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Area I'm Detecting


billdean

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I have a new GM 1000. I have never done any detecting for gold before and could use some help deciphering the area I am detecting in. I have been reading mining reports that say this area has a lot of shallow gold in it but after few days of detecting (total 15 hours) all I have is bullets, bird shot, tin foil, tin cans and a few magnetized rocks I have found. I am not sure I am detecting in the right type area? I have been concentrating on the deeper washes in Sw Arizona. I have attached some pics of the area. Maybe I should try higher ground. Just getting a little discouraged and need some help on the type of area I should be looking for. Do my areas look ok?

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Maybe try to get into the bedrock cracks and fissures. Get off of the wash bottom and try the benches on the sides. Also look for any drywash piles, or any stacked rock or un natural landscape. Persistence will pay off. Use slow coil speed and control. And learn to trust your detector.

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G,day  Billdean 

I would double up on what JW and Sourdough have expressed about finding shallower areas of bedrock that are  covered with minimum overburden to give your monster every chance of finding smaller pieces of alluvial gold .The GM is not a deep seeking detector so you need to get the coil as close as you can down amongst the cracks where the gold will lodge . You may need to use fairly high sensitivity levels if that’s possible without getting to much ground noise and falsing .Your other option is to look for the reefs shedding the gold in these areas and see if you can get some of the drift deposits between reef and the watercourse , I have found some gold like this with the gold monster including a nice 2 grammer .Some general hints I can give you for operating the GM are 

(1) when nugget hunting in any but the mildest soil conditions don’t put much stock in the accuracy of the discrimination graph .

(2) If your new to the Gold Monster run in Auto or Auto plus until you gain some experience.

(3) Try not to bash the coil on rocks as there are some reports of falsing caused by this. 

(4) Use a plastic scoop to locate your target as the GM  is sensitive enough to react to your hand.

(5) Natural gold comes in all shapes and sizes from smooth water worn slugs to rough angular pieces with ironstone and quartz attached so don’t expect coin like tones and response. You will be amazed how well the GM responds to even the smallest  pieces of gold so be careful when discarding material.

Finally don,t get discouraged  if success doesn’t come as quickly as you envisioned,. Learn by reading and watching what methods others are using successfully and it won’t be long before you can adopt some of these techniques to your advantage in your local goldfields .

Regards PM

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billdean,

I'll take a shot at your dilemma to encourage you and give you some pointers I wish I had when I was new to gold nugget detecting in 2010.  You are doing one good thing by asking questions.  Don't think you know it all or much of anything and your first gold will come sooner.  A novice with a metal detector looking for a gold nugget is a frustrating scenario that most of us can remember.  Many of us were with someone else when they found our first gold.

That is one of the first lessons.  Go with someone else who will show you their area, maybe you belong to their club or you just happen to watch what they are doing.  Many of us will help but that is part of the problem ... you don't know anyone yet.  I didn't so I spent many wasted hours on the wrong areas and often times going too fast.  I thought I knew more than I did.  What I have learned is that finding gold with a detector is an expert's game.  Go where the experts go and start to think like the experts think.

The second lesson I would say is have a target in mind.  Get a sample nugget and test it on top of the ground and buried at different depths.  Those of us who find gold know it sounds different in many cases than a nail or a bullet.  Learn that sound.  Dig everything in the beginning even if it says trash on your screen.  What kind of trash is it?

I was in Arizona near Lake Havasu (Yucca Strewn Field) targeting meteorites with my 5000 one trip.  I had only found a couple of pieces of gold then but this trip I was looking for hot rocks!  I was using all the proper swing techniques and I got a signal and I looked down at my feet and there was a golf ball sized specimen (sunbaker) that turned out to have 1.5 ounces of gold in a 3.5 ounce piece of quartz.  It was the wrong target ... but I kept it!  (A year and a half later I went back looking for gold in a meteorite field and found a larger piece but that is a different story.)

I'll followup on your post by going line by line ... sort of:

I have a new GM 1000. I have never done any detecting for gold before and could use some help deciphering the area I am detecting in. I have been reading mining reports that say this area has a lot of shallow gold in it but after few days of detecting (total 15 hours) all I have is bullets, bird shot, tin foil, tin cans and a few magnetized rocks I have found.

My first observation is that 15 hours is not a whole lot of time.  Experts (not me) will sometimes go a day or two without finding a nugget and they know where to look.  As they say ... don't be too impatient grasshopper.  Your research is good and you may be close but that only counts in horseshoes and ...

I am not sure I am detecting in the right type area? I have been concentrating on the deeper washes in Sw Arizona. I have attached some pics of the area. Maybe I should try higher ground. Just getting a little discouraged and need some help on the type of area I should be looking for. Do my areas look ok?

Two guys that I respect a lot have already given you some advice and I think it is good.  Being a novice you may have missed what they said.  Do you know what a bench is?  Do you know what happens when water flows and moves rocks and gold?  Do you know where gold will tend to collect?  Scott said look in areas up on the sides ... that would be gold that hasn't really moved or washed in a long time.  Benches can also be in the center.  Big rocks can also trap nuggets.  Move a few of them.  JW and Scott both said look for man-made stacks.  These would have been made by someone before you picking up those rocks and stacking them to the side because they were in the way of the gold they were looking for.  The more stacks and the bigger the stacks probably means more gold was found.  By now some of it will have replenished with the monsoons.  You can find it.

If you have stuck with me through all of this then you might have the patience to find your first gold before you throw the detector in a closet and never use it again.

Mitchel 

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6 hours ago, mn90403 said:

Get a sample nugget and test it on top of the ground and buried at different depths.

Had some free time (sitting in Dr.'s office) yesterday so took along Larry Sallee's Zip Zip book.  He says 1 or 2 grains (0.065 g = 65 mg per grain is the conversion) and place between the male&female of velcro, about the size of a silver dollar.  Attach a string (preferably orange!) so when you bury you'll be sure to be able to recover. 

If you don't have any gold that size, flatten one of your pieces of lead shot (you may have to cut it down).  But I think the weight of the lead should be only about 2/3 of the weight of the equivalent gold because of its lower density.  (You're trying to mimic the size and shape of a nugget.  Lead's conductivity is such that it mimics the alloy of naturally occuring gold.)

For example, I just flattened a piece of lead shot (sorry, don't know the size specification used by hunters) which weighed about 1 grain (so equivalent to 1.5 grain of gold, conductivity-wise) by hitting with a hammer about 4-5 times.  It came out 0.5 mm thick X 5 mm diameter.  (That's 0.02 inch thick X 0.2 inch diameter.)

For a quick (and easy to remember) reference, a typical business card is 0.010 inches thick.  So the piece of lead I ended up with is about 2 business cards thick.

 

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Don't get discouraged yet... Many people have gone months and even years before finding their first gold.  Keep at it and remember that if you don't get it under your coil, you'll never hear it.

I suggest going to areas where there is evidence of mining.  They didn't get it all.  Good place to find your first piece.

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13 hours ago, mn90403 said:

billdean,

I'll take a shot at your dilemma to encourage you and give you some pointers I wish I had when I was new to gold nugget detecting in 2010.  You are doing one good thing by asking questions.  Don't think you know it all or much of anything and your first gold will come sooner.  A novice with a metal detector looking for a gold nugget is a frustrating scenario that most of us can remember.  Many of us were with someone else when they found our first gold.

That is one of the first lessons.  Go with someone else who will show you their area, maybe you belong to their club or you just happen to watch what they are doing.  Many of us will help but that is part of the problem ... you don't know anyone yet.  I didn't so I spent many wasted hours on the wrong areas and often times going too fast.  I thought I knew more than I did.  What I have learned is that finding gold with a detector is an expert's game.  Go where the experts go and start to think like the experts think.

The second lesson I would say is have a target in mind.  Get a sample nugget and test it on top of the ground and buried at different depths.  Those of us who find gold know it sounds different in many cases than a nail or a bullet.  Learn that sound.  Dig everything in the beginning even if it says trash on your screen.  What kind of trash is it?

I was in Arizona near Lake Havasu (Yucca Strewn Field) targeting meteorites with my 5000 one trip.  I had only found a couple of pieces of gold then but this trip I was looking for hot rocks!  I was using all the proper swing techniques and I got a signal and I looked down at my feet and there was a golf ball sized specimen (sunbaker) that turned out to have 1.5 ounces of gold in a 3.5 ounce piece of quartz.  It was the wrong target ... but I kept it!  (A year and a half later I went back looking for gold in a meteorite field and found a larger piece but that is a different story.)

I'll followup on your post by going line by line ... sort of:

I have a new GM 1000. I have never done any detecting for gold before and could use some help deciphering the area I am detecting in. I have been reading mining reports that say this area has a lot of shallow gold in it but after few days of detecting (total 15 hours) all I have is bullets, bird shot, tin foil, tin cans and a few magnetized rocks I have found.

My first observation is that 15 hours is not a whole lot of time.  Experts (not me) will sometimes go a day or two without finding a nugget and they know where to look.  As they say ... don't be too impatient grasshopper.  Your research is good and you may be close but that only counts in horseshoes and ...

I am not sure I am detecting in the right type area? I have been concentrating on the deeper washes in Sw Arizona. I have attached some pics of the area. Maybe I should try higher ground. Just getting a little discouraged and need some help on the type of area I should be looking for. Do my areas look ok?

Two guys that I respect a lot have already given you some advice and I think it is good.  Being a novice you may have missed what they said.  Do you know what a bench is?  Do you know what happens when water flows and moves rocks and gold?  Do you know where gold will tend to collect?  Scott said look in areas up on the sides ... that would be gold that hasn't really moved or washed in a long time.  Benches can also be in the center.  Big rocks can also trap nuggets.  Move a few of them.  JW and Scott both said look for man-made stacks.  These would have been made by someone before you picking up those rocks and stacking them to the side because they were in the way of the gold they were looking for.  The more stacks and the bigger the stacks probably means more gold was found.  By now some of it will have replenished with the monsoons.  You can find it.

If you have stuck with me through all of this then you might have the patience to find your first gold before you throw the detector in a closet and never use it again.

Mitchel 

Thanks Mitchel....I really don't know what a bench is or what side the gold collects on a wash. Yesterday a tried a deeper wash with lots of gravel. I look mostly on the sides of the washes up next to any bedrock and cracks in the bed rock. I found small pieces of lead, cans, foils and bullets but no gold. The ground seems to be very mineralized with lots of hematite (blood rock I believe) in spots, so Auto or Auto + has been difficult. Manual 6 seem to quite things down quite a bit. 

I want to thank everyone for there replies and encouragements. I am off to try again this morning. I have never been to Arizona before and the beauty of the desert is stunning. I also love looking a all the different types of rock. Gold detecting gives me something to do while I winter here for the next 3 or 4 months. Thanks again everyone

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Good luck finding the acorns!  With time lots can happen and it is a nice 'hobby' for a few months in the desert.

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Welcome to the forum billdean!

Wow, you guys are awesome. I kind of dream of the day when there are enough knowledgeable people willing to make helpful posts that I just keep things running. This thread made my day in spades with all the great helpful answers. There is nothing I can add except to say that we all go 15 hours or more without gold on a regular basis even after decades of experience. Thank you everyone! :smile::smile:

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Days without gold? I`m slow, took me 3 years when I started and I know now I went over a lot of detectable gold, now I get a wee bored if it takes a week when patch hunting, so I`ll return to an old haunt just to remind me what it looks like. Tis a skill that no one has or will reach the pinnacle of, ah but gaining that skill is the journey that sets it apart from other hobbies, gold detecting is an extremely frustrating but very rewarding challenging hobby. Enjoy that challenge, just look around at the surroundings when your out there, the best work office there is.

 

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