Lanny

Thanks for the compliment Fred, truly appreciated.

All the best,

Lanny

A Lonesome Nugget Tale

Flashback to the the summer of '99, and I was swinging the SD2100 up in Northern British Columbia. We four-wheeled up an incredibly bad road to get to the site. The road was so bad that one of the other mining operations had dropped a big four-wheeled military surplus truck into one hole, and the unit sunk down far past the axles. After fetching a Cat, they finally got it out.

So, this was the same road we had to negotiate, with the same hole, and we moved very carefully around the edges of it, as well as around other nasty water traps until we finally made it to a small creek in the high, northern mountains where the road turned into a rough trail. Being muddy and slick, the truck started to slip off the road, and we had to stop, walking was the only way forward

I got set up, made a lot of noise to alert the Grizzlies in those thick pines that we were in the area, and then I set off to do some detecting. It was a sunny day which meant the bugs were bad, but there were butterflies, songbirds and beautiful, iridescent humming birds at work on the alpine blossoms. High overhead, thin white clouds drifted on the mountain currents.

Bordering the side of the trail, there was a long stretch of exposed bedrock that the Old-timers had cleaned off in the 1800's; however, as I detected, all I found were various sizes of square nails, bits of old tin cans, and tiny pieces of wire.

A bit later, I spotted the remains of an old cabin farther up the trail. I scouted around it and tried some detecting, but there was so much trash under the moss beside the building that I gave up after a short while. I marched over to the creek and was confronted with piles of Old-timer hand-stacks, ones left where they'd worked the creek bed. However, all I found was the regular trash plus bits of lead from tin can solder.

I worked my way back down the trail to where the truck was parked. My buddy was slugging it out in the brush while swinging his 2100, and he was in a serious war with the bugs, and the bugs were winning! In retreat, he came blitzing back to the truck for bug dope, and off he went in a different direction.

So, that left me standing alone by the truck. I'd already detected all of the exposed bedrock I could find, but I'd noticed a curious spot earlier back up the trail where someone had dug a test hole and piled a big mound of muck beside the road.

Since I had nothing else to do, and since my buddy was eagerly donating to the Northern Bug Blood Bank, I wandered down to the test hole. I detected all around the bottom of the hole and only found a few bits of tin, and two square nails. On the sides of the hole I found more nails, but these were round nails, so obviously this was an area that was worked in the 30's. To elaborate, there were more miners active in this particular goldfield in the 30's than there were in the 1800's gold strike.

At the far end of the test hole, there was a large boulder. I scanned it, and the whole thing was a hot rock! I'm no geologist, so I have no idea what kind of rock it was, but the 2100 constantly sounded off on it no matter how I configured it. However, just to the side of it was a little dike of dirt, one pushed up from the test hole. I climbed up on top and started to detect it. The ground was very slippery, and the next thing I knew, it had caved off and down I rocketed into the muck and water in the bottom of the test hole. (Zero points for grace.)

After that slippery adventure, I was ready to head back to the truck. I was muddy, wet, and tired. It had been a long unrewarding day, yet that far north there's still daylight at eleven p.m., so my stubborn streak kicked in, and I decided I'd claw my way back up to detect the top of that wall of dirt once more. And that's the thing, the material was dirt--no river run in it, just a bunch of black clay and goo (in retrospect, the black should have tipped me off that it came from deep down near bedrock). I walked along more carefully this time, came to the break in the dirt I'd made when I slipped off, and I gingerly slid the coil across the gap. Almost instantly I got a nice sweet signal. This one was nice and smooth, no harsh iron growl.

I worked my way across the breach and set up shop. I passed the coil over the signal again, approaching from a different direction. Still a nice smooth sound and very clear. It sounded like it had to be shallow. I dug down with my plastic scoop and scanned again. The hole was silent, but the scoop had a nice rich sound when I scanned it. I processed the dirt in the scoop, and then dumped the remaining bit in my hand and passed it under the coil. The signal was definitely in my hand. I dropped the dirt onto the coil and, thwack! The object hit the coil. All I could see was that black dirt. I moved the lumps around and one of them squealed when I moved it. I picked it up and rubbed off the dirt. The golden glow confirmed its identity. It was a nice, sassy five-gram nugget.

I detected around the rest of the dirt, but no more luck. When my buddy came out of the bush and saw my nugget, he gave the detected the spot as well, but no luck.

My lonesome nugget was the only one that came to play that day.

All the best,

Lanny

Love the increased price, love it.

All the best,

Lanny

On 1/26/2020 at 4:26 AM, nugget hunter nz said:

Sorry I'm abit late to throw my 2 cents in I've hunted old tailings simalar to your pictures here in nz. Like mentioned big stones means you loose the depth of the stones but big nuggets can end up there so ounce plus nuggets will sing at good depth the smaller piles you can rake down if you want. As for trash these can be really trashy. When I've hunted them I went over the area with gpx and placed we builders flags at every target then when I was done I went over each one with my monster 1000 dug the good targets left the bad and anything I was unsure off I took top layer off to get Beter signal. This alowes you to search with the more powerful pi but saves you digging 50 holes for nothing.. Just an idea but flags can be your friend even in creeks they work a charm 

I really enjoyed this response, lots of good tips won from getting in there to find the gold.

I've hunted coarse and fine tailing piles and found gold in both.

Perseverance is the key as you'll need to move a lot of rock (for the coarse piles), and you'll need to do a lot of raking for the smaller stuff.

It does require dedication and lots of elbow grease, but it can pay off if, as Steve stated, you're in an area where there's been detectable gold found in the past . . . this is a critical tip from Steve.

All the best,

Lanny

Hi there,

Way back in January of 2003, I chose the name my dad always called me for my username, Lanny. My mom put the name of Lance on my birth certificate, but my dad always called me Lanny, so that's the story of my username.

All the best,

Lanny

Lost Drift-Mine Cache

Quite a few summers back, I heard a fascinating story, one set in a mountainous, heavily wooded area with pines, firs, balsams, birches, and aspens. The forest floor is covered in undergrowth, dark canyons abound in the wilderness area, but somehow a tiny human population clings to civilization.

The only way to get to the goldfields is by logging road, always dangerous, often terrifying. Wildlife abound in the cool climate: deer, moose, elk, wolverine, fisher or martin, cougar, grizzly and black bear. And for humans, the far northern latitude ensures ice on the fire bucket in the outfitters tent even on summer mornings.

In that vast northland, rushing streams of icy water race from the mountains into deep glacial lakes, while slower streams are choked with alders. Dark, alpine peaks loom in every direction, their lower reaches covered in deep deposits of boulder clay (thick masses of clay and rock dropped by glaciers), ones that cover ancient streambeds rich in coarse placer.

These thick deposits of boulder clay roof the dark world of the solitary drift miner, for to follow the gold, the miner must find a bedrock outcrop, then tunnel beneath the clay by hand while drifting along the bedrock contours. Constant shoring of the mine is essential (with hand-cut timbers and lagging) to prevent cave-ins.

It is brutal, backbreaking work, as the tunnel height is kept as low to save on materials and labour. As well, boulders are a battle, with the drift-miner detouring over, around, or under the blockages. In addition, when rich ground is hit the miner “rooms out” a large area with parallel tunnels, backfilling as the work progresses. The work is lonely, with long, tedious days, but as the work is done underground, a constant temperature above freezing allows winter-long work, during the long, dark winters. In the spring, when the freshets (spring runoff) start, the pay pile is sluiced with the coarse gold placed in either a poke, or a tobacco can, or in coffee cans when the take is heavy.

Thus some setting and the context for the tale that follows:

Late one chilly evening, as we sat around a warm campfire, the local placer miners told of how several years previous, a reclusive member of their tiny community failed to appear at the log-built community store and post office for his weekly visit.

In the tiny community settlement, every resident rendezvous on the same day, mail day. The miners, loggers, and trappers take time to socialize and to catch up on the news. Clearly, in such a remote area, anytime someone breaks a routine, the locals head out to see what’s wrong.

Sadly, the searchers found the miner dead in his cold cabin. On his table was a nice tub of rich gold concentrates. Coarse it was too. Everything in the cabin was peaceful and in order. No foul play, the miner had passed quietly away in his sleep, off to the big nugget mine in the sky.

The mystery is that as a dedicated drift-miner, he had been mining full-time for decades in a great spot. Yes, decades. His diggings were located on great gold-producing ground. Everyone knew it was so as he always paid for his supplies at the community store in nuggety gold. (They still take gold as payment even today; there’s a set of scales on the store counter.)

However, as is the case in that tiny community, many live alone, just as the dead miner did. So, the local recluses exist without the companionship of spouse or family. They seem to thrive in the solitude.

On a side note, some of the more colorful, mysterious characters there won't allow you to take their photograph (under any circumstances!), which hints of being on the run. In fact, certain ones are. Some have been hiding out since the Vietnam war, unaware that a pardon has been granted.

On a different note, there is no local bank for gold deposits. The nearest bank is four to six hours away, the time depending on the uncertain road conditions. Moreover, heading to the city suits only those that WANT to get out; some never take the opportunity, preferring solitude and isolation.

To return to the story, the deceased miner was working a rich, ancient tertiary channel that resided with stubborn determination under a steep cliff of boulder clay. He had spent endless summers and winters of unimaginable effort tunneling along the bedrock, doggedly staying with the ever-fickle gold. It is understood that the miner's golden challenge is a riddle that forever taunts to be solved, a quest to find the solution to a mystery left eons ago by a coy Mother Nature. Regardless of Mother Nature’s efforts, the miner had solved the riddle; he was one of the masters.

For those of you that have seen old placer drift mines, you are familiar with how the tunnel's low height forces the miner to work in a perpetual, stooped condition. Thus, the reason why so many of the Old-timer's walked permanently hunched over. Clearly, the drift miner's work was backbreaking, formidable, and uncertain, but in the miner’s mind, there was always hope.

On a related note, I have gazed into those still dripping, cold, damp tunnels while trying to imagine only a pick and shovel to excavate the stubborn ancient river channel, filled with endless cobbles, stubborn cemented material, and mammoth, defiant boulders. Moreover, the constant fear of cave-ins must have been an endless strain.

I must confess that I was too dumb to realize that people still mined using such old methods. I assumed they had vanished decades earlier. Nonetheless, other determined miners still use this method of hand-mining, just as the dead miner from the small community did.

As the deceased miner had no family that anyone in the community was aware of, the locals declared a treasure hunt to try to locate the cache.

They found nothing.

As I pass through this long winter, somewhere deep in that primeval northern forest there resides a rich treasure, one once claimed from Mother Nature, yet now silently reclaimed, trusted to her timeless care yet again.

All the best,

Lanny

Just thought I'd post this: Move Those Rocks!

One of the greatest mistakes I see made in gold country by eager rookies, is the mistake of not wanting to move the rocks--the ones in the channel, or the ones high-and-dry out of the present channel. I'll see people pecking around the rocks, dipping the tip of their shovels between the rocks to get as much material as they can, but not using the elbow grease necessary to move those rocks!

Especially the rocks stacked on bedrock--the ones thrown up there by higher, faster moving water long since gone. Sure, there's often clay, and maybe roots, and other crap jammed in there, and it's most certainly tough digging, but that's the dance you need to step to in order to find the good stuff.

I you dig around in the sand and the loose stuff, you'll most often get a little fine gold, and those specks can be pretty, but the better stuff needs some serious moving of nastier material.

The bigger rocks travel with, and drop out with the nicer gold. Generally, so do the darker rocks (at least up here)--for some reason, many of the heavier rocks are darker. I know the old timers used to look for darker, stained, heavy rocks. Also, don't be afraid to get to the very bottom of any cracks or crevices you uncover. Trust me, the gold loves to get down there as far as it can--so you should too. Also, watch what's coming out of the crevice--there should be lots of little packed stones and often some clay too. Wash it all very carefully--break up any bits of clay--mush them around on the bottom of your pan until they dissolve. I've found some very nice gold trapped in clay jammed in crevices!

So, don't be afraid to move those rocks, and be exhaustive in your efforts to clean out the cracks and crevices. Remember that specific gravity should be your guide--most of the time the nicer gold travels with the beefier rocks, and the pieces of steel, and the lead fishing weights. . .

All the best,

Lanny

33 minutes ago, davsgold said:

For crushing rocks (quartz) especially the sledge hammer and rag is not really ideal and very messy.

Use a dolly pot, I have various sizes that I use starting with a big un and sieve the fines out and keep going, less mess, virtually nothing escapes, portable and requires no power source, except man power.  

I have done many many kilos' of rocks  this way, and recovered many many ozs of gold, yes detectors find the rocks first. 😉

cheers dave

The good old dolly pot, great invention.

All the best,

Lanny

Yes.

All the best,

Lanny

12 hours ago, geof_junk said:

Lanny it amazes me how many videos show a person picking up a hand/scoop full of pay dirt then run the coil over the hole. If they get a signal on the hole they throw the full hand/scoop away without running over the coil.🙄

Good observation, and yes, that's taking a risk at losing something for sure.

All the best,

Lanny

1 hour ago, fredmason said:

Dang good info and experience you have shared..

thanks fred

Many thanks Fred for saying so, truly appreciated.

All the best,

Lanny

More Nuggets In The Bedrock Tips

One Saturday, June 14th, I got ready to head to the hills to try to find some gold. I grabbed my pulse machine, and I picked up my partner. We drove the four hours to get to the gold fields. The day was incredibly beautiful.

We cached our equipment in the outfitters tent we always set up for the season and went out with the detectors to find some gold. The week before, I'd finally found a nugget on the slate cliffs.

My buddy headed off to stomp some ground he'd been saving, and I went to a gully that had always intrigued me, but one that had consistently skunked me. The old-timers had done a massive amount of hand mining in this area, with stacks of rocks piled all over, and it's shallow to bedrock in quite a few places. There's massive old pines, and lots of guts, shallow little washes, with cast up boulders everywhere.

Well, what I'd noticed on previous trips, was that someone had moved a lot of hand-stacks from places that were shallow to bedrock, lots of them. So, they must have moved them for a reason. However, I'd tried detecting those places with my Minelab pulse machine, and I'd never found anything but little steel and brass boot tacks, as well as the ubiquitous square nails from the 1800's gold rush.

I started detecting along the exposed bedrock, generously uncovered by someone else. All at once, I got a whisper amplified by my enhancer. So, I kept scrubbing that coil over that faint bump in the threshold signal with the coil right tight on the bedrock. (To elaborate, the friable Slate bedrock is in up-faulted sheets, the tips broken in fractured finger-like projections.) 

With my pick, I worried out any loose bits of rock and soil, scanned again, and there was a sweet, mellow signal. With no soil or gravel to work, I started to pry out pieces of the bedrock but scanned after removing each piece. Having now exposed a  small space in the bedrock, the tip of my small sniping coil fit it nicely, and the signal was coming right through one of those sheets of bedrock, the piece perpendicular to the surface.

I kept carefully breaking the rock and scanning, and I noticed that the signal was moving, not getting any louder, but moving deeper. The target still had that soft, sweet sound, no harsh-edged tone. So, I removed a chunk of that sheet and the signal remained stationary, no drop. I looked and I saw a golden glow, a nice, flat nugget. I called my buddy over to see the nugget, and then I was ready to move to an adjacent spot, but my wiser buddy suggested that I scan the hole again--Duh! Sometimes I forget the basics, so I scanned again, and I got another signal! I retrieved another flat nugget, one lodged tightly between two sheets of bedrock, about an inch from where the other nugget was.

Then I really went to work on that little area--about two foot square--but no more signals. But, the bedrock sloped away downhill, and I noticed two inches of small, gravelly overburden and clay covering it. I scanned it, but no signal. However, and this is important, I took my pick and cleaned off all the dirt, every bit, then scanned it again, another sweet whisper.

I broke the sheets of bedrock, but the nuggets dropped quickly every time the bedrock was disturbed. Nevertheless, I got two more nice, flat nuggets that way, and one of them was bent on the end, as it was lodged in a perpendicular crack. So, I took out four nice small nuggets from a section of bedrock about ten feet long, a minor patch. I scraped around in the bedrock farther down the gulch, but got skunked.

I went back to the Outfitters tent to get some grub, geared up again and went to another spot that's always looked good, a place also cleared by someone eager to get to the bedrock. I used the same slow, "scrubbing the bedrock" technique, but got blanked.

It was getting dark, and I went up over a big sheet of bedrock that had a lot of slump on it, a spot loaded with square nails. I got a sharp signal, moved the dirt and a square nail flew to the super-magnet. Remembering my buddy's counsel, I scanned the spot again. Once again, that same soft, sweet tone I'd found earlier.

Only this time, the bedrock was different, solid, no leaves or sheets, just solid, hard stuff. I worked hard with my pick, went down a couple of inches, and out popped a nice, flat, nugget. By this time, I was beginning to think that maybe this was my day, and I'd better scan the spot again. Perhaps there was something lucky or sound in that technique. I did, and there was another signal, but I could not break the rock anymore with my pick.

So, I headed back to the tent for a masonry chisel and my small sledge, and a flashlight because it was dark! My buddy came back with me, and he made the bedrock chips fly. Every time he chipped out a chunk, I'd scan again, and the signal got louder. Yet, down four inches, the signal moved. Up on the side of the hole, in some bits and broken chunks of rock, the signal rang sharp and clear. Nestled in it was a little beauty with a pot belly and a very flat end.

I rattled the gold around in my gold bottle, six sassy nuggets in one day! It seems when the gold finally comes, it does so with a rush.

Update: I went back later to that solid bedrock with the Falcon MD 20 and got a couple more grams of gold from those cracks!

All the best,

Lanny

Another tip, High up bedrock.

I was out one day digging a whole bunch of old boot tacks from long since disintegrated miner's boots! The little nails were all over the place, including down in crevices, well rusted or (for the non-ferrous) green with patina. I was also finding the little tips from old square nails, so I knew there were still targets to be found.

I found a few pieces of lead, from spent bullets, a steel button from an 1800's miner's shirt, a couple of pieces of wire, and many, many square nails, as well as a few more modern nails from the 1930's.

After digging a palm full of nails, I went down to a spot on the river that has always intrigued me, but one I've been handcuffed from detecting. The old-timers washed lots of gravel over this notch in the cliff: it's an area of high slate cliffs, where the slate has been sluffing off eons. I've always looked up at those cliffs and thought, that with all the jagged protruding edges, some gold must have been trapped, especially with all the sluice runs sent over the edge, including the virgin material that had eroded over the cliff before the miners started their workings.

Anyway, I've never been able to find anything but small flakes trapped in that jagged bedrock, and these discoveries were made by panning. However, I decided to walk along the base of that cliff to detect it.

Well, I hit all kinds of square nails, and spent bullets (I found a nice old 44 caliber slug too, and a big bore rifle slug with grease grooves), as well as bits of copper and brass wire. Being somewhat frustrated, I decided to cut some footholds up the slump at the base of the cliff, enabling me to reach higher up the cliff with my detector.

Almost instantly, I got a signal. I pinpointed it easily, cut some more steps with my pick so I could get up to the signal, and then I trapped it in the scoop. The target was the rusted tip of a square nail.

I rested the coil as I stepped back down and the coil swept through an arc over a new spot and gave a crisp signal. I stayed put on the cliffside and scanned the spot again. Of course, my brain was saying, "It's another piece of trash."

I reached up gingerly with my super-magnet to see if a nail would jump out, but none did. I say I reached up gingerly because the whole area of dirt holding the signal would have gone scurrying down the cliff, and you know what a nightmare it is to try to find a target after that happens.

No metal jumped to the super magnet, but the target could easily be copper, or a sliver of lead, or another non-ferrous boot tack!

I carefully inserted the tip of my scoop where the coil had pinpointed the signal. I saw a golden flash as the dirt poured into the scoop! 

I worked my way back down the slump to a level spot, scanned the scoop, and there was a nice crisp, mellow growl. I sifted the material onto the coil and heard a whap!, then a scream from the coil. I gently moved the particles around and there grinning up at me was a sassy nugget.

I now have lots of new area to search, difficult though it will be.

All the best,

Lanny

Checking old hand-stacks of rock and old bedrock workings

I ran into a guy from the Yukon a few years ago while I was up in north-central British Columbia, and he was running a big placer operation in the Yukon. He told me that they always pushed off the piles of hand stacked rocks from the old-timers and then they carefully checked the bedrock underneath with detectors for gold. Not only were there nuggets the old-timers had missed, there were sometimes virgin strips of ground that he said were incredibly rich. He explained it this way: in the rush to mine the bedrock, the old-timers had stacked their rock piles over virgin ground, and then got too busy, or rushed on to new diggings, etc., and they never got back to the virgin dirt they'd buried in the first place.

I know of a nugget shooter that found an incredibly rich patch under such a pile of rocks. He took out hundreds of small nuggets, and some nice fat ones too, and the strip was only about three feet wide at its widest point!

This makes me think of tales some old-timers up north told me of how mining companies were in a hurry to get to the bedrock, and to quickly get the chunky gold, kind of like skimming thick cream off of milk and not really caring about the milk underneath, and that some of those companies were very sloppy in their recovery. As well, there were always other rushes going on that lured them away to "better" ground.

There are countless piles of hand-stacked rocks where I'm working, and I've winched rocks off before and found good gold. In fact, in the area I'm referring to, for years nugget shooters have been winching the boulders off the bedrock, and they've recovered a lot of nice nuggets as the detectors can see what the old-timers could not possibly visualize in that bedrock. 

All the best,

Lanny

Now, for a few things I've learned about working bedrock.

When checking bedrock, always look very closely at the surface. Clear all of the material off of it first. Moreover, any clay, and associated material, that is sticking close to the bedrock, carefully save it, so you can pan it out. This means that you'll need some sniping instruments to clean out all the visible cracks and crevices as well.

Go to a wholesale supply store, a place that sells lots of various hardware/automotive items, to get some things. Several screwdrivers of various sizes is a place to start. Take a slot screwdriver, place it in a vice then bend a couple of inches of the end into an "L". This will make the screwdriver into a little digging/scraping tool, very handy for cleaning out crevices. You might buy an awl as well to use for probing. Also, if you can find them, you can buy dental-type instruments--they come in all kinds of hook and scraping conformations, making them excellent for working narrow crevices, and they're made of stainless steel, making them robust and not prone to rust.

As well, buy several sizes of wire brushes, from the small, almost toothbrush sized ones to the larger ones that you'd scrape a wall for painting preparation. You'll need a variety of chisel sizes as well to break open crevices: the good gold goes down deep, and even if the crevice is narrow, it wasn't always that way. I've taken nice nuggets out of crevices that were far too narrow at the top to let in the nuggets they held.

This opens up all kinds of theories as to how the nuggets got there, but regardless, they are there, so it's irrelevant how they got there. Bust open those crevices until you're sure you're at the bottom, and rip up the bedrock bottom--a note on this later.

A note on chisels: you can buy ones that have a protective shield on them so you don't smash you hands and fingers. To run the chisels, you'll need a small sledge. Buy a fibreglass handled one as they're much tougher than the wooden ones, and the water doesn't affect them. As well, paint your sniping tools fluorescent orange--trust me, you'll leave things laying around and it's much easier to spot them later.

You'll need a variety of brushes, from stiff bristles to softer ones as well. Also, you'll need something to sweep your sniping concentrates into. Those little plastic shovels that kids take to the beach work well for tight places, and plastic dust pans work great in larger areas. A plastic gardening/planting scoop works wonders too. It's also a good idea to have to have a steel one as well; they're a lot tougher for digging.

Stainless steel spoons of various sizes are handy for digging and for collecting, and sometimes a tough, small plastic spoon will work in a pinch.

An important point, that I'll now address, is that after you've cleared all the visible cracks and crevices, and cleared and or washed the bedrock down, take a very close look at the bedrock to see if you can notice any subtle differences (colour, texture, folding, etc.). Also, watch out for a purple stain with any adhering clay as for whatever the reason, this purple colour sometimes indicates hidden crevices and gold.

To elaborate a bit on the bedrock's subtle differences, the reason for this is that sometimes, eons ago, the stream was running little bits of material the exact same colour as the bedrock. This material, in combination with binding minerals, formed a matrix that cemented in cracks and crevices, and often, gold was already trapped in those crevices. The cemented material makes the crevices virtually invisible, but if you look very closely, and if you chip away at any suspicious looking spots, you may discover a hidden, once invisible crevice. Furthermore, any cemented material should be carefully crushed and panned as I've found a lot of nice gold this way.

Now, the best way to find these obscure crevices is with a detector if the nuggets are big enough. I've found many a sassy nugget completely hidden in camouflaged crevices. Moreover, the matrix is as strong as the host bedrock, and the bedrock will break off with the matrix while chiseling the nuggets out. Always work well to the sides, and above or below the target signal, so you don't damage the nugget as you chisel it out.

This is where it's critical that you have the right detector for the temperature of the bedrock--by temperature I mean that a cool temperature would be a low mineralized bedrock that a VLF would run smoothly on; and by hot I mean bedrock that only a premium pulse or GPZ type machine will operate on. If your current detector just screams and gives up on hot bedrock, go borrow or buy one that will run on that bad bedrock just to be sure you're not missing gold. Moreover, if any of you have further tips on sniping, I'd love to hear them as well. I know there's always more I need to learn.

All the best,

Lanny in AB
 

No idea either, but perhaps you should get on YouTube and post a picture and ask MeMiner about it. He knows a lot about rocks plus he's from your eastern neck of the woods.

All the best,

Lanny

On 1/10/2020 at 4:05 AM, RedDirtDigger said:

I detect for gold alot and have paid off my detectors since the 2100 many times over. My best was the 4500...paid off 40 something times over. Its my backup detector after the Zed which is catching up to the 4500 in times paid off.

While spending time wandering deserts other income opportunities come along, meteorites, gems, ornamental stone deposits. Detectors also lead to taking out leases and paid detecting from mining companies. 
But whether your obsessed like me and many others on this forum or just a hobbyist its great just to get out in the bush/desert with friends or family.

 

Great post, love the pictures.

All the best,

Lanny

14 hours ago, kiwijw said:

Hi Mad Fish, You are so right. I sort of have a golden rule now that if a very obvious signal has moved after a couple of light scrapes then I write it off as a surface pellet & move on. If it lives on down a bit more then I will recover it. But just like you said, you will get a signal that sounds like all the rest (pellets) & has moved after a couple of scrapes but something in your mind tells you to dig it...and it is gold. Yep...why is that? Intuition, gold gods just smiling down on you? Sometimes for me it is the type of ground that makes me investigate. By type of ground I mean cracks in bedrock or bedrock that suddenly drops off to deeper ground where gold may have got caught on the edge of the bedrock & the drop to deeper ground, like a riffle. It doesn't have to be much of a drop to 'catch' & trap gold. It could be just the structure & make up of the ground that makes me investigate. A lot of ground can just have that horny gold bearing look to it. After a couple of scrapes you recognise that type of ground & recover the target. But then of course I can guarantee that some signals I walked away from that had moved after a couple of scrapes & thinking they are just pellets would have been small gold.

Maybe sometimes there is just a very slight different sound that makes you take more notice. Another thing that gobsmacks me is the number of signals that I have got that I wasn't even sure was a signal. It just seems like a hunch that it was a signal. But there is something that pulls you up. You check, re check, no nothing. A ghost signal? But you know something made you stop in that very first instant but no still nothing. So I scrape a bit of dirt away to get a bit more depth & bingo. Yes...that is something but ever so faint. Those ones always seem to turn out to be gold. In my case small gold but down quite deep. That has happened to me more times than I can remember.

I think the subconscious is a very powerful thing & works for us in ways that we don't even recognise or think about or understand. Stuff just happens & we think WTF in amazement but can't explain it. Maybe it is karma.

Good luck out there

JW 🤠

The things that make us stop . . . .

This is a very interesting read, and I enjoyed reading it.

Nicely done, and all the best,

Lanny

5 minutes ago, Rob Allison said:

Thanks Lanny!  Hope all is well on your end.  

Rob

Yes, all is well, just been travelling a lot lately so not on the forums while doing that. (Home for a bit now.)

When the big freeze up here ends, I'll be out chasing the gold again.

All the best,

Lanny

7 hours ago, kiwijw said:

Took the words out of my mouth.....or should I say....fingers 😂 Unless you see the recovered target you never know for sure. In my early days with my GP 3000 I got so sick & tired of digging .22 shells & there lead bullet heads I started to ignore those loud, in your face, signals that were always a very close to surface target. Some were on a couple of patch areas that gave up some nice amounts of gold to me. The ones I ignored played on my mind that night. So next morning I went straight back. I was fresh, bright eyed & bushy tailed. So I dug them. The day before I was over the heat & getting lazy & that is a habit I have today. Start to ignore those signals that I just can't be bothered digging due to the heat & 'feeling' it is just crap any way. Some of those ones I had ignored the day before, one was a 9 gram slug of gold, one was a 5 gram slug & one was 13.75 grams. They all moved after just two scrapes with the pick. So very shallow & hence the day before thinking...oh yer...just another bloody .22 casing & walking away from it. Ok...some were .22 casings but I learnt a very valuable lesson that day. You just can't tell what a signal is until it is in your hand. FACT. I still shake my head today in disbelieve when I dig a crap sounding target & it morphes into gold. I think to myself....thank god I dug that 'crap' signal. Those that bang on about, I can tell by the sound, are kidding themselves. The ones they leave behind....they will never know for sure. Ok....the majority may well be crap, but, just take my experience from the three I used in my above comment. Nearly one ounce of gold in three pieces, & that is big gold for here, that I so nearly walked away from.

When chasing gold....dig all signals!

Best of luck out there

JW 🤠  

JW, I love your response and your insight to how we get burned out by weather, tiredness, etc. and start to convince ourselves not to dig. Your response is right on the money, or should I say, right on the nugget?

Regardless, great response full of wisdom for those willing to pay attention.

All the best,

Lanny

10 hours ago, Steve Herschbach said:

How do you know what the targets were that you did not dig up? Do you believe 100% of the targets you did not dig were not gold? That you have a 100% accuracy rate? If not, what percent is acceptable to you? If you skip 100 targets is it ok for ten of those to be gold? Five? Two?

I’m not being critical here, just curious. I have skipped a lot of targets over the years for various reasons, but I am certain that I have left gold in the ground as a result. I know this because I have dug plenty of “nail signals” that turned out to be gold.

Truer words were never spoken . . . .

All the best,

Lanny

23 hours ago, Rob Allison said:

Hey Guys,

   I want to point out something I hear all the time as a dealer.  Many firmly believe "gold" has a certain tone or reading.  Anyone who suggests they can just pick out gold due to the tone, but leave all the lead, brass, casings and other rubbish is being fooled by themselves.  I can personally tell you over the last 20+ years swinging detectors, I have dug many targets that sounded like iron rubbish, double signals, breaking up, screaming loud and so on, that were large gold nuggets!!  That is right, big gold nuggets, some various shapes, sizes and weights, but all sounded like the typical iron rubbish.  

I think the key to "guessing" if you have a gold nugget or not, in my opinion, is more of where the target is located for the most part.  When you have detected enough, you gain a lot of experience on where gold nuggets have been found and where they typically could be.  Everyone at some point will be able to start guessing if the target they are recovering is gold or iron rubbish and will get better at the probability.  

The last couple of trips out, I was working some very trashy placers and every target to me sounded crappy.  However, one of the targets was a small 2 Gram gold nugget, so luckily I stuck with digging what I could until I burned out.  

Just my thoughts on target response.  It will be nice when technology allows us to scan over a target and the Gold Meter on the screen says - GOLD, and don't jump back in forth from iron and gold. 🙂

 

This is a solid gold post that needs to be internalized by every serious nugget shooter.

Nicely stated!!

All the best,

Lanny

Steve, your pictures of your non-nugget finds sure brings back a lot of fond and sometimes not so fond detecting memories.

All the best,

Lanny

On 1/13/2020 at 2:29 PM, GaryC/Oregon Coast said:

Good lesson for newbies.  You've got to kiss a lot of pigs first!  GaryC/Oregon Coast

Gary, I just wrote a piece about this very topic for all those that get discouraged early in the game . . . .

All the best, and thanks for your insight,

Lanny

Discouraged at not finding a nugget?

I've been doing some reflecting lately on the topic of finding that first nugget.

I've read many posts on this forum over the years of people that buy a nugget machine, but then they're quickly discouraged after a few trips to the gold fields, and then they get discouraged and either sell their machines or let them die a slow death in a dark, claustrophobic space somewhere.

I keenly remember how many targets I dug before I ever found my first nugget.

I started off chasing gold nuggets with a Garret Scorpion Gold Stinger way back when, and I actually got some good signals on a river bank way up north one day, but all I recovered were square nails. Now, the reason I bring this up is that the next year, I went back to the same spot, but Mother Nature had torn up that bank and exposed nuggets and square nails a plenty!

If I'd have stuck with the Stinger, I'd have likely found the nuggets among the square nails from the 1800's, but I simply got discouraged with digging so many square nails. However, now that I reflect back on that river bank, many things make a lot of sense today that made no sense then.

For instance, the square nails were there because they were heavies that were being drawn out of the current by a big suction eddy, the bedrock on that bank being shallow underneath the river run. The abundance of nails should have been my first clue that I should have slowed down and investigated throughly, but I didn't do so as I was a green rookie. Nevertheless, the next year when I returned, I was running a sluice and running the bank material through it, and that's when I hit the nuggets (along with lots of square nails). In fact, that bedrock was such a good trap, I actually found nuggets by eyeballing them as I cleared off the overburden!

However, I've wandered from my original topic, and I'll now address it by telling about all of the junk I dug before I ever found a nugget with my detector. That second year, as mentioned above, I went back to the gold country with a shiny new Minelab SD 2100. (The previous year, my prospecting buddy had found nuggets with his Minelab 1700 while all I found was trash. I actually put the trash I found in 4-litre ice cream pails, so I had a record of what I was recovering.)

In the pails I've mentioned, I had bits of copper wire, spent rifle and pistol cartridges (which always sound sweet), musket balls of various calibers (which also sound sweet), pistol rounds of various calibers (lead sure makes a sweet sound!), bits of blasting caps, many ends of square nails, lots of intact square nails of various sizes, lead sealing portions from tinned food, lead keys from meat tins, bits of rusted tin cans, steel wire of various gauges, lids from small tinned goods, bottle caps going back to the birth of bottled goods, bits of harmonica reeds, gears and parts of old watches, shotgun bb's and cartridge ends of various calibers and sizes, wire mesh bits, boot tacks (steel and non-ferrous), bits of aluminum, chunks of copper sheeting, as well as other junk I can't recall right now. The point is, I kept on digging and collecting because there was no discrimination on the SD 2100, so I dug everything, but with detectors that had discrimination (my buddy had the Gold Bug, the Minelab 1700, a friend had a Whites with discrimination), they would not handle the extreme mineralization where the best gold was. Therefore, I had to slug it out with the 2100 day after day.

The buckets kept filling up, but no nuggets . . . .

That is, until one day, when I'd been detecting a spot with lots of hand-mining test holes from the 1930's, my fortunes changed. As the spot was littered with round nails, I'd been digging a lot of them that day, plus I was recovering lots of bits of rusted tin from cans as well as bits of wire and screen. Nevertheless, on the rim of a test pit, I hit signals all the way around the top and sides of the excavation. I recovered round nail, round nail, round nail, round nail, but then something heavy hit my palm that was just under the moss. It didn't feel like a nail at all. It was my first nugget and a multi-pennyweight/multi-gram beauty. I still have it and will likely always have it for sentimental reasons as it represented when the dam broke, so to speak.

For after that find, on the same trip, I recovered a slew of multi-pennyweight/multi-gram nuggets. It was like there was some kind of invisible barrier that I'd finally breached, and the nuggets have kept on coming ever since.

So, to those of you that are discouraged, that are thinking of hanging up or banishing your detector after a few outings, you have the right to do so, but there seems to be an up-front price to pay for nugget hunting, one that can't be substituted with any other option.

On a related note, my son has found many nuggets, but right now he's been tuning his brain for finding coins and rings, and he's doing very well. I gave him a detector and told him to put in at least 200 hours to learn his detector, and he's done so, and is now finding silver and gold rings. For any of you that hunt rings, you know how challenging that can be, but the reason he really knows his detector is because he's invested the time, along with good techniques, to go find the kind of targets he wants to keep. Does he still find trash? Yes, lots. Do I still find trash, of course, all kinds.

The message I'm broadcasting is to go put in the time, to use proper techniques, to go to the places where gold has been found, and eventually you'll get your coil over a nugget.

Point in case, I have a nephew that's chased the gold for a few years with a detector I gave him. He's found a lot of trash, but he'd never found a nugget, that is, until last winter down in Arizona. He finally got his coil over a beauty. He's off to Arizona again to try his luck this winter, and I'm betting he'll get his coil over some gold again . . . .

All the best,

Lanny