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Bishop

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    north phoenix
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    gpx 6000, gold monster,

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  1. today was my first trip for the new year. also first time out with the new coiltec 5x10. a new wash i was hunting is/was someones honey hole as evidenced by the massive amount of placering and fresh dig holes around. the first target didn't show up for a few minutes and when it did show up in the scoop i was having a hard time believing that the bird-shot pellet was reason for such a loud signal. after lots more lead i did end up getting a little .33 gram bit. also my new coil top scuff guard my mining partner got me. i like the new coil and will go back to the 11 inch only for better coverage when needed.
  2. nice. always good to see end of year gold. 1604 bits. that's a hell of a lot of digging. if you don't mind me asking, whats the trash ratio where your at. here in Arizona, im at about 25 to 1. lots of lead and brass/copper. on my 2024 hunts i am going to track that info a bit closer. i was going to get out tomorrow, but am feeling a little sick and looks like rain next weekend. so here is my end of year pic. the silver quarter was an eye ball find last month.
  3. myself, i would not stake a mining claim for a detecting spot much less buy one. i don't even think i would even stake a claim for placer at this time, and i know a few decent areas i could. hard rock? maybe, depends. i have seen some stuff. im still figuring a few things out. one thing with mining claim flippers or miners is they want easy access, a road or a trail, and somewhat close to a town. they know most people from out of state are not going to buy a claim if they cant drive right up to it unload, camp and start mining. the last of the good open ground is away from easy access. learn to navigate my land matters and check out the website of the County Recorder’s Office for the County you are interested in. look under, section, township, range or name. maybe under the scroll down menu, look for notice of mining location. you will likely see the claim paperwork and even the map of the claim. gold goes down hill and doesn't seem to stop at claim boundaries. or you could skip all the paperwork and research, join a club and get a small rv of some kind and be a snow bird. i was out this last last weekend and cant believe how many rv and vans from back east are just camped out enjoying the desert. hundreds of them. best of luck to you.
  4. its was bit cool at 48 degrees this morning but it warmed up to 72 this afternoon, perfect nugget hunting weather. my buddy and i got to the area just before sun up. hiked 1/4 mile to an old patch that i found about 20 years ago. he picked up the 3 bits on the left, almost right away including the wire gold bit, it was a sunbaker. it is one gram. i snagged the spongy bit top right. its .4 of a gram. for its size it gave a very soft signal. we then went prospecting for new spots. found a small wash that had ironstone and quartz that looked good. after about an hour i pulled the 2 gram bit from about 6 inches down in a decomposing bedrock crack. might be a one nugget wash. we will be hitting it again soon. after the last few trips watching my partner getting more bits with his 5x10 coiltec than i was getting. i was thinking of getting one. then my work gave me a $500 gift card so sometime next week ill be getting mine. good coil for sniping work. nice 5 hour hunt, total weight was 4 grams.
  5. over the years i have had at least 70+ rattlesnake encounters. i remember one summer in the late 90s, seeing one or 2 every trip. nothing in the world like the taste of adrenaline when you almost step on them and start doing the snake dance. i have found (for me) dropping a good size rock on them kills them faster than a pistol. now days, i will only kill one if they are in an area that kids or pets might be around. they have there place in nature. snakes eat the mice and rats that can spread disease.(hantavirus) i read that western diamondbacks can get up to max 8 feet, but i have seen 2 that i would i would swear were 10 foot. one of them i have on an old video. it stretched all the way across one side of a dirt road to the other. that was at Verde river sheep bridge. the other i was detecting. there was a small tree in this little wash.i did not want to get out and go around. so i hunched way down to get under that tree. about 3 steps in i saw the back end of a rattler slithering past. never rattled. my face was about 3 feet from it, and i was kind of stuck in a bad position under that tree. talk about hebejebes. i only seen the back half of it. it was thicker than my upper arm. funny thing about that one was i ran into Skookum, who is a forum member here about a week later. he was hunting in that area and he was telling me about his encounter with the biggest diamondback that he had ever seen. i was like ya, that is a big one. in the last year i have only seen one. i don't know if there are fewer or if im just not seeing them.
  6. roadrunners is a good club. i am a life member. 275 claims, 5500 acres. $340 first year and i think $240 per year until paid off $2000 for life membership. looking at this years newsletters, “Bird Tailings” for the first 8 months of this year they have added 101 new members. i don't know how many total members. there is a small club out of mayer az, big bug mining district, they have 10 claims. some of there claims are very hard to get to. not bad for $42 bucks a year.
  7. Hurricane Hilary is coming and will be very dangerous and more than likely deadly. that being said, i know what you California beach hunter are thinking. just be careful, be safe.
  8. that is some very nice gold. a lot of time, energy and effort for nuggets like that. very selfless and generous of you to give it to the mine. as you said, ENJOY it while you still can. the health thing. i indeed understand. hope your doing well.
  9. they can be made street legal in AZ. i see a few driving around. i looked into getting one. they sell for 6 or 7k. one problem is they max out at about 55 mph. the other problem is that they don't have the articulation needed for old mining roads here. i could see it being useful on a farm or ranch, not so much off road. Mike Festiva has 7 or so videos on his suzuki carry 4x4 Kei mini truck camper build. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KB3OZUVSNZc if you scroll through he has some interesting off road builds.
  10. here is a treasure map. if you take the time to learn how to use it. http://www.mylandmatters.org/
  11. (I'd rather get less gold if it means less trash) the old timers were everywhere. when you are finding miners trash from the 1800s its probably a good idea to slow down and have a look around. (I don't prefer locations where I know others have detected already) you might be surprised just how far some will go to find nuggets. (The more remote, the better.) ill just say be careful. this morning i found a 60 year old guy from Texas broke down. he was nugget hunting. he was pretty far back in there. he had busted his oil pan on a very bad road. i had to use a tow strap to pull him out over some spots i don't even like to take my 4x4. kind of messed up my day. you didn't say when you were planning to do this, its 90 degrees here in AZ today and will be pushing 100 next week.
  12. i think it was 1995. i bought a Tesoro Diablo II Gold Demon from Arizona Al who had a little shop in Glendale. as i only had a car, i only got out when a friend of mine with a truck could get out. i think it was about 8 to 10 trips within about a years time i found a 1.5 gram nugget shaped like a small pinto bean. i was out in that area this morning and thought i would give it a look. i have hit this spot a lot with lots of different machines. and was not expecting to find anything. all these years and i have been walking past this .56. it was 8 feet away from the first one i ever found on the opposite side of the wash. it was under 5 inches of old dry washer tailings.
  13. first pic, an old miners cabin,1930? San Domingo. back in the late 90s i was on a quad and had to take shelter in it during a hail storm. fire place worked nice. 2nd a rich little rivulet that had a nice bit of gold next to that tree. 3rd a too hard to get to wash that had a lot of small bits in it. 4th is the small hill i think spit out the 6.4 gram specimen i found recently. work in progress. heads down you Arizona boys. snakes are up and moving. i saw my first rattler last Sunday.
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