Clay Diggins

They are back up but they have removed 91% of the claimant names and addresses and all of the case files.

A definite hit on the usefulness of their system.

Land Matters maps do still display claimant names to help your searches.

Seems this is where people are getting the idea that highbankers are restricted to within 100 yards.

California Code, Fish and Game Code - FGC § 5653

(e) It is unlawful to possess a vacuum or suction dredge in areas, or in or within 100 yards of waters, that are closed to the use of vacuum or suction dredges.

Rather curious reading of a law that begins by stating:

(a) The use of vacuum or suction dredge equipment by a person in a river, stream, or lake of this state is prohibited, except as authorized under a permit issued to that person by the department in compliance with the regulations.

No mention of highbanking anywhere in there. Or any other law for that matter. FGC 5653 is all about in stream work.

I know California has a lot of big head agency types that think whatever they say is the law. They can be scary. Sadly to this date no one has been able to point to a law against highbanking, a ticket for highbanking or a court conviction for highbanking. Nor is there a permit available or required under the law.

Yet the belief continues to spread. Sometimes I think small miners are their own worst enemies.

Highbank or don't highbank - it's your choice. I'm only sharing what I know, I have no intent to encourage people to do anything they are uncomfortable with. I no longer mine in California but I know several miners that are openly highbanking there and have had no problems.

Thanks for sharing.

Barry

There are no federal regulations for in stream suction dredging so I don't see how this bill would have any effect on that?

I'm pretty sure that Congress doesn't have the power to change Executive branch regulations. Separation of powers and all that Constitutional stuff.

Congress does hold the purse strings so they could defund/underfund some departments/functions in the budget. It's been done before.

As an example of how this could work Congress does have the power to end the moratorium on mineral patents. They removed the funding only for processing mineral patents in 1993. Mineral patents are still legal and a possibility if the BLM had the funds to process the patent applications. Without the funds they aren't allowed to take a patent application across the counter or assign it a case number because that would cost more than $0.

Patent application processing is an Executive branch function. Congress has to renew that defunding decision in every budget - so to begin mineral patents again all they have to do is NOT VOTE to defund the patent processing in any single federal budget. If they don't vote to defund the BLM processing of patents the funds and process become automatically available again without any action by Congress. I wonder if any miner has ever bugged their Congresscritter not to vote on patent funding?

Sometimes it's the most obvious stuff that gets passed by.

An insurance appraiser is your best bet if you have finds with gems. They are trained and have no financial interest in buying your finds. Jewelers sometimes know enough to give a reasonable appraisal but unless you have a working relationship with a jeweler you don't know their level of experience or honesty.

GIA does not do appraisals - they never have and never will. GIA will do gem grading for a price but they will not appraise the value.

A GIA certified gemologist (GG) can be a good choice but make sure they have the certificates/training for the type of gems you have. There are separate certifications for diamonds and colored gems.

If a jeweler or appraiser doesn't have a gem lab give them a pass. Just looking at stones or using a diamond testing pen is not adequate. There are insurance appraisers that have GIA GG gemological training. These are known as Certified Insurance Appraisers - they take special insurance appraisal courses after they receive their Graduate Gemologist certificate from GIA.

Nice work Tom. Very well made chart. Thanks for sharing!

5 hours ago, GhostMiner said:

If you go out there, make sure you stay off this guy's claim.

 

 

Nothing like a little drama to get the conversation going ghostminer!

Jeff's claims are about 180 miles north of Wickenburg by mule. About 6 more miles by car. I think your average Wickenburg prospector is safe from Jeff as long as they stay off the internet.  I'll bet he appreciates you putting up his link though. 😃

You can't legally prospect Arizona State lands with a recreational permit. That's a big no no.

You can legally prospect a specific section of State land with a Mineral Exploration Permit. That permit is $500 and takes about a month to process so it's probably not appropriate for the casual visitor to be directed to State lands.

Stay off State Lands for prospecting if you want to enjoy your visit. Locally to Wickenburg most BLM managed land that hasn't been claimed is open to prospecting. Your best bet is to pick a spot near where there are existing mining claims. You can get a view of which Sections are open by visiting the Land Matters Mining Claim Maps. It's free and the most current information available on the internet.

47 minutes ago, cobill said:

Barry, 

An update from CO...my claims are now considered ACTIVE and OK, but names and addresses are still XXXX...looks like this is for privacy reasons:

Good news Bil! Thanks for the update. I know a lot of mining claim owners that have had their closed claim status corrected. Quite a few more are still waiting.

There can be no expectation of privacy when you locate a claim. By law a public notice (including your name and contact information) is required to be made to locate a mining claim. If you don't make a public record, including your name and contact address, your claim is null and void after 90 days or less.

By law Personally Identifiable Information protection does not include information already made public by the individual. Every single mining claim owner made their information public to receive the benefit of a mining claim.

The BLM is not redacting this information to help miners. They are tying to protect some particular individuals but I can assure you that no one on this forum is in that protected group.

Welcome gialovesminerals. Your material looks more like slag than Magnetite. Normally you won't find vesicles in magnetite.  Why would you want to mine Magnetite?

Land Matters did update their Mining Claim Maps today.

I've received a lot of calls and emails from claim owners saying their claims were closed in error. Some State BLM offices have admitted there are errors and are in the process of fixing them.

If your claim was closed it may have been reopened. There were 1,791 new claims since the mass closures. Maybe your claim has been reopened and is one of the "new" claims? Here's a tip on how Land Matters makes that easier to find.

TIP: Land Matters Mining Claim maps all have a map display layer named "New Claims". This map layer is turned off when you first start the mining claim map. If you select the checkbox next to "New Claims" and click the reload map control all the claims that have been located since the last update will be highlighted in red. You can even uncheck the other claim layers and the only mining claims displayed will be the claims located in the most recent update.

Barry

1 hour ago, Redz said:

I wonder how much actual consultation with stakeholders they did? Does this even feature in their decision making?

There was zero consultation. We received notice well after the fact.

The BLM removed the owner names once before. From January 21 - April 1 of 2021 all of the customer information was removed from their database. That was a disaster for claim owners and the BLM. Someone put them back on the right course back then, we can only hope someone will be there to do that again.

The BLM mining claims database consists of nearly 250 tables - there is about about 32 Gb of data in those tables. The customer tables are an important part of that structure with many tables depending on the customer tables to be complete.

Land Matters for several years had a good working relationship with the BLM. We participated in several stakeholder projects including the MLRS development. For the last couple of years the BLM has become uncommunicative and unresponsive - we no longer receive the updates and notices the BLM used to share with their stakeholders regularly. Getting an actual response to a question now usually results in replies so far off base you have to wonder if they even read the question - if they even respond. From what we have heard this is now standard procedure for the BLM, it's not just Land Matters getting this treatment.

There are some good people in the BLM. I've known several thorough the years. Most of the people we relied on in the BLM have now quit. Virtually everything is run by private contractors now and we aren't allowed to contact them directly unless they are one of the contractor assigned Public Relations employees. I'm sure there are still some good people at the BLM ...

Reducing public access to public information is not a appropriate policy direction for any Federal agency but it is particularly disturbing that the record keeper for the public domain has decided, without notice, to limit the public's access to the mineral ownership status of those public lands.

Barry

10 minutes ago, cobill said:

Clay, 

I just checked one of my CO. claims and it's been CLOSED. I sent the claim paperwork on 7/26 called BLM in Sept and they said they didn't have the personnel to handle filings. I received my stamped/approved filings dated 5 Nov and my claims were marked Abandoned/Forfeited on 17 Nov.  Will the CO. BLM office fix their late processing and correct this?

Bill

I have no idea Bill. The BLM has beconme very uncommunicative after years of a good relationship. We used to work with them closely on several projects including the MLRS. We didn't even receive notice of this data redaction until a week after they had done it.

If I were in your situation I would put my concerns in writing and send them a copy by registered mail. I think at this point it's going to be up to individual claim owners to get the BLM to correct their errors.

Good luck and keep us posted.

Barry

I didn't say they were planning on taking away the database jasong. I wrote that the online database access is gone now. It's been gone most of the day. Right now I can occasionally get a response from it but it fails more times than not.

Here is the actual impact of the BLM's redaction of claim owner names.

237,692 owner names removed. 91% of all names including historical records.

And here is what a case file serial register page looks like now.

You will find those replacement XXXXs in all the BLM records now - not just mining claims. If there was a claim transfer XXXXs same XXXXs for NOIs and POOs. New owner or drop an owner XXXXs.

14 minutes ago, GotAU? said:

With that many closures one would think it was another administration error like last year… maybe?

Oh ...probably.

I'm sure it's just a coincidence the error happened on the same date last year. 😅

10 hours ago, Jim_Alaska said:

Clay, your argument is not with me. I post the information I have and state my personal experiences in this 13 year fight with authorities. Like I said, 13 years has passed; this is not new stuff just because it is new to you personally. It has effectively shut down mining in CA for that length of time.

You asked me to point you to where the law can be read and I did that.

I am sorry for being so abrupt, but I have nothing to prove here. You are free to take this up with the appropriate authorities and pose your arguments to them. We did, all the way to the supreme court.

No arguments Jim, just facts. I'm not trying to "win" anything here. I've been in this business decades before the dredge moratorium in California. I first dredged in Californisa in 1973. I was personally involved in gathering support in the mining industry for California dredgers. I've been writing about these California mandates and mining law in general for more than 15 years. None of this is new to me.

I know you have miners best interests at heart Jim, I don't have any personal animosity towards you. In fact I've found your posts to be informative and caring. The fact you seem to want to apply the dredge permitting scheme to all placer mining in California is an error on your part. We all make errors.

The only reason I pursue this issue with you is that you keep misinterpreting the California laws on highbanking. I'm not blaming you personally but these kind of misunderstandings have led to a lot of California small miners actually believing highbanking is prohibited in California. That's not the case as I have demonstrated and the CDFW made clear in their reply to the placer miners questions.

Spreading this type of misinformation hurts small miners only. The big mining companies find these type of claims of mining restrictions amusing. I find it harder and harder to get them interested in supporting small miners issues just because of these constant unsubstantiated rumors and misunderstandings. Many of these mining companies were ready to stand by dredgers when the moratorium began but virtually all that sentiment has been drained by the ignorant actions of a few in the small mining activist community.

I'm not pointing a finger or blaming you Jim but I am calling out the errors in your theory about the banning of highbanking. Please reread my posts, I think you might come to a better understanding of why I'm interested in setting the record straight. It has nothing to do with argument and everything to do with educating miners about mining law.

I don't see anywhere in the CDFW reply you posted where they said highbanking or pumping water from the stream to your highbanker was a problem. In fact they say just the opposite.

CDFW said this in their reply (CDFW quotes in red):

possession of your highbanker more than 100 yards from a California river, stream, or lake would not be a violation per se of Fish and Game Code section 5653, subdivision (e).

As to the use of a motorized pump to pump river water to the highbanker more than 100 yards from the river, the principal issue relevant in the first instance under the two controlling sections of the Fish and Game Code is not use of the pump or the water returning to the river.

Here is the CDFW's sticking point. IF you source the materials for processing in your highbanker from the stream or lake that would be a violation of 5653.

The relevant issue is the source of the materials you would process in the highbanker and the purpose.

If you aren't going to be processing material from the "bed, bank, or channel of the river" you are not subject to the restrictions of 5653.

The 5653 dredging law is specifically about dredging in a stream or lake. Not a thing in there about highbanking or processing material sourced from outside of the stream bed. Nothing in there about moving water from the stream bed. Nothing in there about pumping water out of the stream. I've already posted the California laws for highbanking. I've already posted the laws about riparian stream use. There are already laws that govern these activities.

There is a basic principle of law that says existing laws are never to be assumed to be repealed by implication. In other words unless a new law spells out that the old law is being replaced the old law is still in effect. In this case since there is already a law about processing minerals out of stream a newer law that doesn't specifically repeal that law and doesn't even mention processing materials out of stream can't have changed the existing law.

So now I've given you California State law governing and permitting out of stream placer mining, California State law governing and permitting riparian rights to stream water and you have the CDFW response specifically stating the issue isn't about highbanking or pumping water but about where you get the minerals you are going to run through your highbanker.

I'm still puzzled why you would think any of this means highbanking is outlawed?

1 hour ago, Jim_Alaska said:

Why the "confused" emoticons? The ban on using mechanical devices to recover gold is in place and has been for quite some time. Miners, myself included, have fought against this regulation and spent millions through various organizations since the beginning. We took it all the way the The Supreme Court, with the help of The Pacific Legal Foundation. But at that level the court refused to hear it; which is not uncommon given their case load.

Just because someone got away with whatever means they used doesn't mean you won't get cited, or that the regulation is not in effect.

I'm still looking for the California law that banned "mechanical devices to recover gold".

I'm pretty good at finding laws and I'm "confused" how you found a law that I can't find and why you won't point us to where that law can be read.

There is already law in California regarding placer mining with surface water.

No placer mining operator shall mine by the placer process on any stream or on the watershed of any stream tributary directly or indirectly to the Sacramento River or the San Joaquin River without taking both of the following precautions to prevent pollution of the stream by the effluent from his or her operations:

(a) Constructing a settling pond or ponds of sufficient size to permit the clarification of water used in the mining processes before the water is discharged into the stream.

(b) Mixing with the effluent from mining operations aluminum sulphate and lime, or an equivalent clarifying substance which will cause the solid material in the effluent to coagulate and thus avoid rendering the water in the stream unfit for domestic water supply purposes.

There is quite a bit more on the well described procedure for placer mining, including how to give proper notice.

https://law.justia.com/codes/california/2021/code-prc/division-3-5/chapter-3/

To my mind it would be best to follow the law before approaching any agency for their opinion. Sometimes it's better to have all your ducks in a row before arguing what a duck is.

1 hour ago, GhostMiner said:

The ban is caused by the water board, not the Forest Service. The FS had been approving plans in out area until 2022 when the state raised hell about all of this. They are using the dredging laws to stop the use of pumps in streams. At present I am trying to get a clarification on wether they will ban the use of pumps in streams if the water is to be used at a greater distance than 100 yds. Our local minerals agent informed me she was instructed by here boss to stop approving plans involving the creeks for now because they are now working with the state on all of this. Not sure where this will end up but most likely court. One of my partners in the company is working on this at the present time so we are early in the process of sorting this out. There are federal mining laws that should protect the ability to mine on claims that are legally filed. 

You would think California would learn. Remember the Big Cut placer gold mine and how the county and state were screaming "illegal mining"? The state and county claimed he had no right to mine his land. He mined it anyway.

https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna46309739

The mine owner was fined 900,000 dollars (which they never had to pay). The end result of the harassment was a federal judgement for 107 million dollars in favor of the miner.

The Sacramento County Supervisor, planning director and aggregate resource manager for the county had more than 2 million dollars in judgements against them for their involvement in suppressing his mining rights.

https://verdictsearch.com/verdict/historical-mine-operators-claimed-county-revoked-right-to-mine/

There are many laws in California regarding using surface waters. All of those water laws are based on the constitutional obligation of the state to ensure that the water is used for a beneficial purpose.

California State Constitution Section 2 Article 10

https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=CONS&sectionNum=SEC. 2.&article=X

There are no laws prohibiting the use of water for mining because under California law mining is a beneficial use of water.

The state water board agrees:

The following definitions for beneficial uses are applicable statewide;

Uses of water for industrial activities that do not depend primarily on water quality, including, but not limited to, mining, cooling water supply, hydraulic conveyance, gravel washing, fire
protection, or oil well repressurization

https://www.waterboards.ca.gov/about_us/performance_report_1314/plan_assess/docs/bu_definitions_012114.pdf

The water board has no power to make laws or change the meaning of laws. The California constitution would have to be changed to give the water board the power to ban surface water use for mining.

Rob rents his forum software just like the other forums. Rob can't fix the software if something is wrong with his forum, only the company he's renting from can do that. I doubt his software has any problem. If it did all the other renter's sites would have the same warning. The forum url subdomain is redirected on the provider's servers correctly. Rob has no control over that, it's strictly a function of the providers software service.

Usually these PUP warnings are more about the quality of the antivirus software than they are about potentially(?) unwanted programs. Security software makers benefit directly from false warnings and the fear they create, very few are straight up about that aspect of their industry. I won't have any McAfee products on my computers but that's an informed personal choice based on experience and not a subject for a detecting forum.

The web is a big, scary and sometimes dangerous place. You should always be aware of what links you are clicking on and what content you are downloading. Most of all remember there is no such thing as a free lunch. That is 99.9% of web security in a nutshell. Almost all security problems from the web are created directly by user actions, no security software can save you from that.

Rob's forum does not have a virus. I just reviewed his code. There is no virus and no indication there ever was one. The warning you received is about a malicious url - not a virus. Big difference. The way uBlock works the warning may not even be about the site you are trying to visit.

It's a 24 hour filter block that will be lifted after the issue is resolved. If you didn't install and use the free third party software that put a warning notice on the site you wouldn't see any block or any problems. A lot of times these warnings are more about poorly coded "free" antivirus and "security" software than about any real threat to users.

Mike I'm surprised you would post something like this. Rob is a good guy that has worked hard for years to build his business, serve this community and his family. Spreading this kind of disinformation can cause real damage to Rob, his customers and his family. Saying these things about an internet business is really no different than painting slurs on a shop owners window. I doubt you intended harm here Mike but please think twice about raising panic and fear about someone's business. Maybe choose your words more carefully next time?

Barry

Interesting...

California is without a doubt the hardest of the mining states to jump through the hoops.

I work with several mining companies who have permitted large operations in California in the past two years. The fact is if you know what you are doing and have the funding to carry through your plan even a major operation in California can be permitted, built and operating in under two years.

The same type operation in another mining state would be mining in less than a year.

That's my experience. I realize others have different experiences but I'm not buying into the "impossible" narrative. If you have mineral rights on federal lands you have the right to mine those minerals.

As phrunt pointed out that video is not that far from the reality. With enough AA Alkaline batteries these electric cars would run fine - until the batteries run down. Other than the battery chemistry the video pretty much reflects the reality of electric cars today.

Neither Tesla nor Toyota manufacture batteries.

Tesla has a partnership with Panasonic who manufactured the 18650 batteries previously used in Teslas and the current 2170 they are now using. It takes 4,680 2170 batteries to make the battery pack in a Tesla model Y. The 18650 battery requires 8,256 cells. The 2170 battery pack is about 300 pounds lighter than the equivalent 1860 battery pack. The 2170 is nearly twice the mass and more than twice the output of the old 18650 battery.

Panasonic is also manufacturing the replacement 4680 batteries Tesla is now incorporating into their manufacturing. The new (much larger) 4680 battery supplies 5 times as much power as the 2170 and are quite a bit more efficient. The Panasonic 4680 is not just a bigger lithium battery it has a tabless design which is an actual concrete improvement in Lithium battery design. It's how they managed to finally make a bigger lithium battery instead of using all those flashlight batteries everyone else is still stuck with.

Toyota sources most of their EV batteries from Panasonic and LG. Toyota uses both Lithium and NIMH batteries in their cars and don't generally reveal which you are purchasing. Toyota has had plans to manufacture a new solid state lithium battery in a partnership with LG (South Korea) since 2018. Two months ago Toyota pledged more than 5 billion dollars towards that or possibly another partnership or two. At present neither the money nor the batteries exist but the plan is to be in production by 2025.

I think Chevy got the jump on everyone. Their Bolt uses a pouch battery (like in your cellphone) that has a runaway problem (fire) that caused them to recall all 141,000 of their Bolts and stop manufacturing new Bolts. Unlike Tesla and Toyota, Chevy for the time being, is no longer bleeding money by selling electric Bolt cars at a financial loss. In my book that's a win with the bonus being there are now fewer electric cars catching fire and burning to the ground, with toxic fumes, in our public places.

Chevy Bolts are now being offered for sale with a new battery pack and a $6,000 lower price. You can order one now but there is no plan to deliver Bolts until "sometime" in 2023. Chevy is offering current Bolt owners $6,000 cash to promise not to sue Chevy for any battery issues they might encounter.

Solid state batteries aren't new technology. "Solid state" when referring to battery technology is simply a solid electrolyte battery as opposed to the liquid or gel type electrolytes used in lithium batteries now. Solid state batteries have been in common use since the 1950s. The first solid state lithium battery was manufactured in the 1990s. There are a lot of problems to solve before a solid state lithium battery can be considered as a real candidate for replacing the current lithium batteries in autos.

Being that 18650 batteries cost about $5 retail and less than $3 wholesale I doubt the cost of Minelab battery packs has much to do with what batteries are being used in cars. Does anyone know how many 18650 batteries Minelab is using in their battery pack?