Define For Me "sunbaker"

[nebulanoodle]

I nabbed a pretty neat find the other day and I think it was sunbaker...

Is it only a sunbaker if you saw it before you disturbed it or is it still a sunbaker if the rock that it's lodged in tells a sunbaker tale? Every dirt dog can tell what half of a float rock was in the ground and what half was face up. 

This is a rock with a nugget lodged in it that tells one of those sunbaker tales. 

Is it a sunbaker?

-OR-

Was it a sunbaker?

-...OR-

Is it not a sunbaker?

It's wedged in there really good! I haven't tried to yank it out because it's so unique as a sort of specimen of a bedrock nugget trap. I've picked at it and got no movement, plus it survived getting tossed around in my pack on my hike.

An interesting find too! One of those days, patch hunting a new area (this new area hasn't met the three nugget threshold). All I had in my pocket was trash and my nug jug only held my test nugget. But lo, another signal! Few and far between, they are out here. Giving the spot a boot scrape moves my target. Probably surface trash, a bullet. Gotta know. These 4 rocks. These 3. These 2. That one... it's not a hot rock? Turned in hand to reveal a little smooshie stuck in a crack! WHOA!!!

My strongest theory is that this "specimen" is a remnant of the bedrock that trapped some gold, all the bedrock having been eroded away. The gold since washed down the hillside and into the main drainage, perhaps all the way into the basin... But hopefully it has only travelled just past where I stopped detecting for the day and I get a whopper bonanza another day! 😂 Yeah right.

[flakmagnet]

That IS really unique. So glad you didn't yank it out. If you can maybe
leave it as it is. You rarely see finds like that. 

As far as I know a sunbaked is a nugget lying on the surface. I have found two like that but I have seen guys in Australia find some incredible ones.

Nice going!

[Cascade Steven]

Congratulations on your find of a very unique specimen.  If it were my find I think I would leave it as-is and not remove the nugget.   It may be worth more as a unique specimen.  Just food for thought.  In any case best wishes for continued success in the area.

[geof_junk]

To me a sunbaker is one that you can see before you disturb the ground, that is the nugget can see the sun. It is OK if the detector sees it before you do.😁I have lost count of how many but it is around 30 but most are small in the range 2 to 4 grams. 

The one on the left has moss and lichen as it was hiding from the sun most of the time. It made the oz+ the other one was an oz also 

The large one on top was just under 5¾ oz and was sitting right out in the open enjoying the sun. The smaller one was in the ground hiding near by about 6" deep.

[Valens Legacy]

Nice find on the gold, but a sun baker is a person who has been staked out on the ground by leather straps.

Then someone poured honey on him to attract the ants and birds. When the bones are left for about a year, then it is a sun baker.

As long as the rock was face up and the gold was always in the sun, then it is also a sun baker.

[Lanny]

Always fun to find gold on the surface, better for a wow factor when you actually see it before the detector does, also lots of fun to find nuggets with the eyeball when you don't have a detector!

I'm no expert on the sun-baker definition, but I really enjoyed Geof_Junk's definition, response, and photos, amazing finds!

Interesting find GoldTree, keep swinging that coil. . . .

All the best,

Lanny

[Kioti]

Several times I have found sunbakers. While swinging the coil I have spotted several nuggets lying on the surface before the coil reaches them. It's great to see them and then swing the coil over them and hear that lovely beep. Western Australia was the best place for finding sunbakers. 

[mn90403]

You have it.  Either you see the gold before the detector sees it or you see the gold after the detector but you see it without digging.  

You can take a picture of a sunbaker and know it is gold.

[nebulanoodle]

Ah! It seems my lack of attention to detail brackets me into a: No sunbaker! As I did not see the gold before I disturbed it, but the specimen tells the story of presenting the opportunity to have.

...at the end of the day, it's gold! 😏

[Reno Chris]

If it is sitting so that the sunlight touches it, its a sunbaker, whether you see it first or the detector sees it first. I've found underwater nuggets that were exposed to sunlight, and I'd also call them sunbakers, even though they were underwater.