I hope to offer an idea of what can be done by one person with relatively inexpensive equipment. Keep in mind I have been doing this most of my life, and that I am familiar with the areas I am working. I don't want to imply you can just jump right in and have the same results I have. On the other hand, if one works at it, the rewards can be immense. I'm not talking about just the gold and other finds, but the sheer fun and adventure of the search! So here we go, with the successes, and occasional failures, of a prospector and detectorist from Alaska.

Steve with 14.1 Dwt Nugget found at Ganes Creek, Alaska

The reuse of these stories and images is strictly protected under the copyright laws. You may not do so without my express permission. Image reuse on other websites will normally only require a credit and a link back to this page... but only if I am notified in advance for permission. This Journal is dedicated to my wife for encouraging and supporting my adventures, and to my father for getting me started on the search for gold.  ~ Steve Herschbach

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After returning from Moore Creek in July I put the word out that I was looking for Honda 200 three-wheelers. I was offered one in good condition and bought it, plus another one not running that I purchased for parts. My father came up with a Honda 110 that a friend gave him. Our little fleet was growing. I wanted to make sure that for our assault on the old bulldozer we had plenty of ability to transport people and tools the three miles over the mountain to where the unit was stuck in a bog.

When we acquired Moore Creek some of the equipment we got was actually over the mountain at another creek named Deadwood Creek. In fact, that other location was where the bulldozer was coming from when it got stuck three miles out from our camp. There was another Honda 200 ATV over at that far camp, and so my father and I decided to fly up to Moore Creek, drop off one of our just purchased Hondas, and then fly over the hill and get that three-wheeler.

This proved to be a true Alaska Bush pilot adventure. I’ve flown around Alaska with my father for 40 years now and we have seen some pretty exciting moments in that time. But in recent years usually the flying is uneventful and even downright boring. Every once in awhile though you tackle some new airstrip in a remote location and things can get very interesting, to say the least. This proved to be one of those times.

We crammed a Honda 200 3-wheeler into the Cessna 206 and flew it into Moore Creek. No big deal there. My father had checked out the Deadwood Creek airstrip previously when we had a friend up to Moore Creek with a Super Cub. He figured he could put the 206 in and so we went for it. The strip is dozed over the curve of a hill and grown up with brush. It is always something to be making a landing for the first time on a strip like that, and this was no exception. We hit the ground going uphill, and then had to skid to the left to stay on what appeared to be the best route. You roll up over the crest and down the other side, so forward visibility is limited. We made it but it was one of the more exciting landings I've made with him in some time.

Airstrip at Deadwood Creek, Alaska over the hill from Moore Creek

We explored a bit, and then loaded up the Honda 200 three-wheeler to take over to Moore Creek. The unit appeared to have real low hours but had been sitting in the weather for years. Two tires were flat, and although it would turn over the fuel tank was full of rust and it would not start. Then came the fun part... takeoff. A Cessna 206 with two guys and gear is iffy on this strip. We ran flagging over the hill so we would know which way to go since we could not see over the crest of the hill. Not only does the strip run over the hill but it is not straight. We had to spend an hour breaking brush and even tall grass as it slows you down plowing through it. We rolled the plane on down to the lower end of the strip, which meant a takeoff run up a pretty good slope, leveling at the top, then hopefully getting off the ground as we rolled down the other side.

We had a preference for one direction as there are ridges to clear both ways, but the one way the ridge is farther away. Plus, if we had to abort the crash zone was smoother that way. We would run into downhill sloping brush as opposed to falling into a small valley the other way. No, I'm not kidding, you plan your crash... just in case. Only problem was a tacking tailwind going that way. So we parked and waited a half hour watching a piece of flagging tied in a tree. It finally hung down straight indicating a lull in the breeze, and we went for it.

After all the suspense, we got off with no problem. That, my friends, is what it is like flying small planes in Bush strips in Alaska. This scenario may sound insane to some but it is what you have to do to be able to see and operate in the vast 99% of Alaska that nobody else ever sees. You have to be willing to land on beaches and ridges and marginal airstrips just barely carved out of the wilderness. The secret to success is an old Alaska Bush pilot saying - “There are old pilots and bold pilots but no old bold pilots”. You have to know when to go for it, and when to just give it up and go back home. And dear old Dad has proven he knows how and when to make those calls.

The stage was set for the next attempt to get the old bulldozer back into camp. However, before I would return to Moore Creek I planned on making one last nugget hunt at Ganes Creek. This trip was prompted by Steve Burris finding an incredible 33.85 oz nugget at Ganes in June 2004, right on top of the ground in an area heavily hunted by others in the past, including myself. It was the largest nugget found at Ganes with a detector up until that point, and highlighted just how easy it is to miss nuggets when dealing with an area the size of Ganes Creek. Seeing a picture of the nugget gave me a case of gold fever, and the desire to give Ganes just one more try.

I put the word out I was planning a trip to Ganes Creek, and in short order a group of people signed up to go the same week. Half were local people I know, and the other half were visitors from down south, mostly from Arizona and Nevada. Some of these I knew by reputation and the internet to be knowledgeable nugget hunters and so it had the makings of an interesting week. I planned on meeting my father in McGrath as the group left Ganes Creek and going straight over to Moore Creek rather than returning to Anchorage.

The stuck D9 bulldozer

The Ganes Creek trip is a long story in itself, but one I’ll leave for another time. The short story is that we had delays getting both into Ganes Creek and out due to the smoke from the many forest fires in Alaska that summer. It also became apparent that the years and number of hunters at Ganes Creek have had an effect on the chances of finding nuggets at Ganes Creek. I actually was very pleased with the nuggets I found, but the fact is that most of the visitors from the Lower 48 had pretty poor luck finding gold. In the early days most anyone swinging a detector at Ganes Creek could find a nugget, but at this point I think only the very experienced or very lucky will be finding nuggets in the future at Ganes Creek. It also was obvious that nugget detecting experience elsewhere does not prepare people for nugget hunting tailing piles in Alaska. It is a different game, and requires a different set of skills. Some of the guys from down south were not too happy with their finds… or lack thereof… for the week.

While I found some nice nuggets and had a good week at Ganes Creek, it was with a certain amount of relief that I found myself watching the rest of the group get on the plane in McGrath and head back to civilization. I count among some of the very best times of my life those times when I have been totally on my own in remote locations of Alaska. There is something enlivening about being totally dependent on ones self and the knowledge that there is nobody to bail you out if something goes wrong.

So now what? The smoke from the forest fires prevented my father from making it over the Alaska Range to McGrath to pick me up for the trip to Moore Creek. It was morning still, and I faced the prospect of checking into a hotel and waiting it out. By the time I got supper and breakfast I’d be looking at a $100 bill.

The smoke was thick in the area but had lifted since early morning, and it looked flyable to me. So I wandered over to Magnuson Air and asked Lucky if he thought he could get me to Moore Creek. It costs $250 one way to the mine from McGrath but I figured I’d be getting a $100 discount by not staying in McGrath. Plus, I’d be able to get to work at the mine instead of just killing time. Lucky figured we could make it to Moore Creek, and so I loaded my gear up into the Magnuson 206 and we headed for the mine.

It was actually a nice, sunny day despite the smoke, and the smoke thinned as we got to Moore Creek. We landed at the mine, and then Lucky took off to head back to McGrath. I opened up the camp and did odds and ends work waiting for my father and cousin Bob to arrive. I hung around camp a bit the next morning half expecting them to show up, and was just getting ready to go up and clear trail when they did finally arrive. They had a tale of wandering mountain passes in thick smoke trying to find a way over the Alaska Range that sounded not a bit fun, so I was glad they had made it to the mine safe and sound.

We cleared the last bit of trail to the top of the mountain and so were finally able to drive our three-wheelers all the way to the bulldozer. The trail is actually an existing bulldozer route that has grown up over the years and so along some portions is actually like an old road in the lower elevations but fades to a bare trail above tree line. Once you get above tree line the ridges are rounded and smooth and so it is pretty easy to get around on an ATV.

Using Honda 3-wheelers to run supplies over hill to stuck D9 bulldozer

We took a dual approach to getting the bulldozer unstuck. A combination of trying to dig it out and trying to get the old beast started up. The D9 is a 1950’s era model that uses a small gasoline motor referred to as a “pony motor” for a starter. So first step was to try and get the pony motor started. It uses a 6V car type battery and so we used the ATVs to haul up a battery plus some fresh gas. The first thing we discovered was that the small exhaust pipe sticking straight up out of the top of the dozer had not been covered, and when we cranked the pony motor over water puked up out of the exhaust pipe! We drained what we could, and then ran the battery dead trying to clear water out of the system. The battery did not last any time at all, actually. The old starter motor seemed to just suck it dead in very little time. We spent the rest of the day digging away at the lower rear track where it was sunk in the mud.

If we could get the motor running, we could hopefully use the rear ripper hydraulics to push down and lift the rear of the dozer up, so that logs could be stuffed under the tracks. But since we had more people than we really needed digging seemed to be another approach to take while also keeping busy. The old bulldozer has a cable lift blade in front, which unfortunately cannot be used to do the same thing up front. It can only lift, not push down.

We headed back to camp eventually and put the battery on a charger overnight. Dad and Bob decided to fly over to one of the nearby mines to borrow a jack and returned with a loaned 40 ton jack. Then back up to the dozer for more digging and work. We got the rear corner of the dozer dug out far enough to get the jack under it and this started an effort of putting rocks and timbers under the jack and driving them down into the muck until a solid base was created. It took a lot of work to finally get the rear of the dozer to lift a couple inches. And with that accomplished, we stuck timbers under the rear of the track, which when the jack was let down just sunk into the muck. Over and over we jacked the unit up, stuffed timbers and rocks under the track, and let it down to all sink right back to where we started.

We got the pony motor clear of water but it still would not start before the battery ran dead. And finally after a couple days we ran out of time and had to return to Anchorage.

Lots of digging, lots of work with hydraulic jacks and log sections

This time I returned with my other partner John, along with more batteries as the single battery was not giving us any life before it ran dead, and having to return to camp to charge it overnight was taking too much time. Plus a new jack. I found there was no spark on the pony motor, and so I pulled off the magneto, cleaned up the points, and put it back together. And Pow, Pop, Pop, Pow! Smoke came out and more water came from somewhere and got the plugs wet but at least we had fire! But we ran the batteries dead without the motor actually starting. We spent more time digging, and more time pulling every part of the pony motor apart we could trying to get it to start. It would pop and backfire and do everything but actually run. Finally we gave up and once again we had to return to Anchorage, frustrated by our inability to get the motor running. The dozer was now so dug out that it would most likely drive out of the hole, if only we could get it running. The fall colors were out in full, and winter was coming fast. We needed to do something soon or winter would put things off for another season.

I got a hold of my old friend Tom, who has worked with heavy equipment for many years. He is a very busy person, but he agreed to come up and try and figure out what was up with the pony motor. I was stymied at this point, and was worried about the delay. Overland permits for bulldozer travel off claim blocks can generally only be had in the winter months. The ground is softer in the warmer months and so travel when the ground is frozen protects the ground. If we could not get the dozer running before winter set in, we would most likely lose an entire season. The main limitation in the permits is the requirement that the ground have snow cover. We needed to get the bulldozer onto the claims while the ground was still frozen.

Tom, my father, and I returned to the mine for one last try in early October. The snow could fly at any moment, and we not only wanted to try and get the bulldozer running, but also wanted to stake some more mining claims. We had our hands full, and this was likely to be the last chance with the bulldozer for the season.

We made it to the mine, and settled in for the evening. And awoke the next morning to snow and thick fog. It was only a dusting of snow, but it covered the ground just enough to hide the trail to the bulldozer. Add in the heavy fog, and we were soon basically lost up on top of the mountain trying to find our way to the bulldozer. Luckily I had used my GPS on the previous visit to trace the trail. Even so, what the GPS said argued heavily with what our eyes were seeing. Were it not for the GPS I have doubts we would ever have found the bulldozer that day.

Winter is coming - fresh snow at Moore camp

But find it we did, and Tom proceeded to try and figure out why the pony motor would not start. We had over time eliminated almost every possibility, and when you get right down to it these old motors really are not very complicated. You need fuel, compression, and spark. The only thing that seemed weird was all the backfiring and that the carb would want to blow out backwards instead of pulling air.

There simply seemed to be no options left, when I thought back on my previous work on the motor. Early on I had pulled the magneto apart to clean the points. Did I maybe not put it back together correctly? It is a simple thing to disassemble, but if you are not careful you can put it back together 180 degrees out of where it came apart. I wondered about this for awhile, and finally piped up with “you know, maybe I put the magneto back together backwards”.

So we pulled the magneto off, rotated it 180 degrees, and put it back together. Tom got on the dozer, turned the pony motor over… and it fired right up! I felt a very strange combination of embarrassment at having been the cause of a lot of extra work, and happiness at having finally figured out what the problem was.

Tom let the pony motor run a bit, and after a rough start it smoothed out and sounded just great, albeit loud as heck. Kind of like listening to a shotgun firing 3600 times per minute. Then he engaged the clutch to the main motor, and smoke puffed out the big stack. And puffed, and puffed, and then all the sudden our bulldozer was running!

Smoke coming out of the stack - the D9 starts!!

What an incredible moment! The main engine really sounded good, and Tom let it warm up for some time. Then he gave a pull on a lever, and the blade lifted. We have a ripper unit on the back of the dozer, and had filled the tank with fresh hydraulic fluid. Tom pulled another lever, and the ripper blade lifted up.

Dad and I got all the remaining timbers we had and laid out a parking pad just ahead of the dozer on level ground. We had just enough logs to cover two track lengths. Then the moment of truth arrived, Tom pulled more levers and the bulldozer drove out of the hole.

Whoops and yells and handshakes all around ensued. Tom parked the bulldozer on our logs, and powered her down. We drained and covered everything to the best of our ability for the winter ahead, and left the dozer for the next spring. It was amazing how everything finally happened in so short a period of time, but it was all the hours of preparatory work that made it all seem so easy at the end.

Dozer up and out of the hole, ready to drive to Moore Creek next spring

We did our claim staking, and closed up the camp for winter. The year 2004 at Moore Creek came to an end, and the snows of winter came shortly after we left the mine. Success could not have come any later that year.

Events slowed, but I did get an Overland Permit lined up in anticipation of moving the bulldozer into camp in the spring of 2005. Travel within a claim block is covered under our mining permits, but since the bulldozer was off the claims we needed a permit to bring it into camp. The main limitation was that overland movement had to be while the ground was frozen and covered with snow, and so we were aiming for an early spring operation.

We were planning for April, but the winter of 2004-2005 proved to be one of the heaviest snow years on record. Dad and I flew up to the mine in April, but the dozer had snow drifted over the seat. It was still too early, and so we took advantage of the snow, and asked our friend Mike to fly a load of gear up to the dozer with his Super Cub, which was on skies for the winter. He landed on the hill by the dozer, and left a battery, propane tanks, a heater, and tarps plus some miscellaneous gear. Dad and I planned on flying into Moore Creek just before the snow melted, and so getting that gear to the dozer would have meant lots of snowshoeing. Now we were set.

We monitored the snow situation, and finally flew up in early May in my brother-in-laws Citabria. Our original permit expired the end of April but I was able to get a two week extension due to the extreme snow conditions. There was still a few feet of snow on the ground in places but in most areas there was less than a couple feet. We made some passes over the bulldozer, and I launched sleeping bags and some basic camping supplies out of the plane. I’ve done some of these “bombing runs” before and they are actually kind of fun. Dad does all the work, however. I just hold stuff out the door until he yells “Go”! and I let go of it. With any luck it lands halfway close to the target.

Aerial view from Citabria of snow in the hills in early 2005

We landed at Moore Creek, and hiked up to the dozer on snowshoes. We planned on camping the night, and heating the motor overnight, but it was rather warm (relatively speaking) when we got to the dozer so we went ahead and tried to start her. And amazingly, it fired right up!

I had been studying my D9 bulldozer manuals, but the fact is I have never driven anything even close to one of these monsters. I really had no true idea what I was doing, but just followed the manuals. That worked well enough in getting the unit started, but finally after warming her up I had to make the big move. We loaded up all the tools, batteries and other gear. I held my breath, put it in gear, and engaged the clutch. The next thing I knew I was driving a D9 bulldozer up a mountainside.

I had been warned that no matter how big these things seem, driving into too deep of snow conditions could get you high-centered in short order. The snow was only a foot or two deep, but I could not tell really how deep it was, except for my what seemed like endless trips over the trail on the three-wheelers the previous fall. I just kept her going slow and forged ahead, and after a bit it actually seemed pretty easy. Dad and I both had grins on our faces as well drove along, with all the overnight gear we had pre-staged loaded on the bulldozer unused.

Up the hill I went, and down the other side. Basically just a drive over the hill, and I got to being lulled into how easy it all was. Finally we were on our claims, and camp was only minutes away. I was on cruise control, just enjoying the ride. And then the dozer broke through the crust and muck started churning! Only a heartbeat seemed to pass, but next thing I knew we had come to a stop in the middle of the trail. Apparently the low flat bog areas which we were passing through just before arriving at camp had thawed under the snow. The only good news was that it was still frozen a short distance below, but the dozer was spinning on the frozen muck and could gain no traction to get up and out of the hole we were in.

Still, we had made it 99% of the way into camp, and so could not feel all that bad about the situation. It was only a 10-15 minute hike to camp, and we got a good nights sleep. Then up and back to the dozer the next morning, to get out of our little situation. We took chains, cables, and clamps for camp with us, and a chainsaw. We cleared a bunch of alders ahead of the dozer and laid them down in front of it to make an exit pad. The we cut a big dead spruce and levered it over in front of the tracks with a long pry bar. We took cables and ran then through the tracks and around the log. I fired up the dozer, and when I engaged the clutch the front end climbed up on the log and what seemed an incredible angle. I half closed my eyes, and the front end came up out of the hole, and fell over out and onto the alder pile ahead of the log. We were unstuck and on the first try.

Project a year in the making - D9 finally back at Moore Creek and Steve clearing airstrip

I now was much more cautious heading into camp, as my inattention the day before had got us stuck. If it even threatened to get soft ahead, I drove over the alders next to the trail, which created a natural pad. The next thing I knew I was driving the bulldozer into camp, and when I finally parked it and got off it was one of the happiest days of my life. I literally wanted to kiss the ground! Dad and I hugged and shook hands and slapped each other on the back. In all our years I do not think we have tackled a project that took so long and so much effort as moving this D9 bulldozer into Moore Creek camp. And like all things difficult to achieve, the final success was all that much more satisfying. In all the excitement I forget to take any pictures, but here is a shot of the old girl back in camp later in the year, with me working on clearing and extending the runway.

I have to finish this tale by thanking Bob, John, Tom, Doug, Mike, and most of all my father, Bud Herschbach, for all their hard work and contributions towards getting our bulldozer back to camp. There is no way I could have done it without them. Thanks guys!

~ Steve Herschbach
Copyright © 2005 Herschbach Enterprises

Steve's Mining Journal Index

I walked a little ahead of my detecting buddy Jeff as we searched along the bulldozer trail for gold nuggets. The bulldozer had pushed little berms of material along each side of the trail as it made its way through the old tailing piles. I swung off the trail to one side where the tailing pile sloped down into the brush. Sweeping my White's MXT over a moss covered cobble pile resulted in a loud beep. I peeled the moss and cobbles back with my pick and looked down at the largest gold nugget I have ever found!

This story actually starts in 1972. That is when I purchased my first metal detector, a White's Coinmaster 4. I put in lots of hours with that detector, finding thousands of coins in Anchorage, Alaska, in the days before metal detectors became more common.

I was already doing a little gold prospecting and so I just had to try my new detector out for finding gold nuggets. I purchased a little 4 inch coil touted by White's as being the hot ticket for finding gold. They actually called it the "Gold Probe". However, after a couple outings I discovered that the detectors of the day were just not up to the task. The inability of the early units to compensate for ground mineralization made it impossible to find all but the largest nuggets. I am sorry to say that these large nuggets were very uncommon in my area, and so the chances of my finding gold with the early model detectors were slim to none.

Steve in 1973 on very first nugget hunt - Moore Creek, Alaska & White's Coinmaster 4

This early experience caused me to overlook metal detectors as a practical mining tool for many years. In fact, when my partner Dudley Benesch and I got into business in 1976 we sold metal detectors from the start but strongly downplayed their usefulness for prospecting. My standard line was "you can probably find more gold with a $5.00 gold pan than a $500.00 metal detector".

During the 1980's, I was heavily involved in gold dredging, so much so that I did if full-time for a couple of years. The amount of gold I thought I might find with a metal detector seemed trivial compared what I was producing with my suction dredges. I continued coin detecting from time to time but did not spend as much time at it as I had previously. It was at this time that stories of fabulous gold finds in Australia started to appear. My attention returned to using metal detectors to find gold nuggets, and I finally found my first nuggets with a Compass Gold Scanner Pro in 1989.

I was still selling metal detectors as a dealer and it was about 1990 that White's introduced its breakthrough Goldmaster II. At an operating frequency of 50 kHz, it was by far the most sensitive detector available for smaller gold nuggets. The Anchorage area has lots of gold but it is mostly in match head size and smaller nuggets. Nuggets weighing up to one-quarter ounce are very rare and nuggets weighing an ounce or more are almost unheard of. The Goldmaster II opened up the local area to nugget detecting with its small gold sensitivity and ease of operation. Put all this together with its bargain retail price of $499.95 and the Goldmaster II quickly became one of the fastest selling metal detectors ever. It is one of the only detectors I ever sold that quite literally could not be produced fast enough to meet demand.

I contributed to this electronic gold rush by taking my new Goldmaster II to local gold mining sites and finding thousands of gold nuggets with it. One popular site, Crow Creek Mine, had produced only small numbers of nuggets with other metal detectors. However, the Goldmaster II and its successor, the Goldmaster V/SAT, appeared be the perfect detectors for Crow Creek. The creek has only moderate mineralization and tremendous amounts of the smaller gold the White's units could find so easily. All of a sudden it seemed like gold was pouring out of the mine, all due to the introduction of the Goldmaster models.

Steve with White's Goldmaster II in 1992

Jeff was managing our Mining Department at that time, and if anything, he was even hotter than I with the Goldmaster. We were both having a great time finding gold and posting photos of our finds at the store. The Goldmaster models got so popular at Crow Creek that problems started occurring with so many people running the same frequency unit in the same area. Detectors running at the same frequency interfere with each other electronically, and it got to where people would have to take turns running the detectors at some of the more popular locations at Crow Creek. This problem was finally solved with the introduction of the Goldmaster 3 and its frequency shift control.

Despite these successes, gold dredging still occupied the majority of my free time in the 1990's. I was using a 6-inch dredge as my production unit, and the consistency with which I produced gold with it could not be matched by the more sporadic success one has with a metal detector. That, and the finds at Crow Creek and other local sites were depleting and so more and more time and effort was required to be successful detecting gold in these areas.

A couple things about my dredging bothered me however. One was that I was finding good quantities of gold but I was finding very few large nuggets. It was not until 1998 that I finally found a 1 ounce gold nugget while gold dredging. My use of larger dredging equipment was tying me down to local areas where large nuggets are very rare. I really wanted to be able to find a monster nugget like I would read about other people finding. Second, I was spending all my time going to the same nearby areas, over and over again. Days, if not weeks, were spent working in the same stretch of creek. I wanted to get out and spend more time exploring remote areas of Alaska. I became convinced that if I wanted to get serious about gold and prospecting I needed to get away from the local area.

Therefore, I made a conscious decision in 2000 to focus on metal detecting as a prospecting method instead of suction dredging. I sold my mining claims near Anchorage and my 6 inch gold dredge and invested the money in new metal detectors. I have used all the various brands over the years and found each one has strengths and weaknesses. In my opinion one key to successful nugget detecting is to have a variety of machines with differing capabilities. I invested in several makes and models of metal detectors that I use depending on particular nugget detecting tasks.

I was amazed with the results of my new strategy. Not only did I see no real decline in the amount of gold I was finding each year, but my nugget finds blew away decades of dredging results. I was finding more gold nuggets weighing over an ounce than I had thought possible. My previous record of a 1 ounce gold nugget from Crow Creek Mine was totally eclipsed by 4.95-ounce nugget from Ganes Creek in 2001. Finding that nugget was one of the biggest thrills of my life!

The real secret proved to be the freedom afforded by my metal detectors. With only a few pounds of gear to pack, it became far easier to go to remote Alaskan sites where large gold nuggets are found. It helped tremendously that I have developed many contacts with miners in my years of business and as a member of the Alaska Miners Association. These contacts are helpful when it comes to getting access to nugget producing mining claims. The fact is that most of the good locations for nugget detecting Alaska are on mining claims and so getting permission from the claim owners is critical.

Ganes Creek is in west central Alaska near the town of McGrath. Ganes Creek has produced some of the largest gold nuggets ever found in Alaska, including a 122 oz monster. The creek has a long mining history and so has many miles of tailing piles from old bucket line dredge operations, and from more recent heavy equipment operations. It was at Ganes Creek that I found my 4.95-ounce nugget and numerous other gold nuggets in the 1 to 2 ounce range in 2001.

Fall colors and old tailing piles at Ganes Creek, Alaska

With some prodding on my part the owners of Ganes Creek decided to give a "pay to detect" operation a try. Opportunities to metal detect at places like Ganes Creek are rare, especially for people from outside Alaska. As part of the effort to get the word out about the operation, I received permission to bring a couple "key players" in the detecting industry up to Ganes Creek for a short visit. The idea was that once they saw the potential firsthand they would no doubt spread the word to others.

In the spring of 2002 I decided to organize a Gold Show at Crow Creek Mine near Anchorage. We had never done this type of show in Alaska before and I thought it would be fun for all involved. Little did I know the work that goes into making a show like this come together. It proved to be a massive undertaking, but a rewarding one.

One key to a successful gold show is to try to convince manufacturer representatives into making the expensive trip to Alaska. We received a lot of support from various suppliers but that shown by White's Electronics and its Alaskan distributor Renton Coin Shop was truly exceptional. Many accessory items and gold coins were donated as prizes to be given out for various activities of the gold show. Most impressive was the latest version of the White's Goldmaster, the new GMT, which was donated as grand prize in the detector hunt held during the show. This was very fitting, as there have probably been more Goldmasters at Crow Creek over the years than any other single model of metal detector. The generous donations were greatly appreciated by everyone attending the show. I would like to offer particular thanks to Mary Gladding of Renton Coin Shop for her enthusiastic support.

Steve Houston of White's Electronics had come up for the gold show, and so I took the opportunity to arrange a trip up to Ganes Creek. Steve is an avid nugget hunter and so he jumped at the opportunity. I arranged for a visit immediately after the Gold Show ended.

Steve had never been in a small airplane before, and so the bush plane flight into Ganes Creek from McGrath was an adventure in itself for him! Having flown in small planes my whole life, I underestimate the effect swooping low over the terrain and landing on small runways has on the inexperienced flyer.

After we arrived at Ganes Creek, we did a bit of metal detecting in the immediate camp area, as quite a few gold nuggets had previously been found right around the cabins. The whole camp is built on old tailing piles that have been flattened out. After a little time spent with no results, we decided to head upstream.

The first group of 10 visitors was already at the mine, and two nuggets weighing over 5 ounces each had been found the day before. The nuggets were found just upstream of a large drainage ditch that had drawn my attention the last time I had visited the mine. The ditch is piled high on both sides with excavated material. I reasoned that the piles might contain some nuggets, since the material from the bottom of the ditch was from deep below the surface.

We started detecting the area, and in an amazingly short time, I heard Steve yell that he had found one. Sure enough, scanning the sides of one of the piles with his GMT produced a chunky 3.2 oz gold nugget! Well, that was so easy we figured there must be a bunch of nuggets along the ditch. However, as much as I tried I could not find a nugget myself, and Steve's initial find remained his only find. As if he really cared! I finally wandered away and found a small gold nugget on a large tailing pile nearby but that was it for the day.

Steve Houston with 3.2 ounce gold nugget found at Ganes Creek with White's GMT

This was a very short trip and so we only had the following day to try and find more gold. I found a few more small nuggets and Steve found none. Searching tailing piles for gold nuggets is literally like looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack. Entire days go by with no finds, but when gold is found it tends to be worth the wait. I was grateful Steve Houston found a nugget as large as he had in our limited amount of time. It was the largest nugget he had ever found, and better yet, larger than anything his regular hunting buddies had found.

More than 30 people visited Ganes Creek in the summer of 2002. Over 10 pounds of gold was found, with many nuggets weighing over an ounce and several in the 5-ounce range. The success rate was amazing; with a large majority of the visitors able to say they found the largest gold nugget of their lives at Ganes Creek.

Still, people started to wonder if the creek was "worked out" and that all the nuggets had been found. I scoffed at this idea, as I have seen even small parks produce old coins missed by decades of diligent metal detecting. The idea that a few dozen people could find all the nuggets to be found in many square miles of tailing piles is not something experienced detectorists would worry about. To prove the point, I put the word out that I would make a visit to Ganes Creek after all the visitors had been there that summer and go find some gold.

OK, I have to admit there was a certain amount of bravado in this. The fact is that detecting tailing piles is very much a hit and miss proposition. In general, sheer hours of diligence will pay off, providing the nuggets are there to be found at all. However, there also is a bit of luck involved, and sometimes even the most dedicated person will get skunked. If it was easy we would all be out swinging a detector looking for gold nuggets for a living, but that is not the case. So, although I was talking big I certainly had my doubts about how much gold I would find.

It was late in the season when Jeff, Brian, and I made that final 2002 visit to Ganes Creek. Brian is an avid gold dredger and so his focus for the trip was to do some exploratory gold dredging. Jeff and I were both hot to go detecting for gold, however. As I noted before, Jeff is a very accomplished detectorist, and we usually have a cheerful competition going while nugget detecting.

We brought along several different detectors to try. I had my GMT but also White's new MXT model. I was intrigued with this machine that combined the basic Goldmaster circuitry with the features normally found on high-end coin detectors. I figured its exceptional target ID features might prove useful in the trashy tailing piles, and especially around the camp area. Jeff and I traded machines back-and-forth to get a feel for how the different detectors worked at Ganes Creek. Jeff in particular was in the market for new unit, and so was most interested in trying them out comparatively.

Jeff with White's MXT at Ganes Creek, Alaska

We first headed back up to that ditch area where many of the large nuggets were found, including Steve Houston's. The area had been hammered hard all summer, but we figured there might be some gold left to be found. I located a 13.8 dwt (dwt = pennyweight) nugget, and then a 3.8 dwt nugget (20 pennyweight per ounce) the first day. Jeff, although he tried in earnest, came up with no nuggets. We also tried some old tailings upstream farther, but found no more gold that day.

The second day dawned under rainy skies. We decided to stay near camp, and see if there were more nuggets waiting to be found around the cabins. I grabbed the new White's MXT, while Jeff used the GMT. The rain poured, but we stuck with it. Lots of bullets and shell casings were dug, which I consider a good sign. You cannot get all the nuggets and leave bullets in the ground. However, by the end of the day we had no nuggets. We headed up to the bench deposits above camp and found some small nuggets, just so we could say we did not get skunked. Jeff found a nice little pennyweight nugget, and I got a few smaller bits. Nothing to brag about, but at least we could say we found gold.

I have to note that I was very impressed with the MXT around camp. I used the 6" elliptical coil, and ran the unit in the relic mode. This mode, when set up a certain way, gives a high tone on non-ferrous targets, and low tone on iron targets. It was easy and efficient around camp, and all the targets I dug were non-ferrous items. It has very good trash separation with the small coil, and easy target ID with the dual tone system. The machine was great for places where trash is literally inches apart.

The weather cleared the third day. Jeff again ran the White's GMT, and I the MXT with the small coil. We started in camp, and I found a small nugget just behind the cabins. We then tried some of the dragline piles above camp near where I found my 4.95-ounce nugget in 2001. I switched the MXT to the 950 9.5" coil. Both Jeff and I found nuggets weighing several pennyweights each.

So far we were not exactly knocking down the nuggets. Frankly, we were both a bit puzzled, as our constant digging of bullets indicated nuggets were still to be found. If an area were thoroughly detected we would be digging nothing at all. Nevertheless, our nugget results were lean, and so our enthusiasm was flagging.

I am a big fan of aerial photos, and had some new ones showing an area downstream opposite the old bucketline dredge machine shop. Long rows of old bucketline tailings ran far back away from the road, and so I suggested we run down and check them for a change of pace. Jeff was running the White's GMT with the Sierra Max 14" coil, and I ran the MXT with stock 950 coil.

The more I used the MXT the more I liked it. On the cobble piles I ran in prospect mode, with full gain, minimum V/SAT setting, and in automatic ground balance. The 14.7 kHz frequency ran smoother on the mixed rocks of the cobble piles than the higher frequency GMT. High frequency detectors tend to get weak signals from mineralized rocks because of their extreme sensitivity. The MXT seems well suited for searching areas of mixed mineralization due to its lower frequency and fast automatic ground balance.

We followed an old bulldozer trail back towards the area I had spotted in the aerial photos. I concentrated on the edges of the main trail near to and in the brush. My goal was to cover obscure areas others may have missed. I finally got a good clean signal and gave a couple digs with my pick. The moss and rocks flipped back, and there lay a large gold nugget.

I did not get as excited over this one as with my 4.95 ounce nugget of the previous year, as I was not sure exactly how much the nugget weighed. Jeff, however, knew immediately it was something to jump up and down over. And he was right, as upon weighing it came in at 6.85 ounces! My largest nugget ever, and the largest found at Ganes Creek that summer. I also had the satisfaction of proving that finds always remain for those willing to look.

This particular nugget is strange, with very dark, lustrous quartz encasing a solid gold core. The quartz is almost like agate. Fingers of dendritic (leaf) gold reach up from the gold core into the quartz shell. It is a unique nugget, unlike any I have seen before. And at 6.85 ounces it gives me entry into a very exclusive club. Few people can say they have found a gold nugget weighing over one-half Troy pound without heavy machinery.

Steve with 6.85 ounce gold specimen from Ganes Creek found with White's MXT

My White's MXT had paid for itself rather spectacularly. It is hard not to like a detector that finds a big gold nugget. However, while it bench tests well on small gold, frankly it does not hold a candle to the White's GMT when it comes to very small gold under actual field conditions. If small gold is your bread and butter, the GMT is still the way to go. Not only do higher frequency detectors have an innate edge on tiny gold nuggets, but also the manual ground balance on the GMT offers better control for small gold. The MXT must be auto ground balanced, then "locked". The GB point is then fixed, but it cannot be manually adjusted from there. The GMT has both automatic and manual ground balance.

The MXT does do very well on nuggets weighing a few grains or more, and the bigger the gold gets; the less difference there is between the MXT and GMT. Frankly, for nuggets weighing in pennyweights or more, I actually prefer the MXT. It operates smoother than the GMT in mineralized ground, and has depth as good as, and maybe under some circumstances better than, the GMT. It is a great machine for large nugget hunting.

Combine that with the fact that it has a superior target ID system, with both iron readout and conductivity measurement, and you can actually do things like tell most gold nuggets from a .22 shell casing. I used the relic mode with the small coil on the MXT to work extreme trash areas to good effect. This machine has lots of potential to explore, and yet is very easy to use. Add in the fact that it has a 6.5" x 4" elliptical DD, 5.3" round concentric, and 10" x 5.5" elliptical DD coils available as options, and I think the MXT is now the machine to beat for all-around use. Coin, nuggets, relics, and jewelry... it does it all. Moreover, despite its wealth of features, the list price is only $799.95.

This article may seem like a White's ad, as I have purposely made the brand a centerpiece of the story. The fact is that I have owned and used all the major brands of detectors and continue to do so. I think all the major manufacturers make good units; Nevertheless, White's will always hold a special place in my heart as being the first brand I ever owned. It was that White's Coinmaster 4 that got me started metal detecting all those years ago. To come full circle 30 years later and find the largest nugget of my life (so far) with a White's detector is particularly fitting.

You may contact me online at the DetectorProspector Forum if you have questions regarding this article.

~ Steve Herschbach
Copyright © 2004 Herschbach Enterprises

I became aware of a new detector that was going to be introduced awhile back. The Shadow X5 by Troy Custom Detectors. The X5 is not intended as a nugget detector per se, but as a general purpose high performance metal detector. What caught my eye was the operating frequency, which at 19 kHz is much higher than the 6-10 kHz commonly used in many coin detectors. That, and the fact that it has a manual ground balance. This led me to believe the detector might make a very good all-around detector for someone wanting to both coinshoot and nugget hunt.

I received an initial unit, and my bench tests confirmed this was the case. The Shadow X5 is much more sensitive to small gold than most coin detectors, and in fact I will go so far as to say that it will pick up gold the vast majority cannot. Its gold performance is right up there with the best of the dedicated nugget detecting units, and is better than a lot of them.

Still, what was needed was a field test. I planned on getting out to Crow Creek over the weekend to test the X5 on small gold. Troy Galloway was kind enough to send up his new 7" concentric coil for me to use, so I was raring to go.

Well, my weekend did not go quite as planned. I ended up working Saturday, got tied up Sunday, and so took Monday off to go to Crow Creek Mine to test the Troy Shadow X5. Then I made the mistake of stopping by work Monday morning, and got caught. We were short handed, and so I worked again.

By Tuesday the good weather was gone, and a light rain was falling. Plus, I found I had picked up a cold. But I was anxious to give the X5 a spin, and so headed off to Crow Creek under gloomy skies and with a runny nose. The place was empty when I arrived... nobody but Sean around. I set the X5 up with the 7" concentric coil I had been sent, and headed up the creek.

Troy Shadow X5 metal detector at Crow Creek Mine, Alaska

I stopped at a knoll not too far up the creek, and tuned up the X5. In all-metal mode there are few controls to play with. I turned it on, and set the sensitivity at max. Set the threshold for a bare sound, then pumped the coil and ground balanced. Although the ground balance control is a ten-turn knob, I found it took short adjustments to get the machine tuned for a slightly positive response as the coil approached the ground.

I started scanning, and the X5 was very smooth, even though I had it set at full sensitivity. It only took a few minutes, and I got a nice little signal. A bit of work with my plastic scoop, and there was a small flake that later weighed in at 0.6 grain (480 grains per Troy ounce). The coil is very resistant to false signals, as I rubbed it in the soil and knocked it against rocks with no problem.

In short order I found two more small nuggets, weighing 0.6 grain and 1.0 grain. I then wandered up the creek to a clay layer that usually give a bit of trouble with high-frequency detectors, and located another small nugget, weighing 0.7 grain. Also a small piece of lead shot weighing 2 grains. At this point, my cold and the rain were wearing on me, and I had found out what I had come for, so called it a day. Without splitting hairs I'd say I can easily find gold down to about 0.5 grains at up to a couple inches with the X5 and 7" concentric coil. Very impressive! The machine should do even better with smaller coils.

Those unfamiliar with nugget detecting may wonder why finding these tiny gold pieces is important. After all, it's the big nuggets we are after, right? The fact is that in some areas all there is to find is smaller gold. Even in areas with larger nuggets, the ability to find small gold can help prevent boredom from setting in. But the bottom line is that most any detector can find a very large gold nugget. It's the ability to detect small gold in mineralized ground that really sets the gold machines apart from the more common coin type detectors.

Anyone familiar with the Fisher Gold Bug or Gold Bug 2 will feel immediately at home with the X5 in all-metal mode. The machine is more sensitive than the 19 kHz Gold Bug, and actually reacts more like the Gold Bug 2. Small hot rocks and the clay layer were giving some responses that most lower frequency detectors would not. The response on small gold is more mellow than the somewhat harsh, loud response you get with the Gold Bug 2. A very pleasant audio tone, actually, but one that requires a bit more attention than with the Gold Bug 2.

When run at max sensitivity, the detector acts more like a higher frequency detector than a 19 kHz machine. This is good when we are talking sub-grain gold. I also noted that I was getting faint responses on rocks that normally only my Gold Bug 2 or GMT with small coil will respond to. I suspect that in more mineralized ground, or in areas with hot rocks, the X5 will get more ground response than one would expect of a 19 kHz detector. I'm sure the sensitivity will have to be backed off in places like that. I'll be curious to hear what detectorists in more mineralized areas think of the X5. It's a rare area where you can run detectors maxed out like I do at Crow Creek.

Lead shot and small gold from Crow Creek - found with Shadow X5 and 7" concentric coil

The 7" concentric coil only seemed marginally more sensitive than the stock 9" coil to small gold. I would pass on it and wait for the 5" concentric due soon if small gold is the goal. There is also a 10" elliptical DD coil in the works, which may help address some of the ground response issues at higher sensitivity levels.

I did find a couple nails, and when I switched to the discrimination mode I found it took a minimum setting of about 2.5 on the disc knob to get them to audibly "break-up" and read bad. Unfortunately, the gold weighing under a grain also wanted to be ignored. This is not surprising, however, as sub-grain gold is smaller than most detectors can find at all. The X5 is very hot in its disc mode, and for larger gold running more than a few grains should see good use in iron infested areas. I'll have to explore this more in the future. But for the tiniest pieces of gold, I'd stick with the all-metal mode.

Again, I must mention the X5 is not really a nugget detector, but an all-around unit. It has many features intended for coin, jewelry, and relic hunting. I have not touched on these features here, and will leave it to the coinshooting crowd to decide how the X5 works for them. The machine should really excel on gold jewelry for freshwater hunters, as the features that make it great on small gold nuggets should prove valuable for earring studs, small rings, and thin gold chains.

To sum up, my initial reaction to the Troy Shadow X5 is very positive. It was a pleasure to swing a detector that only weighs 2.5 lbs. total, and the weatherproof design made for worry-free detecting in the rain. The nugget hunting features are very basic by today's standards, however. I don't want anyone to think I'm pushing the X5 as the latest thing in nugget detectors. But it really is one of the few units I've used that can really claim to "do-it-all". The Shadow X5 packs real power into a small package, and serious detectorists would do well to keep an eye on this detector.

~ Steve Herschbach
Copyright 2002 Herschbach Enterprises

One of the best things about Crow Creek Mine is its closeness to Anchorage. It lends itself to what I like to call "commuter gold mining". The mine is only 45 miles from my doorstep, so rather than camp, I normally drive back and forth daily. Dredging is hard work, and the value of a hot shower and a real bed are not to be underestimated.

I left my house about 7:30 AM Saturday morning. The first day of May, and we had actually had snow overnight! Luckily the amount was very small, and the roads were clear. I made my stop at the gas station and filled up my jug of dredge fuel, and then headed for the mine.

This picture below shows that the snow had melted very little from the previous weekend. I put on my drysuit in one of the cabins, and returning to my truck I found a cow and her calf had wandered up the road. Moose are relatively rare at Crow Creek, so it was fun to see them. I tried to sneak around them to get to my truck, so I could get my camera. Mama Moose kept an eye on me, and looked at me over my truck as I opened the door. Unfortunately, she and her calf headed away as I finally got to my camera, so another close-up photo got away.

I started dredging about 9AM. Conditions were perfect, and so I mined continuously through the day, with just a quick snack for lunch. I finally quit about 6PM because the water started getting murky from snowmelt upstream. I managed to get about 8 hours of actual dredging in, and was rewarded with about 2 ounces of gold. A very good day!

I got out of the house about 6:30 AM Sunday, and repeated my routine. On the way up Crow Creek Road, I happened upon a spruce hen (grouse) scratching in the road. These birds generally believe if they don't move they are invisible, so it is easy to approach them.

  
Moose at Crow Creek Mine and Grouse on Crow Creek Road

It was rather cold for May; water splashing on my dredge was freezing, so I guess it was about 30 degrees. The sun came out, and it proceeded to warm up. I kept working up the creek, but found I was getting walled in by all the snow around me, so I stopped and hacked away at the snow for awhile. Suddenly, the creek went from clear to muddy brown. The warming temperatures must have caused a small mudslide upstream, instantly creating a zero-visibility situation in the water.

I used to dredge in this kind of water. In fact, Crow Creek is muddy with glacial silt for the entire summer. I have gotten spoiled on clear water dredging to the point where I just don't enjoy dredging by feel anymore. The nice thing about working in clear water with a mask, is that you can see gold as you work along. It is a great motivator, and allows one to stay in gold bearing material to a greater degree. The gold deposits are limited in size, especially width. It is good to know when the gold runs out, so time is not spent moving worthless material. Another benefit is that the dredge nozzle is rarely clogged when you can see what you are doing, as rocks are removed before they cause a problem. Dredging blind results in more clogging of the nozzle and hose, which can be frustrating.

Mudslide upstream mucks up the water, and Steve in Harvey drysuit

I decided to quit for the day. I was a bit beat from the long day before, so I was not that unhappy. I ended up with about 3.5 hours actual dredging, and about 3/4 ounce of gold. Not bad for a very short day. I was cleaning up the site when my friend Ben showed up to see what I was doing. I rarely get pictures of me when I'm mining, so he took a picture of me in my Harvey's drysuit.

The total for the weekend came to 2.7 ounces, for a grand total of 4.1 ounces in two weekends. All I need to do is keep going at this rate, and with a little luck I'll have my first pound (12 troy ounces) of gold for the year in four more weekends. The largest nugget in the photo below weighs just over a pennyweight (1/20th ounce) and is small fingernail sized.

Weekend take - 2.7 ounces of gold

My cousin Cathy emailed to ask "So what is this all worth"? Good question. People tend to divide the gold by the hours spent running the dredge, and get an unrealistically high figure. My gold mining is a business, with all expenses reported as deductions and all gold sales as income. I was once crazy enough to go dredging for a living for a couple of years, and learned quickly this is no way to get rich quick.

Gold is priced internationally in troy ounces. By comparison, there are 28 grams in a standard (avoirdupois) ounce, and 31.1035 grams in a troy ounce, so a troy ounce is heavier. There are only twelve troy ounces in a troy pound, however, so a troy pound is lighter than a standard pound. An old joke goes "What is heavier, a pound of gold or a pound of feathers"? A pound of feathers is heavier!

A troy ounce is further divided into twenty pennyweights (abbreviated as dwt.), and each pennyweight into 24 grains. These are the same as the grains used on powder scales. So, 1 troy oz. = 20 dwt. = 480 grains. A U.S. copper penny (not the new zinc plated variety) weighs two pennyweight, or 1/10th troy ounce.

Gold is currently $285 per oz. (5/3/99) so my 4.1 oz. is theoretically worth $1168.50. It is, however, more complicated than that. First, there is the price of the gold itself. The quoted price of gold is for 99.999% pure gold bullion, not gold in it's natural form. Natural gold generally is 80%-90% gold, the rest being silver and other impurities. If gold is sold to a refiner, you are only paid for the actual gold value. Crow Creek gold is of a lower than average purity, running about 72% gold. If sold to a refiner, it is worth about $205 per ounce. Assay and refining fees lower this figure even more, making this the option of last resort for the small miner. Larger operations, with productions of hundreds or thousands of ounces generally go to a refiner, as the fees are a lower percentage of larger gold quantities.

Luckily for the small miner, gold in its natural form is very rare, since most gold is refined. Gold nuggets, in particular, are valued as gemstones rather than gold, and their value has much more to do with their rarity and the general character of the nugget. A one ounce gold nugget is rarer than a 4 carat diamond. Sold directly to individuals, this type of gold is literally worth what you sell it for. I feel the best indicator today is the price of natural gold as sold at various sites on the Internet. Prices on the Internet find their final level according to the worldwide demand for gold in it's natural form. A review of various sites reveals that gold nuggets are going for $500 to $700 an ounce, with choice specimens bringing as much as $1000 to $2000 per ounce. Many sites on the Internet are selling gold by the gram, so remember there are 31.1035 grams per troy ounce.

2012 Update: As the price of gold increases the premium paid for natural gold tends to decrease. The high price is in itself the premium. When people ask me why they can't get a big markup over the spot price these days I point out to them the price has gone so high so fast they are money ahead no matter what these days. Still, a very good premium can be had for choice nuggets and specimens. They just have to be truly exceptional.

I pay a percentage of 25% to Crow Creek Mine of all the gold I recover from the creek. Usually a claim owner gets 10%-15% of the total, but Crow Creek is worth the higher percentage because of it's easy access, and the support I receive from the mine owners. Keep in mind a normal visitor pays a much lower fixed fee, with the miner keeping all he finds. I and a few others work on percentage because we have access to closed areas of the mine, and because we find more gold than the typical miner. I will be working my own claims on Mills Creek later this summer. I keep all the gold I find, but generally only average 1/4 to 1/2 ounce of gold per day. So it is, that even after the percentage I pay, I still end up with more gold per day at Crow Creek. This is very important to remember. It is generally better to pay for access to good ground than to keep all you find from poorer ground.

Therefore, of 4 ounces mined, I will give Crow Creek 1 ounce. Since the gold I am finding is on the smaller side, I will probably get around $450 per ounce for it on the average. So far I've worked four days, with an average of ten hours per day. 3 ounces X $450 / 40 hours = $33.75 per hour gross ($1350 total). All expenses, such as transportation, gas, equipment costs, selling costs, etc. must be deducted from this. Overhead for a dredging operation is fairly low, but it does take it's toll. And finally, yes, taxes must be paid on the final profit. I turn a small, but regular profit almost every year on my mining operations.

2012 Update: Wow, at today's $1700 an ounce prices I would be making some serious money doing this today. At today's price I would be making over $100 per hour!! Sad story is I and others mined out nearly all of this very rich material since 1995, or I would be back down there right now. I keep hoping for another super flood to reconcentrate the gold at Crow Creek but so far 1995 was the last time stuff really moved in the creek.

The final catch is that Crow Creek is the best place I mine. Most other areas I mine have a lower return for the time spent. Also, keep in mind that as a weekend warrior, I high-grade the deposits. In other words, I take out the richest deposits and leave the poorer grade material behind. Doing this full-time, one can expect lower average returns due to the need to not work yourself out of ground too quickly. Also note that I counted my first Saturday in the overall hours worked. This time truly must be counted, and if a person mines gold for a living it is these kinds of non-productive work days that really eat into your profits. Downtime is the final factor. Any miner that spends a lot of time in the field will eventually have equipment failures and shutdowns due to floods and other factors. The bottom line is gold mining is not a way to get rich quick, and in fact most miners go broke. Small scale mining is best approached as a money-making (hopefully) sideline. Don't quit your day job! I speak from experience. 2012 Update: Still true today. The high price and television shows are creating all kinds of interest but the fact is it is hard for one person to make a buck gold mining.

~ Steve Herschbach
Copyright © 1999 Herschbach Enterprises

The owner of the High Grade lode mine in Hatcher Pass stopped by the store. He was interested in buying a metal detector to aid in hardrock prospecting. I’ve done a bit of this before, and realize how hard it can be for a beginner to get results. I offered to meet him at the mine last Sunday to demonstrate what I could do on his mine dump. If he liked what he saw, great. If not, he would save the price of a detector, and I would still get a fun trip out of town.

I took my to the mine under gathering clouds. When chasing tiny gold enclosed in quartz a high frequency detector like the White's Goldmaster with a small coil is the way to go. The High Grade is up behind the Independence and Gold Cord mines at Hatcher Pass. The High Grade was named because it literally produced some very high-grade ore. The veins were narrow, however, and the mine only produced a limited amount of ore.

The dump had so much iron trash in it that I found it easier to simply pick up quartz samples and wave them over the detector search coil. The ore in Hatcher Pass is relatively clean quartz with free gold. The gold does tend to associate with pyrite, so any quartz with reddish staining or obvious sulphides is worth extra attention. The pyrite here is non-conductive, and so will be ignored by the detector. Many very rich samples, such as those pictured, have little or no pyrite; so all quartz should be detected. I have seen gold in perfectly pure, white quartz in the area.

In less than an hour I found eight pieces of quartz that gave obvious signals. Some had visible gold, while others were giving signals from gold totally enclosed within the quartz. Unfortunately, rain began to fall, and then it REALLY began to fall. I was not prepared for rain, but we had proven the point… the detector worked very well on the ore. I headed on home.

I left the ore with the owner. BLM is putting the squeeze on him, so I figure he needs all the samples he can get. The ore pictured below is from the Fern Mine, also in Hatcher Pass. I obtained it from a geologist that worked the mine years ago. It is shot through with gold, and is a good example of what might be found by a lucky prospector in the Hatcher Pass area. It exhibits black streaking that is often associated with the better ore in the area.

High Grade Mine, Hatcher Pass, Alaska

An excellent source of additional information is Hatcher Pass Gold by Ron Wendt. Ron tells about all the mines in the area, and includes many maps and photos. The book is out of print but can be found used. ee also the USGS report for the area - Geology and Ore Deposits of the Willow Creek Mining District, Alaska (1954).

Be aware that most of the hardrock mines in Hatcher Pass are patented properties. In other words, they are no longer just mining claims, but actually are private property. Few of the mines in the area are ''abandoned'' and permission should be sought from the mine owners to sample the mine dumps. Use extreme caution around the old mines, as many tunnels, shafts, and old structures present a hazard to the unwary.

How was the gold deposited at Hatcher Pass? What follows is a simplified view of gold deposition. In reality is this is all theory, and entire books are devoted to the many theories of how gold deposits form. So what I am presenting below is a layman's view of a commonly accepted theory... not a "fact". Still, the theory works well enough to be used to predict where gold occurs.

Gold most commonly occurs in quartz veins. The quartz and gold were deposited within crevices and fractures in rock far below the earth by circulating hot water. You will see the term "hydrothermal" a lot. hydro = water + thermal = hot. Most gold was formed by hydrothermal processes. Note that most quartz veins do not contain gold, so quartz alone means little.

So we need two things... rock with crevices and fractures, and a source of hot, mineral laden water. The classic gold deposit is the hardrock mine area at Hatcher Pass north of Anchorage. A large mass of molten rock, in this case granite, rose towards the surface from far below. This kind of activity tends to result in a pattern of fractures or faults in the surrounding rock as this molten mass forces it's way upward.

When this mass of molten rock cools, it shrinks, and more fractures form within this rock as it cools. What finally results is a "granitic intrusive", another term you will see often when reading about gold deposits. The hardrock deposits at Hatcher Pass are a were formed around a granitic intrusive.

As the molten rock cools, water seeping down from the surface reaches the zone of newly introduced minerals and heat. Water that is extremely hot and under pressure can dissolve many minerals that we think of as insoluble, especially when some of the dissolved minerals cause the solution to become even more corrosive.

The water, now mineral-laden and hot, rises back towards the surface. As it circulates through the crevices and faults in the rock it deposits many of these minerals. Much of the mineralization is simply because the solution is cooling, and so can no longer keep the minerals in solution. Often, in the case of rich mineral deposits, the solution comes into contact with another type of mineral that causes a chemical reaction. The classic mineral in this case is limestone. Many of these solutions are acidic, and when they come into contact with limestone, the acidity is neutralized, and the mineral drop out of solution. Many very rich mineral deposits have been found where limestone comes into contact with other rock types.

Gold ore from Fern Mine, Hatcher Pass, Willow Creek Mining District, Alaska

In the case of Hatcher Pass, the deposit follows the classic example. There was a rounded mass of granite far underground. Fractures formed in the top of the granite, and in the other rocks immediately above and around the granite. Hot water solutions deposited quartz and gold in these fractures. Ages of erosion exposed the top of the granite and the fractures to the surface. Erosion released the gold from the veins and deposited some of it in the streams and rivers in the valley. The rest remained in the hardrock veins, to later be discovered and mined.

Very common in this scenario also, is the concept that the gold veins have a limited depth. The gold veins tend to occur just above and within the upper layer of the granitic mass. As erosion (or mining) extends downwards below a certain level, the gold deposits tend to thin out and disappear. A situation arises where areas that have extensive gold in the streams often have little in the rock (it all eroded out) and areas where the stream deposits are poor will often be associated with very rich hardrock mines (most of the gold is still in the rock). Again, a generality.

Granitic intrusives are common along major fault lines. Maps can readily be had of faults and their related intrusives, and it is no surprise these tend to coincide with many of the major gold regions of the world.

Volcanoes are another process where by molten rock rises to the surface, surrounding rocks are fractured, and circulating waters deposits minerals, including gold, in these fractures. The oldest hardrock mine in Alaska is the Apollo Mine on Shumagin Island in the Aleutians, near Sand Point. This and other gold deposits in the Aleutians and the Alaska Range are volcanic in origin. The Aleutians are a "volcanic chain", a long string of islands that are actually volcanoes.

There are many other types of gold deposits, and many variations on these types. The best reference I have seen on the subject is "The Geochemistry of Gold and its Deposits" by R. W. Boyle, (1979) Geological Survey of Canada, Bulletin 280, 584 pages.

~ Steve Herschbach
Copyright © 2000 Herschbach Enterprises

Alaskans love Hawaii. At least, my wife and I sure do. Winters in Alaska can be long, and my wife gets to missing sunny weather. I miss metal detecting for half the year! So a mid-winter break in the beautiful islands of Hawaii is a much welcome respite from the cold weather.

I’ve been to Hawaii before and done well there with my metal detectors. I usually focus on detecting in the water, and my machine of choice after using many brands and models is the White’s Surf PI Pro. Hawaii has some of the worst conditions you can throw at a metal detector, with extremely mineralized volcanic rocks and salt water combining to make water detecting there tough indeed. Most any machine works well on the white sands, but when you get into sand mixed with volcanic rock every detector I’ve ever tried wants to generate false signals. The Surf PI is not immune to this false signaling on volcanic rocks, but it has so far offered me the best combination of power and ease of operation (and price!) of all the detectors I have tried for saltwater detecting in Hawaii. And so it was the machine I planned on using the most on this trip.

Then White’s introduced the new Matrix M6 model, and I received one just before my departure to Hawaii. I like having two detectors for trips like this since a detector failure of any sort can be disappointing without a backup. It just so happened I wanted to try looking for small jewelry items like chains and earrings in the drier beach sands and it seemed the Matrix M6 would fit the bill nicely. I already have an extensive background with the closest relative of the M6 – the White’s MXT. The MXT has very good sensitivity to small gold items, and I own lots of accessory coils for the MXT. I was certain the 14 kHz M6 would share in the small gold capabilities of the MXT, and so it seemed a perfect opportunity to try out the new model. I packed the machine up, along with the 6” Shooter DD and 10” elliptical DD Eclipse coils made by White’s.

I have commented before on the features of the M6 and so will stick to how it worked in the field for this report. I decided to use the M6 initially with the 10” elliptical DD coil, which I felt would provide good depth and smooth operation on a saltwater beach. My hunting grounds were the drier sands above the active wave zone. The sand is wet below the surface, but not literally running with saltwater. I am a big believer in pulse induction machines like the Surf PI Pro for wet salt sands and so did not bother doing any detecting in the water with the Matrix M6. Playing in the surf is a lot safer with a totally waterproof detector anyway.

Steve with White's Surf PI Pro ready to jump in the water

The first thing I did was experiment with the sensitivity settings and ground tracking. I was pleased to find that the M6 ran just fine in the normal track or fixed modes at high sensitivity levels, and that I did not have to resort to using the “Beach” mode unless I went down onto the wet sand below the surf line. The Beach setting is designed to allow a single frequency machine like the M6 to operate in wet salt sand without false signaling, but it usually comes at a cost of sensitivity on small gold targets. The Beach setting did allow the M6 to run quiet as can be in the wet salt sand, but when I got up above the surf line it was not needed. I was able to run as high as a sensitivity of “10” with the DD coil and the M6 ran quiet as can be. Only when I set the sensitivity up into the cross-hatched “redline” area above a setting of 10 did I start getting a bit of low level falsing from the sand. Even then the machine worked just fine, and it was a decision between running “maxed out” and a bit noisy or at a still very high sensitivity level but with quiet operation. I did spend hours doing both and ultimately came to the decision that the whole point of the M6 was to have a nice, quiet operating detector. One of the selling points of the M6 is quiet operation and so I think turning that sensitivity control up to where the machine just starts to generate a bit of noise and then backing off is in line with its intended design goals and operation.

I have always been a fan of leaving my detectors at a fixed ground balance setting, as opposed to running them in track mode all the time. Automatic ground balancing is a great thing, and those that want to be on the safe side should just leave a detector in automatic at all times. But I think I get better response with less fading on small or very deep targets with a fixed ground balance setting, and less shifting of VDI numbers on found targets. So I like to let the tracking run a minute or two and then switch to the “Fixed” or “Off” position. This is what I did on the M6, and so ended up at a sensitivity of 10 and in the “Lock Off” position on the Auto Trac control.

For beach detecting setting the discrimination control was easy. I set it to the far left so that all targets would respond. I generally dig it all on beaches, only passing on iron targets at some beaches if there is enough junk to warrant it. But with a new detector digging it all is a good idea anyway to learn the machine and its responses. Besides, I really wanted to see how the new seven tone audio worked on the M6, and so going by tones only seemed like a good idea.

This left the final setting. The trigger switch on the Matrix M6 causes the detector to operate as a standard single tone detector in the default center position, or in a seven tone audio mode in the forward locked position. You can run in either mode and toggle to the other to check found targets both ways. Squeezing the trigger activates the pinpoint/depth reading mode. For dig it all beach hunting I might as well have just set the M6 for a single tone, but I wanted to learn the tones and see how the machine responded in the multi-tone mode and so set the trigger switch forward.

So to sum up, sensitivity at 10, discriminate at far left (off), and trigger forward for seven tone audio. Set the tracking on for about a minute of operation over clean ground and then switch to off. In reality it only takes a few seconds for the tracking to find the proper ground balance level. If you are unsure of ground balancing and what it does, leave the tracking on. It does not get much easier than this!

I could make this long story even longer and go on at length about my detecting. The fact is I spent most of my detecting time with the Surf PI Pro, as I have learned the best finds will usually be made in the water. But I did use the Matrix M6 a lot and I dug hundreds of targets over many hours of detecting. I like to dig everything initially to learn about how a detector reacts to different targets, so I dug the good along with the bad. I was focusing on small signals, and so dug countless little bits of foil and other small pieces of aluminum. I dug pull tabs and bottle caps. I dug a bunch of junk, and I dug up over a hundred coins. And I finally dug a diamond earring and a diamond ring!

The only problem is the diamond earring turned out not to be real. The 14K white gold diamond ring was the real thing and a nice find indeed. Even the earring was a great find however, a testament to the ability of the White’s Matrix M6 to find small items on a beach or elsewhere.

White's M6 and Surf PI Pro along with beach detecting finds

And so here are my observations gleaned from all this detecting and digging. First, the M6 is an excellent beach detector. It worked well and at high sensitivity levels with no need to resort to the beach setting unless the sand was actually dripping wet. I was hitting coins at 8” or more with ease. I was unable to do direct comparisons but I will not be surprised if the M6 turns out to be one of the better single frequency beach detectors. It will no doubt be bettered by some multi-frequency or pulse induction detectors, but it did an excellent job in my opinion. The sensitivity to small items is superb, as my digging of small aluminum proved, along with the backings off a couple of earring posts, which are very small items. The signal on my little fake diamond earring post was strong and loud at a couple inches. Do expect to give up some of this sensitivity if using the beach mode in wet salt sand, however.

Compared to my trusty MXT it is my feeling that the Matrix M6 gets the same depth you get from the MXT in target id modes. I also think the MXT gets extra depth and sensitivity in the threshold based all-metal modes, like the Prospecting Mode, or the mixed mode Relic Mode if you are listening for the less obvious all-metal signals. But the fact is that most people do not dig everything using threshold based all-metal modes. I think many hunters will like the silent operation of the Matrix M6 and the performance it offers for most types of coin and jewelry detecting. I also think extreme performance people like nugget hunters or relic hunters will be advised to spend the extra $100 for the MXT and its extra versatility.

Target VDI numbers on the Matrix M6 were very jumpy at high sensitivity levels on the beach sands. This is where I found a real advantage to the seven tone system. Each tone takes in a wide range of VDI numbers, and so listening to the audio was much better than watching the meter when it came to target identification. There would be either a single tone, or maybe some mixing of adjacent tones for borderline targets. In simplest terms high tones means coins except nickels, medium tones mean nickels, aluminum, and hopefully gold, and low tones iron or hot rocks. There are two low tones, three medium tones, and two high tones as follows:

-95 = 57 Hz (Very Low) Hot Rock
-94 to -6 = 128 Hz (Low) Iron Junk
-5 to 7 = 145 Hz (Med Low) Gold Earrings, Chains - Foil
8 to 26 = 182 Hz (Medium) Women's Gold Rings/Nickel - Small Pull Tabs
27 to 49 = 259 Hz (Med Hi) Men's Gold Rings - Large Pull Tabs
50 to 70 = 411 Hz (High) Zinc Penny/Indian Head Penny - Screw Caps
71 to 95 = 900 Hz (Very High) Copper Penny/Dime/Quarter/Dollar

White's M6 meter and where tone breaks occur (added red lines)

In practice it tends to boil down to high, medium, and low, but the extra tones add extra ability to discern what you are likely digging without referring to the meter. The tones work better than the meter, or at least they did under these tough detecting conditions.

I used both the 10” elliptical DD Eclipse and 6” elliptical DD Eclipse “Shooter” coil. The 6” coil hit tiny items a bit better than the 10” DD coil, but overall the 10” coil seemed the better coil for me. It covered ground better and still had more than enough sensitivity to small items. The fake diamond earring post was found with the 10” coil. The 6” Shooter was able to run all the way up into the cross-hatched max sensitivity area and still run dead quiet, however. If you want the best sensitivity possible to small items and clean running in bad ground, use the Shooter coil.

The M6 may be one of the more powerful yet easy to operate detectors ever designed. I think a person might be well advised to simply go with the “listen-to-it-all” concept behind multi-tone detecting when using the White’s Matrix M6. The idea is to hear all targets, and hunt strictly by ear. Targets are never “masked” or ignored due to discrimination settings, and a decision to dig is made based on how the target sounds. A meter is almost extraneous to this kind of hunting, and in fact a good way to learn how to hunt this way is to tape over the meter and force yourself to hunt by the sounds alone.

If you go with this theory of detecting, then tuning the M6 becomes the simplest task you can imagine on a detector. The discriminate control stays at the far left. Only in extreme iron conditions might you turn it up, and many would advise even then it be left off. If the machine seems noisy from too many signals lower the volume level on your headphones so that the sounds become a threshold of sort. Then just listen to the sounds and dig items until you begin to have a feel for what sounds “good” and what does not. Moving slow and a small coil will help in trashy locations. The M6 is very forgiving on sweep speeds.

Earring and diamond ring on pinky finger found with Matrix M6, rest of finds in water with Surf PI Pro

For those who do not like the tones, there is the single tone mode. Using this mode is extremely simple. Just set the discrimination control to the level you wish, and dig whatever beeps. If you want more ability to discern targets in the single tone mode you will have to rely on the meter. One thing I did note is that small targets gave a more solid hit in single tone mode than multi-tone mode, and so it a person was trying to use the M6 for nugget detecting or any other “push it to the edge” detecting of small items I think the single tone mode may offer a slight advantage. But this may be more a perception thing than reality as the same items signal in both modes. They just sound a tad better in single tone mode to my ear.

I use lots of different detecting strategies depending on what I am looking for, the amount of time available, and yes, my mood at the time. I do think that for the best performance “listen to it all” tone detecting offers the best ability to discern good targets from bad with the least chance of targets being masked by discrimination settings. A gutsy move would be for someone to make a machine like the M6 without a discrimination control or meter. My suggestion is that the Matrix M6 be used as if this were the case. Key switch forward (seven tone), discrimination to zero, and forget the meter. Just listen to the tones and dig what sounds good. But you can use other strategies with the M6, like cranking the discrimination control all the way to max. This is a good setting for those times when my patience with digging trash is at a minimum, as about the only things that will signal at this setting is a coin.

Let's wrap this up. In summary I think the White’s Matrix M6 offers top end performance in about the simplest to operate form possible. The detector will not outperform detectors costing hundreds of dollars more, nor do I think it was intended to. I do think White’s has succeeded in offering MXT level discrimination performance but with more tones and quiet operation to those who were wishing for it. Considering the price, the performance, and the incredible coil selection, the White’s Matrix M6 is worth serious consideration. It offers solid performance and simple operation at a very reasonable price.

~ Steve Herschbach
Copyright © 2006 Herschbach Enterprises

I've been metal detecting in Hawaii several times over the years, and have used several makes and models there. They include the White's Surf PI, Minelab Excalibur, and Garrett Infinium. My wife and I have obviously taken a liking to the south shore of Kauai, as we keep going back there. It is like a second home to us, and certainly a nice place to be when it is the middle of winter in Alaska. See the links here and here for stories about previous visits. I have more details in those previous stories that I am not going to repeat here so you'll want to check them out if you have not seen them before.

This trip I decided I wanted to try out the White's Surf PI Pro, the latest version of the White's Surf PI that I used previously in Hawaii. The PI Pro has improved sensitivity to small gold items and a redesigned, more reliable control box design. The Surf PI Pro has only two controls and so is very easy to operate, and better yet it is a real bargain for an underwater detector with a list price of only $699.95. Many diving detectors run well over $1000.00.

This is the beach fronting the resort area where we stay on Kauai. I've done very well here before and every time I leave I'm sure there is plenty left to be found. The sands runs out onto a coral bottom, and right about where the waves are breaking there is about a foot of sand on top of the coral. I find the rings in nooks and crannies in the coral basement and so I try to work in that zone where I feel the coral bottom is not too deep. I've detected out in the bare coral and find lots of coins but have had less luck with jewelry out beyond the surf. The results are similar up out of the water, with lots of coins but an even poorer chance of jewelry finds. The surf break has been the hot spot for me.

Poipu Beach, Kauai, Hawaii

Since it is mid-winter the surf is about all I can handle when it comes to staying in one place. I use a neoprene suit to keep from getting beat up if the waves toss me on the bottom. I have a 40 lb. weight belt that keeps me in place, and allows me to instantly duck to the bottom to retrieve the finds. Frankly, using too much weight is dangerous and should not be attempted by anyone not very comfortable in the water. I have numerous SCUBA certifications plus thousands of hours of hookah diving time so I'm more comfortable than most people in the water. I have an excellent US Divers snorkel that sheds most of the water taken in as waves pound over me. After awhile you develop a sixth-sense about when and when not to take a big breath of air!

Gear used for metal detecting in heavy surf

I've found a scoop to be just one more thing to be hanging on to, and since the rings are down in coral depressions a scoop would miss them most times any way. When I get a signal I duck down and with my left gloved hand I quickly fan away the sand. I usually blast it hard for the first breath hold dive, then come up for air, and go down a second time to retrieve the target. The glove protects my hand when I dig around as I sometimes scoop out a hole. I keep my right hand bare, as sometimes stuff gets into such little holes I can't get my gloved fingers on it. Everything goes in a little goodie bag I keep attached to the armrest of the detector.

Seven morning finds - aluminum trash, coins, lead weights, rings, and ferrous junk

I hit the beach at daybreak, because once the boogie boarders and novice surfers get going it is too dangerous to be ducking down and popping up. If I was to get hit in the head and knocked out I would immediately sink to the bottom from being over-weighted. Since this is pretty hardcore detecting 2-3 hours a day is just fine with me anyway. The picture above shows most of the finds except the oversized junk which I toss in the trash cans down near the beach. The Surf PI Pro did just fine. It falsed on basalt rocks buried in the sand and falsed when picked up off the bottom but I generally had no problems discerning good target signals. Overall the machine was quieter than the Garrett Infinium I'd used previously at this location. I've decided that this is because the two-tone signal used by the Infinium inherently generates more noise when the machine is falsing than a single tone unit like the Surf PI Pro. It is not so much that the Garrett falses any more than other units but that it makes more noise when it does.

Steve's gold and platinum ring finds with White's Surf PI Pro

I got four platinum and three gold rings. One of the gold rings is white gold so it looks like only two gold. All fairly plain men's bands reflecting the rough surf area I was hunting. Once again that big diamond ring eluded me, but the number of platinum rings really pleased me. I guess I'll just have to keep going back and trying until I find that big diamond!

~ Steve Herschbach
Copyright © 2004 Herschbach Enterprises

In 2007 I was sent a prototype of the White's PulseScan TDI to test, and I was so impressed that I decided to put the new model into service at my "pay-to-mine" operation at Moore Creek, Alaska as soon as it was available. Moore Creek has mixed hot rocks that severely impede the performance of regular metal detectors. I lobbied for and got four of the very first units off the production line in the spring of 2008 and those detectors were provided to visitors at Moore Creek that had no detector of their own or who needed a backup.

These people by nature often have little or no detecting experience. I was happy to find some stock settings for the TDI that worked well at Moore Creek. I could basically set the detector for somebody and as long as they did not touch the controls it worked well. Just turn the detector on and go.

Still, experience counts for much and novices have a tough time finding gold nuggets, just due to lack of basic detecting skills. We had found in the past that regardless of the detector used we were happy if novices could just find any gold at all metal detecting during their visit. So I was very pleased that many new detectorists at Moore Creek found their very first nuggets metal detecting with the White's TDI. The unit is not only very capable but also quite easy to operate and so really the only task left to the novices was to get over a nugget.

Mike and Karl were pretty typical of many of our visitors. Never really done any metal detecting for gold and no detectors of their own. I sent them out with the TDI and they each found by far the largest gold they had ever found in their lives. The small stuff at Moore Creek is larger than many people will ever find and so I had the opportunity to create some real life experiences for a lot of people. It really is a good feeling seeing people make their first finds and knowing you made it happen.

Mike's gold specimen weighed in at 0.28 ounce and Karl got two, 0.12 and 0.25 ounce respectively.

Mike B. & Karl E. of Anchorage, Alaska with Moore Creek TDI finds

Close up of Mike and Karl's gold specimens

I was doing some bulldozing at the mine to stir up some nuggets for our visitors. I got to one little knob of gravel and after I flattened it out I thought "that looks like a good spot". I had not done any detecting in a couple weeks and figured it was about time. So when I got the dozer back to camp I got a TDI out and headed to the location. A guy had just come into camp as I was leaving and so I told him to head up the same way.

I got to the spot and started detecting. First down one row and up the other. After about ten minutes I got a nice signal, and dug up a great 0.31 ounce specimen. It is a little section of a quartz vein with a nearly solid gold core of gold running through the middle.

0.31 ounce Gold Specimen found with White's TDI

I turned off the detector and headed back to camp. The other guy was now just arriving and asked me what was wrong. I told him nothing was wrong, but that I'd got my nugget and so was done. You should have seen the look on his face! Poor guy had been looking for gold for days and I walk right out and find a nugget in ten minutes.

We had an 82 year old gentleman in camp that week who was not having much luck detecting so I gave the specimen to him to take home to Florida.

So what were the settings, etc. we used with the White's TDI at Moore Creek? The Pulse Delay was always at 10, the most sensitive setting for gold, and we were always able to run the maximum Gain of 12. The Ground Balance was tight as we have both a positive and negative hot rock at Moore Creek. A bit one way and the positive rocks signaled and a bit the other way and the negative rocks signaled. Negative hot rocks are by far the more prevalent. In general a setting of about 9 eliminated nearly all the hot rocks. But no matter how much I tweaked there were faint hits on some hot rocks. This is not surprising as the Minelab PI detectors also hit the hot rocks at Moore Creek. The ground is a weird mix of fairly neutral soil made up of the underlying decomposed shale bedrock with basalt and monzonite hot rocks eroded from the nearby hills.

However, I determined a couple things with the TDI that really helped with the new people. First, virtually all gold at Moore Creek gives a high tone, even multi-ounce pieces. I believe this is because of the generally high silver content combined with the specimen nature of the gold. Surprisingly, when silver is added to gold it lowers the conductivity instead of increasing it, and so low purity gold is more likely to give low conductor high tone responses on the TDI. You can figure with 99% certainty that a low tone is an iron target or hot rock at Moore Creek. I ended up with the novices ground balancing to kill the high tone hot rock responses and did not worry about low tone hot rocks. Then I set the very unique to the TDI Target Conductivity switch to eliminate low tones and only sound off on low conductivity high tone targets. This made the TDI a real no-brainer to run. Dead quiet, no false signals at all. Then get any high tone at all, and it was always a bullet or shell casing (rare at Moore Creek), some small ferrous trash that reads low conductive, or gold. The ferrous trash that reads low conductive tends to be shallow easy to dig stuff. Being set up this way almost totally eliminates the PI tendency to have a person digging deep, tiring pits only to find a big piece of steel junk.

The only problem I had was people fiddling with or accidently knocking a control out of adjustment. The setting was so perfect I actually considered just gluing the controls in place to prevent people from messing with them! Another problem happens when you loan people stuff to use - it not only gets used it gets abused. Luckily the TDI is able to take a licking and keep on ticking, just like the old ads. This TDI got strapped on the back of an ATV and then the driver forgot about it as he roared through the mud holes and brush. Having too much fun I guess! Not only did the unit get covered in mud he managed to bend the middle rod section. A little careful work with a water hose and a little bending and the detector worked just fine. I eventually ordered a new rod section to replace the bent one.

White's TDI Covered with mud!

I ran the 7.5" coil a bit and found a 1 pennyweight nugget with it. I was surprised at how stable the smaller coil was, as I expected it would be more prone to hitting hot rocks, but instead it seemed to be more immune to the hot rocks than the larger coil. At Moore Creek though the stock 12" coil is the better way to go not so much for extra depth but for ground coverage, which really is the name of the game at the mine. The person that covers the most ground digging the most targets has the best shot at finding the gold at Moore Creek. But for many nugget hunting tasks I think I would very much like using the smaller coil.

Here is Moore Creek visitor Pete W from Paducah, Kentucky. Pete hunted hard with the TDI but was having little luck. I was out with him at one point and was sitting nearby when he got a signal. He started to dig with his scoop but the target was deep, and so I came over with my pick to help. I scooped a pretty deep hole, but when he checked the target was still in the ground. The TDI got this one at respectable depth. So I dug some more and out popped a really good looking nugget! A very nice piece weighing 0.27 ounce that put a huge smile on Pete's face.

Pete W. and TDI gold

Close up of Pete's nugget found with TDI

And here is a great photo of Moore Creek visitor Jens S from Hupstedt, Germany with nuggets he found with the TDI. The larger nugget is 0.62 ounce and the smaller 0.37 ounce. Jens found the smaller nugget first within ten minutes of turning the TDI on for the first time. Jens really liked dredging and highbanking more than metal detecting and so spent most of his time at Moore Creek doing just that. From what I saw though he was a natural with a metal detector and so who knows how he would have done if he had concentrated on that more. He went home with a lot of gold anyway and a very happy visitor to our country, with an experience most will never have.

Jens with 0.37 oz and 0.62 oz gold specimens found with White's TDI

You would be surprised how little detecting I did while at Moore Creek. Running a pay-to-mine operation is a full time job and then some. Still, I did have my chances to get out now and then and having the new TDI around certainly gave me reason.

A couple of our visitors, Keith M and Bob D and I decided to hit some tailing piles downstream and across Moore Creek, making them hard to get to and so less hunted by others. We loaded our detectors and waders up on ATVs and headed down to the general location. After crossing the stream we hiked down to the lowest tailing pile which I've been eying from afar the last couple years. It has a lot of brush on it, and I figured a nugget might be lurking unfound in that brush.

The tailing piles are very steep, and so I hip mounted the White's TDI to keep the weight off my arm while side-hilling. The only issue I found in the brush was a tendency for controls to get knocked off their settings and so I was alert for changes in the detector's response. I found a good ground balance setting that minimized the response from both the positive and negative hot rocks. This ended up being about 8 on this tailing pile. I ran at the gold sensitive 10uS setting and was able to run the gain up to max. I set for a quiet, faint threshold. I do run the Target Conductivity switch on All myself as I prefer to hear the hot rocks and sort them out myself. I do not mind digging a few rocks if need be but usually they have a consistent sound I can learn. In this instance though the TDI was running real nice. There seemed to be less of the bad hot rocks on this side of the valley.

Bob, Keith, and I spaced ourselves around the tailing pile and proceeded to hunt. I started low on one end, hunted around that end, and then worked up the hill into the brush. They were both running Minelabs. Minelabs can be set to run pretty close to each other, but we discovered that the TDI does not play well with Minelab detectors. The TDI does not pick up the Minelabs at all, but the Minelabs go nuts with a TDI anywhere near, and they cannot tune the TDI out at all. So I took pains to stay as far away from both Keith and Bob as possible. I ended up in a little spruce tree thicket on one end of the pile.

Soon I got a nice, clear, high tone signal. A bit of digging revealed a nice 1.93 ounce gold quartz specimen down in the roots! It was a typical Moore Creek "oreo cookie" nugget with a solid gold core sandwiched between two thin layers of quartz. But very solid in the middle - this chunk had a very nice heft. Not only did it make my day (week? month?) but actually paid for that TDI in a single find. It certainly gave me a real warm fuzzy about the TDI being able to make a find like that with it.

We hunted most of the rest of the day and although we found many targets my nugget proved to be the only find of the day. That happens so often it does make me wonder at times. I have seen myself and others bang into a great find like that early on, and then find nothing the rest of the day so often that when it happens now I joke about it. The feeling is if you get a great one like that right off the bat you may as well quit for the day. But of course nobody ever does.

1.93 oz gold nugget found by Steve Herschbach with White's TDI

Here is the rest of the story on the nugget. I have a rule at Moore Creek that any gold our crew finds while we have paying customers in camp goes to the customers. So at the end of the week we had a drawing. Everyone got 5 tickets, and for every ounce of gold a person had found we took away one of their tickets. We wanted to handicap the hot detectorists. Although we had 15 visitors in camp, it was Bob who was with Keith and I when the nugget that got found that won it. Which was nice as he is one of our regular visitors and had not had much luck detecting. There was some pretty serious karma at work that week! Just a reminder, gold was running around $700 per ounce in 2008, so I gave away a $1400 nugget. I did this a lot at Moore Creek and in fact no visitor ever went home without gold. I always found enough hunting on the side to be able and make sure people who got skunked got a going away present. I think I found and gave away about a pound of gold, which must set some kind of record.

I was figuring there is no way anyone is going to beat my 1.93 ounce nugget for awhile. After all, not many nuggets get found over an ounce, and this one is almost two ounces. Well, I figured wrong. After all our clients left for the summer I invited a couple friends up to the mine to hang out while we shut the mine down for the winter. Husband and wife detecting team Bernie and Chris came to Moore Creek for the first time. Both are expert with VLF detectors having found pounds of gold between them with the White's MXT. Pulse induction detecting was new to them however and at Moore Creek I convinced them to set the trusty MXT aside in favor of PI detectors. Well, no worries about these two running new detectors. Bernie and Chris scored some real nice gold. In fact, Chis got the best find of the week with the TDI, and really gorgeous 2.07 ounce gold in quartz specimen. It is actually one of the more attractive pieces I saw found at Moore Creek. Instead of the usual solid layer of gold wafered between quartz this specimens has gold laced evenly and very attractively throughout the quartz. Chris not only beat me for overall weight by a bit but for sure in the specimen good looks department.

2.07 ounce gold specimen found by Chris P with White's TDI at Moore Creek, Alaska

This story is a compilation of various posts made on the internet at the time and finally added to my journal. I wanted to add a lot of missing detail, and in the process it sure brought back a lot of great memories. The Moore Creek gig will go down as the best time of my life. Not only was a lot of gold found, but many great new friends and fabulous adventures were made there. The mine now belongs to other people and the pay-to-mine operation has long since ended, but the memories will be cherished as long as I live.

The White's PulseScan TDI is a detector I still own. It has some interesting features no other detector has and in some ways is an underappreciated machine. I like the easy hip mount capability and the unique Target Conductivity switch in particular. The main problem I see is people using it in locations where a VLF is a better choice, and then complaining the TDI is no better than a VLF. Stuff like that makes me shake my head. If a location is suitable for a VLF by all means use a VLF. Pulse induction detectors like the White's TDI are for locations where the ground or the hot rocks are such that a VLF operator wants to quit in frustration. Ground Balancing PI (GBPI) detectors are meant solely to handle extreme ground or hot rock conditions, and it those conditions do not exist, then the entire reason for using the PI detector also does not exist. In low mineral ground the only real advantage GBPI detectors have is in their ability to run very large coils, and that can aid in finding deep large targets. But if no deep large targets exist to be found a VLF is often the better choice in low mineral ground, especially given the superior ability of a VLF to sort out trash targets. As always it is about using the proper tool for the job, and a location like Moore Creek is a perfect spot for a detector like the White's TDI. You can find more details on the TDI on this website at the White's PulseScan TDI page.

~ Steve Herschbach
Copyright © 2008 Herschbach Enterprises

My friend Rich Lampright and I planned a joint dredging expedition to Crow Creek Mine in the fall of 1996. We planned on a three week trip in October, which is generally after the rains but before any seriously cold temperatures. We obtained permission to stay in one of the cabins at the mine, and spent a day one weekend cutting firewood to supply the barrel stove in the cabin for the duration of our trip.

We planned on putting both our dredges in the canyon at Crow Creek and working up the creek together. This allows each person to work at their own pace, and avoids the need to split the gold as would be the case if a single dredge were used. I have found that rarely do two people double the production on a dredge. Yet, it is wise to dredge with a partner, both for safety and for companionship.

Steve breaks up the ice around his dredge - Photo by Rich Lampright

This trip, as is often the case, ended up going completely differently than planned. Rich, who was in the Air Force then, was called upon to go to do a tour of duty in Saudi Arabia. He ended up deciding the time before he left would be best spent with his family. The weather also took a surprise turn, and a very early snow storm made things interesting. Temperatures fell to about 10 degrees by day and below zero at night. It just plain got cold.

Rich has done such a good job detailing this trip at his website that I will not duplicate the effort here. Instead, follow the link below to Rich's website:

Suction Dredging at Crow Creek in October 1996

~ Steve Herschbach
Copyright © 2000 Herschbach Enterprises

I finally went out and found my first gold nuggets with the new DEUS elliptical high frequency coil. I want to emphasize that I am a newbie on the XP Deus. Although I purchased an 11" Deus V3.2 model almost two years ago, it was with the express purpose of being able to test the V4 update with the new high frequency coil options for gold prospecting. I decided I was better off just starting fresh with version 4.0 before really digging in and learning the detector. I do get the hang of detectors quickly but this does show what can be done by somebody who went out barely knowing the machine.

The other catch is that I picked a location that favors the Deus with relatively mild soil for a gold location, so mild I could run the machine full out to get the maximum possible sensitivity with the machine. These results are not going to be as easy to obtain in extreme mineral ground. You have to start someplace however and being new to the machine I wanted to give myself someplace easy to start. Finally, the goal here was to find the smallest gold I could so for the purposes of this report - smaller is better.

These nuggets were recovered over the course of a day. Ten nuggets, 4.7 grains total weight. There are 480 grains per Troy ounce and with an average weight of less than half a grain I think you can agree this is some pretty small stuff. The smallest bits are probably near 1/10th grain or 1/4800th of a Troy ounce. Click picture for larger version.

Ten nuggets, 4.7 grains total weight, found by Steve with Deus HF elliptical coil

The new HF elliptical coil running at 74 kHz is clearly in the same league as the 71 kHz Fisher Gold Bug 2,  45 kHz Minelab Gold Monster, 56 kHz Makro Gold Racer, and 48 kHz White's GMT. However, the devil is in the details and it will be some time before I sort out how the machines compare under more difficult and varied conditions.

Again, I am not an expert with the Deus and so the settings I mention are not to be taken as "the best" or anything like that. I was actually gold prospecting so the primary focus was to find gold, not to test every possible combination of settings on the Deus. With 10 program options and numerous settings that will be a longer term project. I obviously wanted to try the Gold Field program 10. After a little experimenting I settled on the GM Power program 2 as an alternate disc mode to try. Getting from program 10 to program 2 is only a couple button pushes, so I bounced back and forth between the two programs and tweaked settings higher as I found targets and could compare readings.

Gold Field is a threshold based all metal mode with what I find to be a rather pleasant digitized buzz. That's me of course, others may differ on that point. I was able to run sensitivity full out at 99. All my work was done at 74 khz, the default highest frequency setting without trying to push it higher via the offset. I figure the coil is tuned at 74 khz and so stuck with that for now. Manual ground balance about 84.

GM Power I got sensitivity to 94 with only minor falsing. I reduced reactivity (similar to SAT for you nugget hunters) to 0 from the default of 2 and ran the audio response (audio boost) up to 7 (max).

Both modes exhibit just a little touch sensitivity at these high gain levels. This might be tamed with the ground notch but I have not fooled with that yet and it did not bother me at all anyway.

What I found was Gold Field has a softer response in general but that my boosted version of GM Power banged hard on the little bits. Not unlike going from all metal mode on the Gold Bug 2 to the Iron Disc mode. Instead of faint threshold variations you get a strong "beep". The difference is that the Gold Bug 2 Iron Disc mode has an obvious loss in sensitivity. The Deus by comparison in this particular situation actually seemed to work better in GM Power mode, but that is mainly the boosted audio at work.

I left the disc settings at the defaults for GM Power which worked well - low tone iron, higher tones non-ferrous. I ran the IAR (iron reject) in Gold Field at 2. This was just enough to cause ferrous to break up. Higher settings would blank most ferrous completely but getting to aggressive can also eliminate weak gold signals. The ferrous discrimination worked very well in both programs. GM Power in particular was pretty awesome in the nail pits with iron tones firing off like a machine gun. I bumped reactivity back to 2 in the dense trash.

Anyway, this is a very preliminary report and so no point getting too deep into it as I will probably modify my opinions and settings as I get more time on the machine. Right now this is a high price option if all you need is a prospecting unit, but for a person wanting one machine to do everything XP just kicked it up a notch. If they introduce a dedicated gold unit at a lower price similar to the Depar DPR 600 it would be very competitive. For now this is an option for somebody that wants a detector for more than just gold prospecting since the Deus is a superb coin, relic, and jewelry detector.

Steve's XP Deus with HF elliptical coil - it collapses to fit in that rucksack!

The elliptical coil and rod assembly is just 1 lb 13 oz (1.8 lbs) and so a true featherweight. At 5' 11" I have to run it fully extended and at that it does flex a bit, but I did not find that bothersome at all. A solid coil cover will be good as there are too many coil edges that want to hang up on rubble and sticks. A minor quibble however as the machine is a joy to handle, especially when reaching uphill waist high and higher. A great unit for poking in and around bushes and other obstructions. The coil is hotter at the tips which also helps in poking into tight locations.

Early days but the final word is that I am happy with how this coil performs on small gold nuggets after all the wait. Time will tell how it handles the really bad ground and how it fares directly against some of the competition as other people report in. As always giving it time and waiting for a consensus opinion from many users to develop is a wise policy with any new detector.

This article originated as a post on the DetectorProspector Forum. There might be additional information there in follow up posts.

~ Steve Herschbach
Copyright © 2017 Herschbach Enterprises