Wyoming Glacier Gold!

[BMc]

Location: BLM land-Western Wyoming. Elevation above 7,000'  Mid July-Temp: 70's, Clear, Sunny and Cool. Rolling hills and sagebrush. Most  gold was found from 1" to 3" average depth, on pediment/bedrock; and/or on a clay layer at 3" deep (except the largest flake didn't have a gold stop. No clay, no bedrock, no gravel or hard pan. Just dirt) Mineralization in the area: Moderate.

Research indicated that the source of the gold was from an elevated rich lode district about 30 miles away, that was transported by Glacier action which pushed huge boulders across collected gold deposits, smashing/flattening nuggets along the way.

 Access to mining area required permissive crossing of private ranch property to reach old Hydraulic Mining area on a plateau several miles wide with a few creeks and  drainages (all of which had been placered pretty thoroughly) No sign of mining outside of creeks and Hydraulic Pit.

 Detecting the Hydraulic Pit full of large boulders did not produce any gold. However, 100 yards upslope from the Hydraulic Pit, scattered, flattened, nugget patches on shallow bedrock were detected.

Photo of gold in pan represents about 2 half days of detecting using various detectors.  By the 3rd day, several patches had been found each giving up around 9 flakes. Repeat visits to the area produced similar number of pieces of gold each trip.

Detectors:  Minelab Gold Monster, SDC 2300, GPZ 7000. All machines found gold. The Monster produced the most, probably because of the shallow nature of the ground. The 7000 detected a few deeper nuggets, 7-8 inches on subsequent trips to the area. 
 

[beatup]

well done

[Valens Legacy]

Nice looking gold and great hunting.

Good luck on your next hunt.

[Bear]

More WYO gold, thank you for posting it 

[rvpopeye]

Yup yup, Dig it up !

[Gerry in Idaho]

I've been fortunate enough to find a few bits in WY and witnessed a few ouncer size chunks as well.  Nice write up and pics.