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Clay Diggins

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Clay Diggins last won the day on May 6 2023

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  1. Good logical question Redz. If a lode deposit is discovered on a placer claim AND the claim owner wishes to go to patent the lode deposit will be excluded from the placer patent unless it has been claimed and paid for. Also if a placer claim owner gives permission to a non owner to prospect the placer claim and the non owner discovers a lode deposit the non owner can claim a new lode claim. The new lode claim displaces the pre-existing placer claim within the new lode boundaries. That might seem like a far fetched possibility until you consider all the prospecting clubs that permit their members to freely prospect their placer claims. I encourage all prospecting clubs to put a clause in their member contracts to avoid this situation. Interestingly the only reason for all this complexity of placer versus lode is because a lode patent costs twice as much per acre as a placer patent. Lode= $5.00 per acre, Placer = $2.50 per acre. The government would lose $2.50 an acre if known lodes were patented within a placer patent. That was a lot of money in 1872 when Congress set the fees. Congress hasn't changed the acre patent fees since 1872. Here is a link to the placer claim patent law. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/30/37
  2. Different states do treat lost, stolen or abandoned property differently. In this particular situation the owners bought the property without any reservations (lock, stock and barrel). In other words they own anything found on the property even though it was originally lost or abandoned. Stolen property is a different story for obvious reasons. That makes it pretty simple. Anything on the property that wasn't stolen belongs to the owners. If they give you permission to search for and keep the stuff you find then it becomes your property. So you could keep the nugget and the coins unless they were known to be stolen. I know of no exceptions in any law to that principle. _______________________ Surface rights are the rights to beneficial use of the surface (agriculture, roads, buildings etc.) and for physical support for real estate. Surface rights don't include any minerals. Valid placer and lode claimants have exclusive ownership of ALL the locatable minerals found within their claim boundaries. The rights of placer and lode claimants to any and all minerals found on their claims are equal. A placer can not be located over a lode claim. A lode claim can only be located over a placer with the knowledge and permission of the placer owner and even then only if a lode deposit has been discovered within the boundaries of the placer claim. In that situation the new lode claim replaces the placer claim within the lode claim's boundaries.
  3. Please don't PM me any pictures you took of yourself in the mirror! I get too many of those already from miners. ((((shudder))))
  4. Lead shared the location with me privately. I checked the land status. There was no way you could know that. No need to feel chastised for what you don't know. I certainly didn't intend to chastise anyone. But that's really the point. If you don't know it's better to find out before you go. Lead did the right thing and I'm pretty sure he has more confidence now. Confident, informed prospectors are 32.8% more successful and at least 13.2% more attractive.
  5. I'm not all that familiar with the tenement system. Do these tenements have rights to all minerals or just gold? In the United State most mining claims are not located for gold. Closed mining claims are more about looking back on other people's dreams and hopes for a non gold mineral deposit. Assuming these closed claims represent potential gold mineralization without other confirmation can lead to wild goose chases. Is it the same with tenements?
  6. Low risk? Usually. The land in question is in a very productive historical and current mining district and has been under mineral lease to a large mining company in the past. It's a purchased property - It's never been claimed and the original patent was not mineral related. It really is more complex than the owner told me it was OK. Maybe if you were detecting barren sand pits it wouldn't be a problem but entering private property in a mineralized district still requires due diligence. At the very least you need to check if the owner actually owns the minerals. More than 90% of landowners in the U.S. do not have mineral rights on their property. If you asked them most would say "of course I own the minerals".
  7. MLRS lode claim lines on private property could indicate: The private property does not have mineral rights and the minerals are open to location. (least likely) Individuals have located mining claims on private land not open to location. (most likely) The MLRS PLSS mapping is messed up and the claims are displaying in the wrong place. (likely depending on location - Oregon and California in particular are a mess) The MLRS can not be used to determine mineral rights. The BLM does not determine individual or private mineral rights. To determine if the land is open to location you will need to study the Master Title Plat for the Township. If you need help with a particular location PM me with the Township/Range/Section(s).
  8. Mining claims can only be located on public lands open to location. Private land is neither public nor open to location so the simplest answer is "no". If the property owner owns both the surface and the minerals there is no need for a mining claim and locating one would be a waste of money and time as the claim would be invalid. If the private land was acquired through a land patent that did not include the minerals then the owner can not give you permission to prospect. There are many types of land patents that did not transfer the minerals into private ownership. The most common in Nevada are the Stock Raising and Homestead (SRH) patents. If the land was acquired through an SRH patent there is a process whereby you can prospect and locate mining claims on those private lands with 30 day notice and bond. Clear as mud?
  9. I think you may misunderstand the situation Dan. I like what Phil and Steve have been doing. They are probably the most engaged and sharing of the hobby miners in California. Their outings have been fun and instructional for many visitors. The Coolgardie area is not mining restricted. It is in fact part of one of the largest and most productive mining complexes on earth. There is still a lot of active commercial mining interest there. The Section the Placer Pete mining claim is located in is not limited to hobby mining. As I stated before it may be possible to arrange a mining lease with the BLM. The restriction on that section is not a prohibition on mining but it is closed to mining claims. There can be no valid mining claims located in that section because it is "not open to entry" (NOE). That is clearly marked on the Master Title Plat as well as the case file for the Placer Pete claim. I hope Phil and Steve can keep doing what they have been doing. I doubt the California BLM will change their internal policy to never check on mining claim validity. As long as BLM does not do what claim owners pay them to do the Placer Pete "mining claim" is probably going to keep paying annual fees for a void mining claim. I don't have a beef with Steve or Phil. Having a beef with California BLM would be futile and one sided. The California BLM has not administered mining claims for many years. My interest in this is to educate small miners why many (most?) of their mining claims are eventually declared void by the BLM. Locating mining claims on land not open to location is the small miners most common mistake. Not checking the federal government's official record of mineral title on the Master Title Plat is the main reason these void claims are located. The Placer Pete claim is a perfect example of this problem. Learn to use the Master Title Plats and the problem disappears. It's a simple matter of education. Land Matters has videos and books for download in their Tutorials section that delve into using Master Title Plats. It's not simple stuff, you will have to study for a few hours. Master Title Plats are the first, and often the most important, step in locating a mining claim. Millions of dollars are wasted each year by miners paying for and developing deposits on "claims" that are void when they are located. Educate yourself and prosper. Barry
  10. It could be a borrow pit. I'm not seeing any real mining activity but I haven't been there. Try turning on the "MRDS Mines" and "Topo Mineral Feature" map layers on your Land Matters map. If it's a traditional borrow pit it will be listed. If it's on BLM managed land check the MLRS case reports for mineral leases or sales. It could be an active site even if there are no mining claims. https://reports.blm.gov/report/MLRS/112/CR-Geographic-Report-with-Customer/
  11. I was thinking the "drill" hole was actually a fumarole. It looks bigger than 2" in the video. Fumeroles are very common in volcanic ash deposits. I'm not positive about the volcanic ash but in the video the broken surfaces exhibit the characteristics I've come to associate with ash flows. Most active mining in Elko is for gold and/or silver although there are large Barite and Limestone mining operations as well.
  12. It looks like a volcanic ash deposit. If so it could be they were prospecting for quality pozzolan. There is a lot of pozzolan mining in Nevada. Is this in Churchill county? There has been a lot of sampling and claiming of pozzolan deposits there recently. Quality pozzolan can be claimed like any other valuable mineral. Regular volcanic ash deposits can't support a mining claim. Quantifying and proving a pozzolan deposit is usually done by scraping the surface in the exploration stage. https://www.concrete.org/tools/frequentlyaskedquestions.aspx?faqid=689
  13. I don't see any evidence of mining. More than likely what you are seeing is a mass wasting flow event. Mass wasting is a very important concept for placer gold prospectors to understand. More placer gold is moved and concentrated by mass wasting than flooding. https://opengeology.org/textbook/10-mass-wasting/
  14. I haven't seen a Dalas in years. The last one I bought was about $6.95 but I'll bet the price has gone up! Do miners still use them? They were originally a bowling accessory but they are good for drywashing and detecting too.
  15. I haven't been out to Steve and Phil's claim but I've spent some time nearby in that desert and several others. What visitors experience during the day and what patient people experience at night in the desert are two different worlds. It's more like a jungle at night. The wonder of the night sky. The spicy smells of desert plants waking up for the cool night air. Busy busy critters everywhere. Hard to reconcile. To this day I wonder where all those critters are hiding during the day. It's a kind of magic.
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