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The Klutina River that flows thru Copper Center has a bit of 1898er stuff in it. Those tough old Prospectors built boats at Klutina Lake sites and floated the river. Many did not make it as this river starts out pretty placid then turns into a monster...I have some campsites to hunt near the main river that is very close to my home...There is a small cemetery there also that I tried to maintain but it is slowly returning to its natural state..These hardy souls had dreams and purposes, many ended at that peaceful serene place very near the river... RIP 98ers...

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On 7/10/2019 at 9:58 AM, Flowdog said:

Lacky,  I hope you post a report of your river hunt. It will be interesting to learn how you do with shovel and floating sifter. Even the slow water sections near me have enough flow to make a floating sifter ackward unless the shape was more or less triangular - like a ship's bow? Even then, I cannot picture such a device being practical in size sufficient to accept a shovel without constant current pulling at the tether or anchor point in my local waters. I can only surmise that the river you are planning to hunt has a very very very low current speed in shallow depth if you are planning to use a shovel and sifter. In any event, I wish you a successful hunt. I am going to hold off for a short while until I get some additional info. HH

I did the first river hunt with the floating sifter and shovel last night. The sifter worked well (I ordered the netting from amazon) and is so light it just skims along the surface,  there is no noticeable drag.

The hunt was a failure though. The water is just too fast still. It was hard to keep my footing, hard to use the shovel as the current was constantly washing it away from where I wanted to dig it in, etc. I recovered some junk targets within 10 feet of shore where the current was less, so I know the method will work once the flow goes down. In the fall after irrigation season the river drops to 1/6th the flow it's at now. I just have to be patient. 

So, the floating sifter works great in heavy current,  everything else, not so much.

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Lacky, thanks for the river hunt update. Good to know that the floating sifter design is not impacted by fast water. It sounds like conditions were otherwise tough for hunting. Maybe better for fishing?:rolleyes: I was thinking about you while wading my local river this weekend. I used my wading staff and felt soled river boots just to stay standing because the rocks are like oiled bowling balls when I use the wrong soles. I was scouting a detecting site and fishing at the same time. Life can be good at times! My prospective hunting site should be cake compared to yours. Still trying to incorporate using a sturdy scoop to grab targets with, but am hesitating to buy one just yet. Wondering how you were geared to stay comfortable and not slip on those Idaho river rocks. I was also wondering what you were expecting to find if things went your way? How did your detector handle in the swift water?

Curtis

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I couldn't find my felt soled wading shoes so I was wearing rubber soled ones I hadn't worn in 10 years. Not ideal. The nice thing is I finally found the remote to the ceiling fan in my bedroom that had been missing for about 8 years when I went to put it on!

So, that and waders for comfort. The river is floated about 100,000 people trips a year, mostly in inner tubes. It's a major summer activity here. The float area is about 6 miles long. So if I figure it out there should be stuff to find. That's my thinking anyway. 

Detector did fine, but pretty tiring fighting the current pushing against the coil constantly.  Detecting downstream with me breaking the current for the coil was easiest. 

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