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Drove down Monday and met up with Chet; we wanted to try out our new 6000s on some hammered patches, just to make sure I wouldn’t have “Buyer’s Remorse” after trading in my 7000. I got there about noon, and Chet had been out hunting in the morning. He had marked two targets in the ground so I could hear them too when I got there. One was in a scrape and the other a bit outside....hmmm? Likely iron crap in this pounded area we thought. Dug them out, and he had just found his first 2 gpx6000 nuggets...beautiful character, with some intricate folds. I ended up with one that afternoon. Even though the 6000 is light with great ergonomics, my detecting arm is out of shape and my bicep was getting a bit sore. I found myself missing my bungee, hip stick, and guide arm on my 7000 setup. I also missed the clip on wireless speaker. I was using the Aventree Torus headphones that hang around your neck; they fell off a few times while digging, then when I tried to secure them, the Power button would get pressed and they would turn off. Chet’s just stopped working. Weird. So need to figure out my speaker system. One other 7000 feature I also miss is the built-in gps...so handy. So day 2 we hit several other old patches. I used a bungee and was getting more in tune with the 6000...much more comfortable with it, though my left arm didn’t know what to do! Put hand in pocket? Hook thumb on harness loop? Its motor memory wanted to be helping with a guide arm😄! By the end of 8 hours we each had found a bit more gold. Nice, but nothing over .2 or .3 gram. On the 3rd day we went back to Day 1 patch, as it was close to camp. Again, the 6000 was able to sniff out some good stuff from this patch that had been hunted by 5000s, 2300s, 7000s. By now I was in sync with my new detector. I mainly hunted in Normal, setting at 3 o’clock position with threshold. Tried the Auto+ but preferred the other, I like hearing the threshold and it was more sensitive to targets. We knew the machine was awesome at finding these smaller nuggets, and weird shaped nuggets, but we hadn’t found anything of any size yet. That changed when Chet found a gorgeous 2.5-3 grammer at about 6”! Woo Hoo!👍 So Chet was the big winner on this trip; 6.2 grams in 3 days. And they will be beautiful when cleaned up...maybe add those pics to this post Chet? I ended up with 2.4 g in 2 1/2 days. Chet attributes a lot of his success on this trip to the ease of detecting with the 6000, compared to the 7000...fewer rest breaks means more time on the gold fields. Though I really loved my 7000, I think this detector will better serve me; either hunting known worked patches or walking miles looking for new, it will do the job and be easier on my neck and shoulders/arm.

About 80 hours of detecting in Alaska with the GPX 6000 and Garrett 24K, gold cleaned by shaking in water with soap. 1.86 Troy ounces total, much of it found by using my "scrape and detect" methodology. Garrett Goldmaster 24K at work

After 3 years with a friend's DFX and 4 years with my own Makro Gold Racer, I finally found gold. Tried a new spot and a new technique. I found 63 pieces in 5 days and my buddy found 81 working right next to me with a Gold Monster. My little VLF can't compete with the big iron, so I needed a new method. I started digging where the bedrock went under the sand and gravel. Following the bedrock along, I noted a few small spots of cemented gravel in cracks and holes in the bedrock. Carefully excavating these gravel patches and detecting as I went let to a wonderful few days. Just detecting from the surface has proven to be a waste of my time.

Hi folks, I've been a couple times diving in two different spots the last week and cause of a ton of new sand, working at a deeper area, less pounded by the most of the army. As usual, my camera was out of service in the moment of glory and there's no footage as I left It once and discharged another time😤... Aniway, two fishes for the week...Too bad...trust me😑 Both 18k bands

Finally, After the damn cycle, some sand moved away from one of my usual spots.. I had almost two hours available since dawn and on a pretty red clay seabed I found these two beauties. Enjoy. Skull

Day one... I headed to the hills this morning to beat the heat and log a few hours behind the control pod of Minelabs' latest offering, the exciting new GPX 6000. Hiking up and down the hills with this featherweight P.I. nugget detector is pure bliss after lugging the GPZ 7000 around for the past 6 years...has it been so long?! Armed with the 11-inch GPX mono coil, I targeted an old nugget patch that I had carefully gridded many times in the past with several detectors, including the GPX-5000, Gold Monster and GPZ 7000. With nearby power lines, operating at a Manual Sensitivity of 10 or Auto+ proved a bit too chattery and required excessive Noise Cancel delays that became rather irksome after awhile. Backing the Sensitivity to 7 smoothed things out considerably without any noticeable loss of performance, and if I got an iffy target response, a quick jump to 10 would provide a definitive yes or no. After digging a few trash targets, the first “nugget” that the GPX 6000 hit was a 0.04 of a gram surface screamer, and the next couple of nuggets were small and shallow; nothing surprising. But how did the Gold Monster miss these? Must not have got that little 5-inch Monster coil directly over them.🤔 It was the next 3 targets that really blew my mind, however... By late afternoon, the temps were soaring into the mid-90's, and despite a nice breeze, it was becoming a tad uncomfortable, and I was thinking about calling it a day. That was when the GPX 6000 sounded off with a sweet, mellow and deep sounding target response. A few scrapes with the pick exposed the underlying bedrock, and somewhere - in a crevice, no doubt - a golden treasure awaited to be uncovered...or so I hoped...could just as easily be a bit of square nail, a bullet or boot tack.😒 Blasting a few inches into the bedrock with the pick got the target out - a nice little golden picker in the scoop. 🙂 After backfilling the dig hole, just one swing of the detector revealed another soft, mellow hit a mere foot away. Same scenario: a small golden goody a few inches deep in a bedrock crevice. Then, about another 4 feet away, a faint response. Quickly jacking the Sensitivity from 7 to 10 brightened the signal a bit, so I began digging about 6 inches through a layer of gravels before hitting bedrock and a rather thick tree root. A little more pick work and pinpointing with the edge of the coil located the target in a crevice right next to the root. This one was deep; nearing the 12-inch mark, the target was finally out, and it was screaming off of the coil edge! A quick sift with the scoop uncovered a hefty 1.34 gram nugget. How the GPZ 7000 missed this beauty, I'll never know...it's a head scratcher.😅 Time to call it quits for the day on that high note, for sure! I'll be at it again tomorrow, this time with the GPX 14 DD coil in EMI Cancel Mode; should be able to run flat out in Auto+ Sensitivity with the threshold as smooth as glass.

New spot inspection last week and happened a lucky strike due to the super sanded in condition even with unusual beach appearance... Few seconds of a three hours session, otherwise useless dive between fresh foil at depth and heavier stuff way too far from shore...Ass hit for me this time...🤣🤣🤣 Enjoy! https://youtu.be/MRzcxk-AhVI

I have been wanting to search this ballpark again and try to find some gold jewelry, so today I had the time and decided to give it a go. I brought the Simplex and was going to dig all targets intent on finding jewelry. I put the Simplex in park 2, iron volume off with all notches accepted and set the sensitivity at half. I ground balanced and started swinging. First target was a bottlecap, second a piece of canslaw and third was bam......10k gold band about 3" deep. I don't think I was there more than 5 minutes. The rest of the hunt was some clad and lots of pulltabs and bottle caps and a junk arrowhead pendant. I guess it was just good luck that got my coil over that ring so quickly in the hunt. The ring came in at just above nickel and weighs just over 2 grams.

Fri. hunt and one of my better hunts this season. 28 bits for a whopping 2.1g.....lol But I'm having fun grinding em out, one bit at a time!!!!!

Moving Boulders to find more Gold Nuggets We return to move a boulder that's been keeping me awake at night just thinking about what might be underneath it. This boulder is sitting on Bedrock just above the main flow of the river so it could be loaded with Gold !!!! I worked the crevice around it and pulled out a couple pickers and a lot of lead so lets see what's under that boulder. Detectors used Minelab SDC 2300 and the White's Gold Master V-Sat . SG 040

Not a lot of words here...I was Just doing my usual business trip downthere and luckily the camera had enough battery to capture the appearing fish... Enjoy! https://youtu.be/qP0ymoFlkHE

I got an email today from Rare Gold Nuggets and it said: A gold discovery in Russia of a gold nugget weighing in at over 22 pounds! Here's a link to the article with pictures: https://earth-chronicles.com/science/in-the-khabarovsk-territory-of-russia-found-a-gold-nugget-weighing-more-than-10-kilograms.html Quite impressive! There have been a lot of big nuggets mined in Russia over the years. A couple years back there was a 15-pounder found in Siberia. Here is a link with a picture of that one: http://raregoldnuggets.com/blog/?p=1085 Lots of big, remote, relatively unexplored lands over there... I bet there will be other big nuggets found in the future. PO BOX 6794 Boise Idaho 83707 USA

Hello All, I came across a really old Youtube video I made back around 2008 here in Arizona. There are only a number of places in the last 25 years of metal detecting that I can say were honestly rewarding and worth all the effort to drag down a drywashing/vac-pac, set it up and run it all day or weekend. This happen to be one of those locations where we found a number of very rough gold nuggets using metal detectors, but the amount of smaller pickers and fine gold was unreal. Practically ever nugget my partner and I dug up, we saw a half dozen or more small pickers and a good amount of fines. You honestly don't find this too often, but they are out there and it does happen. We worked the small gully (as seen in the video) for several weekends, getting whatever we could metal detecting with a VLF and PI's. We then started down lower in gully and drywashed/vac from side to side, digging all the cracks and crevices up the best we could. The wash wasn't too long, nor very wide, maybe 3-4 foot in the widest spots. However, after about 2-3 weekends, we had the entire gully down to bedrock and ended up removing about 3 ounces of very small nuggets, pickers and fines. I believe we did so well due to the nature of this type of gold being very crystalline in nature. The source was probably weathered away as we never were able to locate any type of real vein or source. Overall, with all the gold, fines and gold nuggets, we ended up with about 6 ounces of really nice placer gold. There are hundreds, if not thousands of these locations still to be found, so a good metal detector can lead you into one of these hidden gems! Heck, at todays gold prices, just over $1900 per ounce, that's a nice $11,400 payday. It probably took about 5-6 days to recover it all. Wishing you all a bedrock-gold rich gully. Rob

First 100 bits so far. They are coming slow and small this season so far but having fun!

Just in the last couple weeks I was sent a couple pics from a customer who visited WY with his GPZ-7000. Now this customer knows his detector better than many, as he attended our 3 Days Field Training last Fall and it looks to be paying off. Over 5 ounces of gold and many of them solid nuggets and this folks just came from WY. Yes it's still out there for those who do research and legwork. I just love seeing customers success and is shows my staff/I efforts at Training is paying off. Anyone else been able to find any WY gold with a detector?

Hey Guys, Yes, that is correct, I believe I have found my smallest one ouncer to date. I'm referring to the size overall of the 1 ounce nugget. Most of my 1 ounce nuggets or larger are flat and much large in size. This slug, it solid and dense and weights 20.4 Dwt's, just .4 Dwt's over an ounce (20 Dwt's per Troy Ounce). I'm not going to discuss how deep it was found, or signal response - It was found with a Minelab GPZ 7000 and it was deep! Wishing you all many gold nuggets. Rob

I refer to the majority. Most of mine were quite ,distinct from ground or loud junk signal. Does that mean if I was going slow I would be better to sped up a bit. I know beginner go too fast but speeding up a bit would be more productive for those that have gain experience, I know what works for me or am I wrong. Let hear your view.

I need help identifying this rock please. I found this around Louisiana a few weeks back. To me it looks like raw Platinum or an ore maybe. I’m not really good at this yet haha. It’s not magnetic at all, it’s weight is 3.7 grams, and it’s streak is too hard to get, as it only scratches the plate. So possibly even a meteorite? Idk heh. Thanks you!!

I like detecting for a variety of gold and really enjoy finding the stuff many higher end detectors can't see. I don't know yet, but feel the extra capabilities of the GPX-6000 will open up some of these areas I hunt with the VLF's to get even more of the gold and at greater depths or in worse soil conditions. As long as I am getting more gold, I'm happy. Will the new GPX-6000 see this kind of gold or act like all other PI's and the ZED and not see at all? I recently recovered this 4.2 gram speci with the EQ-800 while running the new CoilTek NOX 15" round. My goal was to find a piece of gold with the 15" and I met that goal. Part of some other testing back at base proved why I still like to take 2 detector technologies in the field. This particular beauty was found right in the middle of a GPZ-7000 grid area, along with 4 others while using different coils on the EQ-800. All 5 pieces specimens have visible gold and a couple how quite a bit, but to the point. The reason I found them in that gridded area, is because the GPZ-7000 does not respond or on a couple right near 1" and that's it. I teach folks this in my classes, as well as try to educate others on the goods and the bads of different detectors and technologies. Sometimes I get detectorists who are good hunters with their detectors and have success, tell me I'm full of BS and their detector will find it. I made a post on my FB (Gerry McMullen) and shared a pic of the find along with the true comments of, the GPZ will not see it. Between the private messages and or public posts, I was immediately informed by a few of BS and even told how I must not know the GPZ-7000. One well known GP-3500 hunter even said he guaranteed his 3500 would hear it. I know gold detectors and I know how to find gold with a variety of gold machines. No I am not the best, but I most certainly can hold my own and I learn to adapt really fast to a new area. Traveling to different states and countries to hunt for and find many different kinds of gold has helped elevate my detector knowledge and skill of many models of detectors and the differing Au rocks I have collected. So here is hoping the GPX-6000 with it's GeoSensing can respond to this little beauty. If it does, I know of some areas I'll be swinging the 6000. If it is like the GP-3500, the GPX-5000 and the GPZ-7000 and misses it, that fine too, I know what they can't see and realize it, I will also know where not to use the 6000. Bottom line for everyone. Please learn the kinds of gold your detector is good at finding and what it is not, so you aren't wasting time in those areas. Or be sure you have at least 2 different detector technologies.

Well I'm laying over in northern Nevada for some detecting before heading back to Idaho and my summer job, and decided to go revisit an old dink patch with the GPZ 7000 this afternoon. Since I've hit this place pretty hard, I figured I better use a higher sensitivity setting to see if it would light up some bits that were missed last time using a lower sensitivity that helped keep the alkali rich ground feedback under control. Needless to say, I had to move the coil painfully slow over the really noisy areas, but the extra sensitivity started working its magic right away, as I got a faint but repeatable little wobble. Digging down about 3 inches or so revealed the first little bit of yellow. 🙂 Soon there was another signal a few yards upslope; another shiny golden bit, this time a little deeper. I couldn't help but wonder at this point how much deeper the new GPX 6000 will be able to snag dinks like these, and how many the Zed is leaving behind. 🤔 Guess I'll find out when I finally get mine. Just then I was awakened from my wonderings by a sharp response from the Zed; sounding pretty shallow, the tiny target was out from under a bush with just a boot scrape. And I mean tiny! One more golden goodie sitting on bedrock ended a splendid, sunny afternoon in the goldfields. Total weight of todays finds, zero point six of a gram. Good luck out there!

Hillside Detecting for Placer Gold Nuggets Armed with a Minelab SDC 2300 and a White's Gold Master V-Sat Jeff and Gary (Two Toe's) try some Hillside detecting for Placer Gold Nuggets. High bench gold in the morning and River deposited gold in the afternoon. We moved a lot of rocks and brush looking for those elusive Nuggets and didnt go home empty handed !!! Our Hawaiian buddy Tim ( Blue Lead Gold Productions ) likes to send me pictures and video of what we are missing on the island during the winter months so I've included a few clips from him in the video. Hope you enjoy the video. SG 038

Had to hike in last weekend to get the tiniest piece I have ever detected. Packed up the SDC and off we went! Atleast it was not a skunk day but dang, if you like small gold the SDC can hit it at 3” with an obvious signal. Took me longer to get it in the scoop than dig it out of the hole 😂. Also added to my square nail collection 😂. Dinks! Its what the world is made of 😂😂.

We caught a break in the 90+ temps in Yuma for one last trip. Ostensibly, it was to be a quick trip to the spot we found the bigger gold in Feb and to test the X-Coil 15" Concentric coil over the ground we had covered extensively with the X-Coil 17x12 and stock coil. It's about a 1/2 mile walk to the spot but I pulled up short to detect a wash we were about to cross. My friend with the Concentric coil went on to the target area. I am using the 7000 with stock coil while waiting for some re-work on my patch lead for the X-Coils. I had worked the lower sections of this particular wash back in Feb and found 6 little bits in one small area, the rest of the wash seemed barren. My goal was work the wash towards our target area just to get the machine warmed up and my listening skills tuned in. I was working pretty quick really looking for a sitting duck rather than slow and methodical because this wash hadn't produced too well. About 100 yds on, I hit a pretty good tone right up against the wash sidewall. I pulled out the bigger of non-specie gold in the picture. From there over about 20 yds I pulled 3 more small pieces then hit the smaller specie gold on an inside bend of the wash. I continued up the wash and found the bigger specie dead center of the wash down in the bedrock. I found 1 more tiny bit up on the bank, but then starting hitting a lot of trash targets so I turned around and reworked the wash for 0 nuggets. Because of the specie pieces I then started a circle on the hillsides all around the area for nothing. I put down my gear and walked to the target area to check on my friend with the Concentric coil. He had found 2 pieces in an area well detected on our previous trips and attributed it to the overall sensitivity of the Concentric on small targets. Because of the heat and short trip we had no opportunity to make any comparisons on undug targets. I worked my way back down the wash to the RZR, over areas I had covered in Feb. On the last bend I was picking my way down a slick rock slide area and waved my coil over some overburen covering a layer of bedrock above me. I got a faint tone and started pulling down the overburden and reached some decomposing granite bedrock. The target sound got better so I ended up busting out the bedrock trying to pick up the target down in a deep crack. As I got further down, the target got weaker and I thought I was pushing it deeper in the crack, so I busted out some more bedrock. I finally picked up a half a matchhead size nugget and thought that just couldn't be right. As good as the 7000 is on small gold, that just didn't seem right. I then waved over my spoils pile with all this overburden and busted up granite. Targets everywhere. The sun beating down on me and I'm on my knees sorting through the spoils trying to pinpoint tiny targets with a 14" coil. After about 1/2 hr, I got most of them, 6 matchhead size nuggets. If I had my handy NOX, I could have made short work of this mess, but maybe I'll go back for the crumbs next year. I'm moving to Reno in a couple weeks, I'll be a snowbird in Yuma next year.

I hear that an individual in Northern California recently stumbled upon a nugget weighing over 16oz troy - anyone have any photos or the story of this find yet? This is the largest CA find I am aware of since the Butte nugget.