How Long Did It Take To Find Your First Nugget?

[Desert Dawg]

It took me about a yr and a change of machines to get my first gold, I was using a mxt pro, and missing a lot of gold since it was very small where I was hunting, was shown a GB2 in action by George D.  and over same ground it was getting small grain size nuggets right and left, then I bought my GB2 and first trip out to Yuba River, I got two little pickers (left side of pic), been finding gold ever since. First trip back to Rye Patch and I found 7 nuggets shown over the dime.

[Denny]

Took me 11 years hunting a small grassy resting spot from the 1870’s to find my first and only gold nugget 5.1 gram with the Deus2 at 6-7 inches deep. The closest mines are in  Coarsegold California. 
 

[mn90403]

It took me a year after I bought my 5000 to find my first, flat little nugget at the Dale.  It was a sub grammer in lots of dry wash piles found with the 17" Commander coil.  I had been on numerous Arizona trips on my own and I think at that point I was actually avoiding people because I didn't think they would tell me where the gold was anyway.

My find was on an outing with another group who were much more helpful.  The buddy system does work but be careful if you get too good because some buddies will think you have taken advantage of them and then you've lost a friend which is more valuable than the few gold pieces you find.

[blackjack]

 

On 4/19/2023 at 12:52 PM, oldmancoyote1 said:

Seven years.  I got a bit frustrated and paid Ray Mills considerable cash for help.  After an introduction session that Fall, he took my buddy and me to a better place that Spring.  Over the next few days I found 63  mostly sub-gram "nuggets".  My buddy the @@@,  fount 79.

You've got to admire him on two levels, honesty and persistence. It's an interesting topic, a good percentage of people started finding gold when the technology improved, I do wonder how many small pieces I missed with my ground hog, before I found a piece large enough for it to register. At the time we had no choice the A2B was state of the art.