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i recently got some gold panning gear and plan on going panning this weekend. im already expecting to find nothing which is ok with me, i just think it would be fun and relaxing, plus its a good excuse to get outdoors.
i was wondering if anyone else pans as a hobby? and if you guys have any advice/tips for a newbie?
Here is a thread we had on this some time ago,if you read through might find some info in it.
http://www.wilderness-survival.net/f...t=gold+panning
Patience is the best advice I can give. And research. Gold generally hides in some select spots in a stream. Think of it as a fish and you'll have the idea. Anywhere swift water turns quiet is generally where you'll find gold. Behind a rock or a tree root. The water pushes the gold along and when it finds some quiet water it drops to the bottom. Even placer gold will fall out if it finds quiet water. You can certainly find it in swift water but it will accumulate where the water turns quiet.
Out of curiosity, what kind of equipment do you have? We never invested in anything more than pans but I've threatened to get a Keene sluice box more than once. One of the places we panned there was an old guy that ran a 2 inch power sluice and he didn't do too bad. There's not a ton of gold in Indiana but it's certainly here. Another site a couple of guys run a 3 inch dredge. They do pretty well.
The older guys don't mind helping you with information so strike up a conversation. Everyone I've run into has always been pretty free with advice and that's about the fastest way to learn.
By the way, don't fret about knowing whether you have found gold or not. If you wonder, it most likely isn't. When you find it, there will be NO DOUBT it's gold.
I've had a bit of luck using this secret map. :innocent:
http://pics2.city-data.com/city/maps2/cm2989.png
Just too funny Ken!! All of us together couldn't get in there!!! I've watched some shows on OLN about panning,but sadly I live in one of the rare states that has never had gold found here... Except where Ken pointed out.
Southern Indiana has it. Nashville, Indiana area. Glaciers deposited it long ago. Grab a pan and come on up. There's gold in them thar hills.
Rick that is one bug that I am really afraid of. It scares me more than any disease out there. People have lost all in chase of that elusive shiny metal. For me I think that's one thing I'll save for Last Resort.
Ive never tried gold panning , but have been to Arkansas to the dig for diamonds thing they got .
My father talks ALL the time about gold prospecting. Though I have never panned for anything I think I have about 20 years experience after listening to him tell me about it.:)
Thanks Ken.
I will be sure to give my dad the "secret" map to fortune. :)
Neither me nor my wife are caught up in. It's just a fun hobby and a nice way to kill time. You'd be hard pressed to make a living at. You won't make a living in Indiana. It's all placer gold and fine as salt although you can find some bits and pieces a bit larger. We panned some in Alaska. Naturally, my wife found much more than I did. She had some of what she found turned into a tie chain for me. Yeah, I know, she's special.
Tonester, on the other hand, is in nugget country. I held a 300 ounce nugget once. That was pretty special.
Hey, Tonester, I just remembered...some of the folks in AK would take indoor/outdoor carpeting and place it at the bottom of a wash out. They'd leave it out all week and then retrieve it on the week-end. They'd dunk the carpet in a rub of water and then roll it backwards to open the weave in the carpet and release any gold that was captured. Then they would pan the dregs from the tub to recover the gold. Once they had cleaned up the carpeting they would throw it back down at the base of the wash out and come back the following week-end. Up there, some of them made some pretty good spending money. You might be able to try that in Cali and see if it works.
The water runs down the wash out and loosens the gold bearing dirt. The dirt washes down across the carpeting and gets trapped by the fibers.
http://rlv.zcache.com/gold_nugget_si...36trlf_400.jpgQuote:
Originally Posted by Rick
wow thats a pretty cool idea rick...ill see if i can try that out, gotta get my hands on some carpet. all i have right now is a bigger and smaller sized pan. ill also be taking some shovels and pick axes. there some spots where im going where it looks like there are some dried up creeks so i wanna try to make some kinda sand sifter too.
I was just up in the gold country last weekend and did a little panning, only got a couple of flakes of dust but that is more than i've gotten on some outings. A pan, a small shovel, an eyedropper and a small vial is all I take.... well that and lunch!
hey sarky what do you use an eyedropper for? sorry im new at this...
To suck up the last little bit of water. Best places to look in flowing streams are under big rocks. At least that is what I have been told.Quote:
Originally Posted by tonester
Sounds like a great time. Is there gold in Texas other than the horns in front of all the Cadillacs
To collect the flakes (in the water) that are in your pan, and then deposit them in the vial. Think of it as a miniature gold vacuum cleaner.Quote:
Originally Posted by tonester
Crash is correct!
Yep. They are called snifters and you can buy them. They are little more than a plastic squeeze bottle with a long spout. Once you get down to a flake of gold you just suck it up in your bottle.
You'll need something to keep your gold in. Obviously, they make small bottles for that, too. Just keep some water in the collection bottle. It makes it easier to transfer the gold and you aren't as apt to loose the gold in the process.
You'll be in magnetite when you find gold. You won't find gold if there isn't magnetite. It looks like black sand but it's ferrous. You can use a magnet to pull it out. I took a 35 mm film canister and dropped a magnet inside. When you get your dregs worked down to just the "black sand" then you can run the magnet over it and pull it all out. If you use a magnet about half the depth of the film canister then you can just give it a bit of a flick, the magnet will move up to the top of the canister releasing it's hold on the magnetite and it will fall right off. So you can run the canister over the sand in your pan, hold it over the creek, flick, drop the sand, and continue on. My little invention but you can have it. Commercial magnets are $9.00 to $20.00 last time I checked.
My grandfather was a fishing boat captain. This thread reminded me of the stories he told of trying to find gold in the area now known as Ovens Natural Park. Some were blasting the rock - he was wandering along the beach and found a large chunk of gold that he said was probably 5-8 pounds. As he was leaving, and headed back to his horse - three men with shovels decided that he should give it to them. He felt differently......they won. Here's the place it happened. http://www.ovenspark.com/ Nice memories. Thanks for the thread.
We drove the scenic lighthouse road when we were in Nova Scotia. Pretty cool. There are some seriously nice folks that live there. Gold robbers not withstanding.
Tonester - If you are going to be working creeks and streams, look for high water marks then look for any rocks, holes, or tree roots that are between the high water and the water level. As I said above, the gold will concentrate when it can fall out of the water and working ground that is out of the water makes it that much easier.
Another tool you can make is a crevice tool. Just take a piece of coat hanger and bend the last inch or inch and a half at a 90 degree angle. It will let you reach into crevices in rocks and drag out any gold that might have fallen in there.
You can also work down your dregs to just black sand then dump it all into a 5 gallon bucket to work up when you get home.
Here's a list of some of the gear we have. This is by memory. I'll have to check and see if I miss anything.
10 Gallon tub to pan tailings into. We never panned in the creek. Always in the tub. That way if you drop something you can still find it.
5 gallon bucket for black sand
We have two classifiers but I don't know for certain what size. 1/2 inch and 1/4 inch I think. Set a classifier in your pan and dump your dirt into the classifier. It will remove the big stuff so all you have to work down is the really small stuff. The classifiers fit inside each other so it's easy to work the larger rock out before it gets into your pan.
Tripod seat. It's really nice to sit on the little seat in about a foot of water and work your pan rather than stand bending over.
Small trowel for loading your pan.
Snifters and bottles for storing tons of gold.
10x jewelers loupe. Indiana also has diamonds and rubies so the loupe helps with that. Check the geology where you intend to pan. You might be surprised what you can find. Also check with your state department of mines and minerals. They generally have pamplets or online information about the geology and where gold is located.
I'll look through my gear and see if anything else interesting is in there but that's the main stuff that I can think of.
thanks rick and everyone else for all the info and tips. i actually wrote down some notes in a note book and took it with me today. unfortunately we really didnt find any thing besides fools gold. but we still had a lot of fun.
the creek we panned in had a lot of gravel and pebbles. didnt really find any of that dark sand you were talking about rick. do you guys think this creek would even have any gold in it?
this week im gonna get some tools and gear to search in some cliffs that we came across, these cliffs look like they have a lot of different minerals in them.
anyways like i said before i really dont care if i dont find any gold (it would be nice though :)) but i think i found a new hobby.
I've never found gold where there wasn't magnetite present. The old timers I've talked to say the same thing. Magnetite has to be present. It's part of the gold bearing rock. Having said that, I've never panned in California so as sure as I tell you that it won't hold true there.
It is a lot of fun and another way to get outside. You'll be surprised how much wildlife you'll run into panning. My wife and I were working a very shallow spot in salt creek when we heard someone walking through the water. We were each sitting on a three legged seat I spoke about above and looked up to see a deer just walking down the creek. Neither of us moved and it didn't seem to be the least bit concerned. It checked us out for a moment then strolled on by. Pretty cool moment.
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