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calgeologist

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  1. Agree that this sounds like a loophole. I really hope there is some merit to it, but it reads like one of those clickbait advertisements that say "Dentists don't want you to know this one secret because it will put them out of business!" Like I said, I really hope to get in the water again, but I will wait and see what the news is.
  2. Just to add to the advice above. I live down in Texas as well and did some graduate geology work at UT. Texas is not really a great state for gold, but if you do want to increase your likelihood I highly suggest getting permission to detect the creeks around Llano, Mason, Marble Falls. There is a gold bearing area around there associated with the Llano Uplift. Other options are really slime unless you want to find your gold in the form of rings. It's not the cheapest or easiest option, but do like I do and head to the western states. Hope this helps a little bit
  3. I’m in the market for a new coil for my GPX 5k since the others have seen better days etc. I’ve seen some good reviews regarding the coiltek elite series and had a couple of questions regarding them. I detect in the sierras with pretty mild ground for the most part. The gold ranges in size but, generally under 5 grams and pretty rough/prickly. I know the 5k doesn’t handle that kind of gold as well as say the Zed, but my buddy has one of those. My big question is whether to go with the 14” mono or the 17-11” elliptical. Any advice here would be appreciated as I hope to make this the go to main coil. And if there is another coil I should be considering as well please share your opinion. Thanks!
  4. I live in the heart of downtown Houston. As a native Californian it is hard to describe how much rain we have seen in the past two and a half days. My family lives in the Bay Area and got roughly 50 inches of rain this year (which was a huge number). We have received 30 inches in the past two days. So more than half of the Bay Area yearly total in 48 hours. The flooding has surpassed the 500 year flood maps and we are likely experiencing around a 1000 year flood. It just wont stop raining. Ways to help that we are hearing through the local news include donating to the Red Cross, but more importantly clothing and everyday items are in very short supply at the shelters (projected to hold 30,000 people in the next day).
  5. Just wanted to do a follow up on this post. I had Steve do the refining for me. Steve is a great guy (and helped teach me how to use my detector) and I would definitely recommend anybody to him. Great price and turnaround for me so many many thanks. Calgeo
  6. Hello all, I'm in search of someone who can refine my placer gold into an 18k alloy. Does anybody know a reputable person/small scale business that could do this for me? Thank you!
  7. I don't get a chance to post a lot as my time spent prospecting has decreased for various reasons. That being said when I get a few hours out and about I'm happy to find anything at all. My best days have been around a pennyweight of dinks. Well the last time out happened to be a little better than usual. My partner and I were checking out some ground way off the beaten path of typical gold country and we found a nice little patch. This is about 4 hours work between the two of us. Keep swinging! There is still good stuff out there and I am now a true believer of that.
  8. Thanks guys. Bummer guess will just stick with the detector. Also good to hear from you Steve. Hope things are well with you
  9. I would like it if we could get a good geology discussion going with links etc.. Also that gold is fantastic!
  10. As the title indicates this weekend I am looking to try out dry washing for the first time. My mining buddy picked one up earlier this spring and we are pumped to try it out. Coming to CA from another state means that I don't have many opportunities to mine. My question is regarding how dry does the dirt need to be? I saw that it rained a little bit in the foothills this past week and now I'm concerned that the dirt may be too wet. Any advice and tips are greatly appreciated
  11. HI Chris, I shot you a PM to ask about the current wait list situation.
  12. Great looking gold and great videos. Definitely my favorite detecting videos out there. Get a little bit of the country, a little bit of the geology, and of course the nice gold. Keep it up!
  13. Thanks JP for explaining the coil size comparison. Also thanks for taking the time to make a great video. Man I love this forum! So much great advice/information with no unnecessary banter.
  14. This may be an incorrect assumption here so please correct me if im wrong. The 12x15 elliptical acts like a 12 inch mono right? And the GPZ is running a 14 inch coil. So there is a disparity of 2 inches there. Maybe a 14 incho mono would pick it up louder on the GPX? I need an expert to weigh in on this since this could be based on no actual fact. Either way its great to finally see a head to head test!
  15. Just a quick way to check (by no means always the case) is to look for any sort of bedding within the gravels. Most stream conglomerates show a high level of stratification, fining upwards as is the case with inside bends (point bars). A FANTASTIC place to see this is at the Gold Run rest stop on the westbound side of highway 80. You can get up and close with the big tertiary channel and stick your nose right on it from a safe location. Its incredible the amount of scouring, bedding, and grading that you can see. Now if you are working in a intervolcanic channel like are common in the motherlode, then things get a little more challenging. (Picture 1) This shows the base of the channel where there is no bedding at all. Look at the chaotic nature of the boulders and smaller cobbles. The matrix of the conglomerate is also clay produced from the weathering of the volcanic material. Compare this chaos to nice bedding (Picture 2). Where it gets really tricky is comparing intervolcanic conglomerates with glacial deposits. Since the defining characteristic of both is that there is almost no sorting of the stream load you need to inspect the rocks a little more closely. The first thing I look for is a change in boulder type. In the Sierras this is very easy to see. The rocks that dominate the tertiary channels are largely metamorphic and in my area lots of blue lead (serpentine). The rocks that make up the glacial deposits are dominated by granites eroded from the batholith to the east. Picture 3 and 4 show what some recent Sierra glacial deposits look like. Picture three is till, while picture four is deposition of glacial outwash sediments above modern day river deposits. Now a lot of the generalities that I have mentioned apply to the Sierra, but the biggest thing that is a dead giveaway for glacial sediments is a change in rock type (provenance) and the utter chaotic nature to the material. If you have examples of glacial material that is bedded I would love to see them just out of curiosity. Hope this helps a little, at least in the general sense.
  16. Hey, So I found a nice piece (my biggest to date out of 20 or so nuggets) about 8 inches into some virgin channel. Only was 0.6 of a gram, but its huge to me. This was my first piece in my new patch and hopefully there is more to come. Went back to my old reliable patch and sniffed out two dinks that were 0.05 g each. That place always gives me some gold (19 nuggets and counting). These small pieces were a couple inches down. Still working on clearing all the trash out so I can bring in the big coils. But I've found a 8 inch pipe thats buried down about a foot that needs to be removed first. All of this will wait until the summer when Im back in CA.
  17. Back from a cold day out in the pit. Both of us got skunked today. We focused on some bedrock that was quite extensive. The old timers clearly cleaned it up well or somebody had beat us to it. We got to thinking that maybe detecting only bedrock might not be the best. Instead maybe focusing on areas that still have a foot or so of the gravel still on top of the bedrock. Hope to find something tomorrow. Or at least some targets to keep warm by digging.
  18. Hey klunker, I wish I only found a few ounces per trip. Man if I found a 1/4 ounce I would be pumped! (Still am new to the detecting side of things) The area I'm on is huge and oddly enough there are almost no dig holes. Partially due to it being private and requiring permission to get into. There are some big drift mines and I will look into that idea of checking out the tailings. Report back this afternoon hopefully with a fist of new nuggets
  19. So most of my grounds are hydraulic sites. I wouldn't call many of them pits but rather they are large expanses that seems almost too big to efficiently work through. I've had my fair share of success usually finding a piece or two, but would like to ask if people have any tricks to tackling such huge areas. Focus only on bedrock at the thalwag of the channel or work all the various false bedrocks made from the clay stratified layers? Any tips would be very welcomed! Cheers Calgeo
  20. This is a fantastic write up. I know my buddy and I tend to believe in the iron id probably a little too much. We generally work moderate trash areas with old sluices so there are a few nails to deal with. I'm still new to the whole detecting game so I've got lots to learn. My suspicions that I may be passing over gold caused me to permanently ditch using dd coils on my GPX and use a mono to force me to dig everything. First day out I came across a signal I knew was a piece of trash. Horribly broken signal but it was a nice little nugget. Forcing myself to dig everything gives me piece of mind that I'm not leaving gold in the ground. This post just goes above and beyond and makes me feel like ditching the iron id was the correct choice. Thanks again!
  21. Anybody use this coil and would be willing to share their thoughts?
  22. Well this year I had grand plans to get many weeks of detecting in with my new GPX. After a great in person field experience with El Dorado I thought I was ready to have a big year and get some serious experience under my belt. But a great opportunity to start my career popped up earlier than expected and I had to pack my bags and head down to Texas. Due to the early move I only got two more days of detecting under my belt after meeting El Dorado, but his help and guidance got me a couple of nice pieces. On the last day, I found my most attractive piece of gold to date, and the ugliest one as well. Hiking out that day I slipped and my face landed two feet from a baby rattle snake, and somehow learned to fly and avoid getting tagged on the face. Needless to say I think I crammed a whole season of excitement into that last day. Hope you enjoy the photos. JD
  23. Thanks Steve for the great time yesterday. This is what I think makes this forum special. A newbie has a few questions about how to be a better nugget hunter and be taken out into the field by a very knowledgable detectorist was a huge surprise and greatly appreciated. I feel lucky to have had the opportunity for hands on training and meet a great guy to boot. As for the birdshot I was running in sharp with gain of 13, normal audio, stabilizer at 10, with the monster coil. Like Steve said they were down a solid 2-3 inches on bedrock. They sure sounded like gold.... Here is a picture of the shot so there is some visual proof on size.
  24. Thanks guys! I know I have a long learning curve ahead of me. Got out again today patch hunting and learned a lot about the machine. The question I posed above was answered in the field today before I got a chance to read these replies. It turns out it is just a little wobble and not targets. It just sounded like the sweet single tone sounds that I know with my GMT that it made me think for a while if it was indeed a target (they weren't). No luck today in the gold fields, but tomorrow is another day. Dug tons of small trash. The old timers really liked to throw around bits of metal. JD
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