oldmancoyote1

It's still way to out of focus. The tiny details are telling.

Someone described nitric acid as less aggressive than muriatic acid (HCl). I would never use nitric acid except under professional supervision in a hood. I have use HCl at home since high school. I carried it around in my pocket. While its vapors will corrode nearby metals etc., it is not a powerful oxidizer like nitric acid which I regard as extremely dangerous. Perhaps the commentator was referring to its action on minerals as being less aggressive not to safety issues. I think it is best to avoid any misunderstanding by mentioning nitric acid is a dangerous material.

A very useful recent post and comments on mining claims left me with the impression that the public can be excluded from mining claims by the holder. It's quite possible that I misunderstood what was written. Perhaps others were left with some doubt as well. The BLM pamphlet "Mining Claims and Sites on Federal and State Lands" reads: The Public has the conditional right to cross mining claims or sites for recreational or other purposes and to access federal lands beyond the claim boundaries. Technically, my post belongs in the previous mentioned post, but it would be buried and

An adjacent property is 50 50. I strongly suspect that my area of interest is also 50 50. If it is, I suppose I can not metal detect there. Any info on wether I can metal detect 50 50 land.

I have used The Diggings for active claims. Taking The Diggings info to the County Recorder's office I have retrieved claim filing documents. I have seen some indication elsewhere that there are patented claims in the area (Greaterville AZ), so I got a list of patented claims (Excel file) from the County Assessor's Office. Yet there is only one patented claim shown in my target area. The area I am interested in probably is patented. It's a prime location. I'd very much like to detect this area, but I'm stymied for lack of reliable information. Anyone got a suggestion?

Folks here have referred to carrying guns for self defense. In Arizona it is forbidden to blame the "victim" for a crime. As strange as it may seem, claiming self defense is no longer an acceptable practice as it blames the "victim". You run considerable risk carrying a gun. I write from painful personal experience. I was assaulted in a parking lot. I fought back and hurt the guy. He lied to the police claiming I was a violent homeless man because I wear a beard and was wearing a ratty old coat. I was charged with felony assault. Since I could not claim self defense, I was compelle

I once transcribed the journal of a 21 year old farmer from Quincy MA who sailed from Boston in January 1849 for the gold mines of California. It's called James White's Journal. It's free on Apple iBooks and $2.99 on Kindle. It's the real deal. No romanticism. Just what it was like.

I still don't know what it is. I do understand why someone might think it is a meteorite. The convex side looks like it might have been partially melted by passing through the atmosphere at high speed, and the back side looks like it might have been slightly melted by hot turbulent gasses behind the meteorite. However it does not look like any of the common types of meteorites that I am aware of. I don't even recognize the orange material on the back side. Show it to a petrologist or a meteorite specialist at a university. They might have an idea.

His name is Ray Mills.

That's one weird rock. Where was it found? Both what region and describe the actual location.

No. We work in higher elevations of the Klamath Mountains

The stream valley we were looking at had produced considerable gold in the past but was heavily forested and the ground was covered with a thick layer of pine needles and forest duff. Mostly we were looking for traces of undiscovered Pocket Deposits near know pockets using metal detectors. Some times we detected cracks in the very little bedrock that was exposed. I have conclude the only way to successfully prospect that area is to do what the old timers did there: dig lots of trenches looking for fine gold and following the trace up hill. I'm too old for much of that.

We didn't take a detector. it was lectures with explanations of actual locations.

For several years now I have been dragging my buddy to new places that I thought would be good spots to detect. We both have darn little to show for all our effort. To make up for it, I got a well known nugget detectorist to take us into the field for some lessons. Here are three important take-aways from that trip: 1) High hills in old burn areas are great places to identify new nugget fields. 2) He showed us such an area where there were a great many very small-scale mining features that were invisible In Google Earth, yet the burn made them quite visible from a hilltop.

I strongly recommend members of this forum read pages 285 to 296 "Pocket Hunting for Residual Placers" in Ralph's book. Ralph has clearly defined a very promising target that I have not seen meaningfully described elsewhere.