Twelve Days At Rye Patch

[Lunk]

Tis the season for nuggetshooting the great American desert southwest once again, and for the first leg of my annual pilgrimage it’s always mandatory to spend some time at the Rye Patch area in northern Nevada. With the ground being very dry this time of year, the GPZ 7000 performs at its best in this region with minimal interference from the conductive alkali component of the local ground. In areas where there was variable ground however, a quick adjustment of the Ground Smoothing from Off to Locate Patch returned the threshold to a smooth and stable operation again. One of the highlights of the hunt was a decent, broad target that had a hint of a gurgle as the coil was swept completely out of the target zone, which indicated the nugget was going to be a bit larger than the usual dinks I had been finding. After removing  8 to 10 inches of material out of a broad area centered over the target, the signal response was fairly screaming as I swung the coil flat against the bottom of the excavation. Turning the coil up on edge however, and the Zed struggled to get a response from the bottom of the hole; when this scenario happens, it’s telling me there’s a really nice nugget and that I have a lot more digging to do. ? Finally, at a depth of 18 inches, the target was screaming off the edge of the coil, so just using the plastic scoop, I dug into the floor of the mammoth dig hole and retrieved the golden beauty: a lovely 10.6 grammer!? This same process was repeated on another occasion, but this time it was a 4.5 gram nugget about 3 inches away from another nugget about half its size, again at around 18 inches deep. Although pretty nippy in the mornings, the sunny weather held out with no wind. So all in all, a super good hunt, with a total of 51 grams of golden goodies.

 

[Lunk]

Indeed Simon, but I use a secret weapon in flogged areas: slow and careful gridding; most operators can’t even stand to do it for a half an hour, let alone all day for days on end. But in these kinds of areas, it’s the most effective way to maximize your gold recovery.

[Cabin Fever]

Impressive hunt!  Nice batch of nuggets with lots of character.. I really like the little wing looking nugget to the right of the Mercury Dime. Not that I don’t like your 10+ grammer too!

Good job Lunk!

Bryan

[IdahoPeg]

Wow, great job Lunk! I think you dethroned Lucky Lundy as King of the Patch this season lol!

[Nevada Brian]

Incredible, nice going Lunk and way to stay disciplined!

Brian.

[phoenix]

Lunk what a terrific collection of finds.   Well done mate ?

[beatup]

Outstanding results Lunk ,you are right slow and careful gridding  is the thing to do out there.

[Jim McCulloch]

Admit it, brother Keith, you are just a plain 'ol gold magnet. Keep up the good work. HH Jim

[Glenn in CO]

WOW ! Very impressive batch of nuggets and some say the Rye Patch has been pounded to death! I don't think so! WTG

[flakmagnet]

You usually have lessons in your posts and the ones in this post are particularly valuable.

Patience and gridding.

I wonder if, when you have a moment, you could quickly describe how you go about how you grid an area and how big the areas usually are.

Thanks for the post, it is inspiring to see someone who knows what they are doing show the results and describe how it's done.