My First Year Prospecting For Scotlands Gold

[Ian g]

Apologies for any spelling mistakes. The touch screen on this is a nightmare.

STARTING OUT

The thought of prospecting for natural gold had always appealed to me long before I actually went out into the field and did it. You want to get a quick buck, then go put a $ in a vegas slot machine, as you have more chance with that. On the other hand if you want to pull your hair out, then why not come to Bonny scotland for some prospecting. In truth, panning for gold really is nothing more than a hobby I’ve took up. Don’t get me wrong, there are still good nuggets to be found if one is prepared to put in the work, and of course, if the gods decide.

Starting out with just a pan and digging tool, Just trying to find that one elusive speck of gold was a hair pulling time. I spent weeks and weeks without success. Don’t get wrong I had plenty of yellow stuff in my pans. I’m not sure what it was but it wasn’t gold. I went so long without finding any that I began to question wether there was even gold in the area. 
The day I finally found gold was a day on which I had zero expectations that I would find any. I stopped the van at a very popular car park not 6yds from the stream, an area that had obviously been panned out by the folk who didn’t want to put much effort into their hobby, and eureka! I found three tiny specks.
I hadn’t gone into my new hobby totally blind, as i had watched enough videos and read up on the subject for a time before I actually went on that first session, so after trying to find gold in the areas I thought might produce some and failing, to find it virtually under my feet in a very very popular spot…….. well that’s just bloomin typical😂.  To find those three little specks on that day was perfect timing, because I don’t know if I was on the verge of giving up because that’s just not in my genes, But I was certainly fed up to a serious point. 

BUILDING MY ARSENAL

Ok I don’t have much money, the thought of being able to purchase a gold detector will probably remain a pipe dream forever, but there’s one thing I have in abundance, and that’s work ethic. This was instilled in me by my brother during my career in roofing. His motto was that it didn’t matter what tools one had if they didn’t gave the work ethic to use them. 
This attitude helped no end when it came to choosing the tools I needed, not the too,so I wanted. I wanted a high banker, I wanted a mechanical digger, hey! Let’s just open a quarry haha!. Well what I purchased was a gravel pump and a classifier, those were of utmost importance and allowed me to use muscle power more economically. 
I began finding gold with every session, and quickly realised that picking tiny specks, and the odd flake out the pan with tweezers and putting them in a vial just wasn’t good, so the next thing I bought was a snuffer bottle. I was learning and adapting as I went, until eventually I got a sluice box. The sluice was an obvious game changer, but I had my doubts that it would catch the gold. I settled my mind by chucking in the gold I had previously found. I admit this was taking a big chance, well it did at the time, but I needn’t have worried, as the gold sank quickly onto the top of the sluice, I don’t think it even travelled to the following ripple. My mind was put to rest and now I try to set the sluice to run as fast as possible. Maybe I have lost some specks, but as the age old saying goes “out of sight, out of mind. I now have what I deem necessary, including some crevicing tools.
     
LEARNING THE AREA OF WANLOCKHEAD AND THE LEADHILLS

 There is just too much to remember, so instead I have put on the link below. This is an interesting read into the geology of the area i prospect in the lowther hills district. 

https://webapps.bgs.ac.uk/Memoirs/docs/B06088.html

 

WHAT IVE LEARNED ON A PERSONAL LEVEL

Well first of all I have learned to put the work in if I want to find gold, and even then it isn’t much. To put things into perspective, in the 13 months I’ve been prospecting I have found just under one and a half grams. There is a plus side however. Firstly the gold is very pure, and secondly, and this seems to be running parallel to the experience I have in prospecting, the gold is getting bigger. Certain things have caught me out in the past that I have learned from, like there’s no gold under the false bedrock, something that took me ages to accept. I now look for where the bedrock reaches the surface of the streams, instead of trying to dig down to it, because sometimes the bedrock can’t be reached by this method. I have learned to spot the bedrock in the hills, and I can see where it is close to the surface. Something that I’ve also noticed is that most fellow panners concentrate on where the water enters the pools, totally ignoring the tails where the finer gold accumulates. I’ve also learned to stop looking at the streams as they are, and I now look at where they run during flood, even where they used to run but don’t anymore. 
Only one year in prospecting isn’t much experience, but putting my limited knowledge to work has even found me a couple of rare pickers, so I’m on the right track. I’m getting better and only the other day I reached the dizzy heights where I found 0.416g, and considering I only managed 1.082g up til then I would say that’s a considerable step up in my finds.

below are three pickers I’ve found recently. I say three because the top and bottom pieces are one picker broke in half.

 

looks just like a flower when pushed together.

Thanks for taking the time to read about my early days in prospecting 

🇺🇸🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿🥃 cheers

ian.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Rick N. MI]

Well worth it. Getting gold.

[Ian g]

1 hour ago, Rick N. MI said:

Well worth it. Getting gold.

Agreed Rick. 

[John-Edmonton]

Very nice presentation. I bet many of us followed a similar path. It always starts with a pan, then ends in a pan.

[Ian g]

6 hours ago, John-Edmonton said:

Very nice presentation. I bet many of us followed a similar path. It always starts with a pan, then ends in a pan.

I think that’s probably true John. I wonder, what would be considered a nugget rather than a picker? Is it weight,size or shape?

yup! I’m an amateur and like nothing better than soaking up advice offered by the seasoned prospectors, wether it’s a pointer on where to look on a stream or in the hills. Any advice would be very much appreciated.

cheers

ian

[Gold Seeker]

Ian,

If there's any moss or fine root masses in and around your steams, they are great fine gold traps, so check them out if you haven't already!!

There's a reason they call the fine gold catching material in a sluice box "miner's moss"!!!

[Ian g]

14 hours ago, Gold Seeker said:

Ian,

If there's any moss or fine root masses in and around your steams, they are great fine gold traps, so check them out if you haven't already!!

There's a reason they call the fine gold catching material in a sluice box "miner's moss"!!!

I haven’t noticed but then again I haven’t been looking gold seeker.

I will take a look the next time I go.  
I know the slopes coming down from the bedrock has thick heather growing in it, but the sides of the stream are covered in grass, which could have moss in it. 
I will let you know next week, and thanks for that advice gold seeker👍
 

[YubaJ]

         The dirt & gravel in the grass roots by the stream--separate them with water in a large gold pan until you get the roots clean, then pan that gravel.

          Also check out some U-Tube videos of underwater sniping with a crevice scraper, hammer & chisel & suction bulb. Probably not much practiced where you are. Of course you'll need a wetsuit, mask & snorkel--for the younger people and the athletic. I've had great finds doing that.

[Ian g]

2 hours ago, YubaJ said:

         The dirt & gravel in the grass roots by the stream--separate them with water in a large gold pan until you get the roots clean, then pan that gravel.

          Also check out some U-Tube videos of underwater sniping with a crevice scraper, hammer & chisel & suction bulb. Probably not much practiced where you are. Of course you'll need a wetsuit, mask & snorkel--for the younger people and the athletic. I've had great finds doing that.

I haven’t seen anyone sniping in person Yubaj, but the odd person does do it, and one of them found a 16g nugget. The biggest nugget in the uk was found in my panning area albeit in the 16th century. That nugget weighed 2lbs. 
I’ve always wanted to try sniping, and when the light is right there’s nothing better than lowering my head to the water surface and staring into the cracks in the rock. It’s like looking into another world.