget before telling you how to do it... I could be wrong though. I would listen a whole lot more intently if a very successful prospector was teaching about the gold modes, guys that had actually had tried and true real world knowledge about the settings.

Yes I caught that too when I watched it this morning. Who are those guys? Where's JP when you want him?

Thanks Steve, It's interesting, Gold mode High Yield medium or small nuggets typical 0.1 grams to 50 grams. I wouldn't call a 1.6 ounce nugget small or medium, at least not in Arizona. And General typical is 5 grams to 50 grams.

Found at the top of a steep hill laying of the ground, there is a dowel joint at the top.

I use to hunt with a friend that would set up his gold bug 2 with the sens maxed out at 10 and the volume maxed out at 10, but the only way he could do this was to turn the threshold down and run silent... no threshold at all and if he still got ground noise he would dumb the detector down even more by lifting the coil and hunt a few inches off the ground. This was his way of handling the annoying squawks of the highly mineralised ground and or ground loaded with ironstones. My point is I'm not sure at what costs or what he lost by dumbing down a detector to max out the sensitivity... Just something I've always wondered about. It might be totally different on the GPZ.

Let the games begin... Fred, while dirt fishing don't forget to hold your mouth right! Good Luck!