Allen in MT

Met John B. many moons ago and he gave me permission to hunt his claims on many occasions in Gold Basin. He even sent me a piece of Meteorit that was found in Montana and I to belong to that 1 ouncer club with a 5.56oz piece I found. Yes, John was a Gold master guy in more ways than one. May he R.I.P.

Finding ladies old vintage wrist watches at yard sales and converting them to necklace pieces filled with placer gold. My girls now have one.

Now don't get picky.

So how long you been detecting? As for me the 1st detector I had in my hands was a AN/PRS7 mine detector 1968 in Nam, Then I bought my 1st detector a Whites Coinmaster in 1970.

For a number of years I have had the opportunity of detecting behind an operating gold mine. I get to detect the bedrock behind the excavator before they back fill, Anything under an ounce I get to keep and everything over an ounce I split with the owner each day. And yes, there were a few times I split gold with the owner. This particular day I got a loud signal and found a pick in a low depression of the bedrock shown in picture. It looked like maybe it had been a new one as the tips weren't worn down, but it had been in the ground water for a long time. The handle had totally rotted away or had been broken off as some of it was still in the pick. But judging by the looks of the pick that cold water had really worn the metal. How long ago the old timer's 1st worked this I don't know. It had to have been buried a long time to look like this on both sides. It is a neat conversation piece.

I found this ring years ago on the beach of Flathead Lake. It has the look of a Black Hills ring and is 14KP (plumb) It had a cubic zirconia in it, and I replaced that with a 1 carat Montana Sapphire that I found at Gem Mountain and had cut and kept it for myself.

Well, it was early, and we wanted to get out to the hills, but we had to wait. It was an election day, and you know we had to wait so that we could do our patriotic duty and vote for the lessor of two evils. Voting done were off, of course we forgot half the stuff that we normally take. We have talked about making a check list of things that we need every time we head for the hills. This particular day we are looking for a mine that we found on a map on the internet. Once in the hills we have no problem finding the site, as we are guided by a reference satellite photo and info from DEQ. After looking things over and making plans to come back we are off looking for other mine sites. We are following the road till we are at its highest point when we come around the corner and low and behold there is one snow drift (the only snow drift left on the mountain) about 40' in length, course back about 100 yards there is another road that goes around this spot. But no, we stop to size it up and I says to Ralph (my prospecting partner) (name changed to protect his identity), go for it Ralph, you can make it. He locks in the 4-wheel drive and off we go. Once we get a full pickup length into it, I realize, faster Ralph faster. We get to about the middle of the drift, and oh crap, there we stop, dead in the middle. Now this is the only sight of snow left on the mountain, and we had to find it and we only have one shovel (his). After digging for a while, we find out the wheels don't touch the ground, they just go round and round, we are high centered. After digging all the snow out from all 4 wheels we gather some wood and rocks and filling in the space between the tires and the ground and after a few tries we did make it out. To pooped to go far so it was time for lunch. A little later after touring around and looking at old mine sites we set our sights on a dig hole and drag out the detectors, lots of old square nails and positive hot rocks. I'm using the GB2 with 6" coil and Ralph is using the GM4 with regular coil. After a few nails and hot rocks there's this nice Zippp zipppp and flipping to iron ID it sounds good, (just like big nails) and after thinking it's another nail out pops this little golden picker, a 4.5 gm piece. Hey this is alright. I rake some more dirt down and tell my partner, you’ve got a bigger coil, check this hole now see if there anything left. He digs a few more nails and then he moves to another spot and continues detecting, so I go back to the hole and then ZZZZZIIIIPPPPPP ZZIIPP. dang another big square nail, right! Dig a little more, run the magnet through the dirt looking for the nail, still nothing ZZZZZIIIIPPPPPP ZZIIPP now this sounds good, and I grab a hand full of dirt, check the hole nothing, got it in my hand, Hey Ralph look at this, is this what I think it is, Yup, where'd you find it, In the hole you just checked. Anyway, out pops this little, bigger picker, a 30.6 gm. Nothing else found that day. But it was a good day. Allen C

Yes Gerry, it's me.

No I don't.

I have a set of 3" brass screen sieves with catch pan and lid. For classifying your gold into different screen size. The screen size is 4, 6, 8, 10, 14, 20 & 28 Mesh. I made a PVC tube with bubble wrap inside for safe keeping. They are in like new shape. Selling the set for $250.00 shipped

This rock I picked off the Yellowstone River in eastern Montana as it looked odd and then sliced it to see what was inside. ???

Anybody slice a meteorite and make jewelry out of it. These I did with a Gold Basin and had it wrapped in sterling silver for necklace for my girls.

Made this little video a number of years ago and thought I would share. enjoy

when you are on crack in Montana