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Average Ratio Of Trash To Gold ?


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Not that many of us keep record of this but it would be interesting to hear the number of trash finds to gold finds on your average day hunt. I know their are many variables as of site location and such, but for me it's been around 40-60 trash targets which includes lead and ferrous items to one single nugget. Regardless of sites in my area....that's the range for me. I try to disc out the obvious, but for safety I do dig questionable sounds. On another topic a heads up as far as disc on the 4500 Minelabs. I set mine at a pretty aggressive setting of 7. I have found that lead bullets will at times disc out, but they do have that distinct low tone ..so be careful !!  Gold will also give of a warbally tone, not like a dic or tone break but some may mistake it as trash so dig it. When in question, dig....happy hunting to you all.....

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Too depressing to contemplate.....

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AuWanderer

 What i'm about to tell you is the norm too many times. I hunted hard for two weeks around Rich Hill and not one nugget did i have to show . I couldn't whole all the trash I dug up in both hands in the form of a cup. This is not counting the big trash that I'd put in my bag.

For me it's always been more trash found when nugget hunting. I've dug lots of trash coin hunting but not as near as bad as the other.

In coin hunting people had a trash dump in one place most of the time. The old prospector has his trash dump but the location was depending on what door are window was open at the time. For the cabins that didn't have a window also didn't have but one door and the front yard is where it went.

If you don't find lots of trash where nugget hunting then someone has been there before you. The less of it are none at all the guy before was good at what he was doing. I'm not saying move on but thank them if you do find something. It's been times I had to clear out the trash to detect the coins. The times I'm talk about is long before you had any kind of ID coin detector.

Chuck

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Like one of my hunting buds said to me once, " if their trash, theirs gold left," especially if your in a well know mining area. So  when I start getting a bit negative by digging trash but know for a fact what type and size gold was found in the area I continue following the principles and push on and keep on working the site. Every time I do that the gold seems to show its bright face. RR, you are right about coin hunting. As I recall when I used to hunt coins at my local beaches and swim holes I would always come home with a few bucks worth of change.Yes their was some trash, pull tabs and such..but you always came out with some silver and copper, and on occasion a earring or charm, not always gold but still fun to find. The richer the dirt the more trash, those guys ate as they worked and discarded the cans all over the place. 

 

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One spot I regularly hunt here in Australia I'll dig 100 bullets to one nugget generally around the half gram, why do I go back? It's close' 

another regular spot although a lot further away the ratio is more like 5 trash to one nugget' the distance between targets gets boring and the gold is small closer to .2 gram.

So... i do more dry washing/high banking these days as I always get gold' and boredom doesn't overtake as quick.

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I wouldn't even want to ponder on how much junk I've dug. I normally only dig non ferrous targets, so lead is my main junk. but some lead can be a clue for if someone has detected there before and cleaned out the gold. if you find a fair amount of old lead{white patina} especially cap and ball rounds or blackpowder balls more then likely it has not been detected hard before. especially if these old lead rounds are out in the open areas. most start detecting a gold location in the open areas, then if they find any gold, then they'll get in and under the brush. white lead like modern day ammo doesn't always mean that there is still gold there. some of these might have been fired 10-15 years ago, and have devolped a white patina to them. but somebody might have been there 20 years ago and cleaned out a lot of the gold. but old detectors could have missed some of the smaller stuff, or might not have dealt with the mineralization well, like todays modern detectors. as far as gold to trash ratios that has just too many variables. 1 for 1 would be nice. good luck

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Just like real estate its all about location, location, location.

If your not finding lead your not finding gold is another thought.  Depending on how known the location is the amounts and types of trash and gold vary wildly but as califoriniagold pointed out old lead is a pretty solid indicator to how hunted out an area really is.

In the US everybody and thier brother for the last few hundred years has shot thier guns off and lead is very prominent.  I myself collected a full coffee can of it one year in areas around the south of Tucson AZ with a gold bug.  In Victoria, my first trip down under the lead kept comming however iron, tin, was also very prevalent.  WA is home to big tin in my opinion but I can say with the Zed this year Lead was a big winner again.  So big that my partner and I had days comming back to camp and seeing who could impress the most with thier Zed/lead for the day.

There is no good ratio to whit.  Only indicators that someone was in the area and if the location is good what they were after. My thoughts.

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Different units make my trash/gold ratio change. SDC and GMT coming to mind first ....so many tiny pieces.

 

But as I specifically target heavily junked areas most times (both modern and old iron/tin upon rich diggings, my junk ratio is extremely high. Takes a awful lot of effort to accept the work and patience needed, but the rewards are worth it.

When I've had a gutful after a few days, I'll get back the general detecting again, mainly to give the knees a rest. 

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