Gold Panning

[WyoDoug]

This is the third bag of paydirt I gathered from a claim I had permission to do recreational gold panning on. In both images, there is a dime next to it for perspective as to size. I do not show any flour gold as that is with a bunch of black sand that I collect until I have enough to process it and extract the finer gold.

The flakes:


The flakes from last batch of gold paydirt I panned. 0.159 grams. $6.87 on the spot market. Next to a dime for perspective.

The biggest nugget I found so far:


Biggest nugget I found so far. 0.249 grams, $10.48 on the spot market. That is a dime next to it for perspective.

Not enough to quit my day job yet (retirement and agitating the wife), but enough to have fun with. These samples I dug out before the snow collected on the claim. Right now there is too much ice up there so it will be a while before I can collect more concentrate to work. Next batch I should hope to do some photography of elk and moose as we are hunting elk and if luck holds out moose in the same area.

 

[Fj605]

I worked with a driller from Spearfish, SD that would show up for his hitch with a pickup bed full of five gallon buckets he collected from his lease on his days off. He'd sit in the doghouse and pan through those buckets all day/night.

 

[XXL]

This is the third bag of paydirt I gathered from a claim I had permission to do recreational gold panning on. In both images, there is a dime next to it for perspective as to size. I do not show any flour gold as that is with a bunch of black sand that I collect until I have enough to process it and extract the finer gold.

The flakes:

View attachment 210446
The flakes from last batch of gold paydirt I panned. 0.159 grams. $6.87 on the spot market. Next to a dime for perspective.

The biggest nugget I found so far:
View attachment 210447

Biggest nugget I found so far. 0.249 grams, $10.48 on the spot market. That is a dime next to it for perspective.

Not enough to quit my day job yet (retirement and agitating the wife), but enough to have fun with. These samples I dug out before the snow collected on the claim. Right now there is too much ice up there so it will be a while before I can collect more concentrate to work. Next batch I should hope to do some photography of elk and moose as we are hunting elk and if luck holds out moose in the same area.

Maybe you're familiar with Two Toes on the youtube. He's always up to something and fun to watch. He's in the N. California area.

 

[WyoDoug]

Maybe you're familiar with Two Toes on the youtube. He's always up to something and fun to watch. He's in the N. California area.

Not one of the prospectors I have been watching but I will take a peek at his videos. I do plan on accumulating buckets that I can seal and start coming back with 5 gallon buckets of paydirt vs concentrate. What I do right now is dig up paydirt from the claim and take it home. Then I run paydirt through a sleuce and put the resulting concentrate into plastic bags after it is mostly dried out and classified to minus 1/4 inch and then pan it at my convenience. I am also finding a bunch of garnets which can make panning difficult. Garnets and black sand move in the pan about the same as gold does so getting clean gold can be time consuming sometimes.

I got an invitation to California to do some dredging through our local GPAA but costs would be prohibitive to me. Hand dredging would be fun.

I also got a handheld metal detector which I am playing with and plan to buy a good gold specific metal detector.

 

[WyoDoug]

Maybe you're familiar with Two Toes on the youtube. He's always up to something and fun to watch. He's in the N. California area.

Checked him out and his videos are really good. Some others you really have to watch out. They over dramatize the video with really distracting sarcasms and many show what has to be painted rock like they became millionaires off one panning event. It's very rare that you find a nugget weighing more than a few grams and some of the ones (which I will not name) I want to see the assay report before I believe what they put out in their videos.

 

[isu22andy]

Reminds me as a kid watching the outdoor channel and the show Gold Fever was on . Go go go go golddd feeevv fiv ivvv errr . Never did pan for it . Looks fun .

 

[Islander]

Worked on an active placer mine on the Mokelumne River as a teen in the late 70s. Lived in that 10 man Army tent for days at a time. Must have panned out 1000 pans or more. Good times. I'm the strapping young devil on the left. My crazy cowboy dad on the right.

 

[WyoDoug]

The local GPAA chapter has a claim off one of the old mines and being a member I am allowed to pan that and keep whatever I find along with metal detecting and hard rock if I get into that. This is a cool hobby to have to fill in time block during hunting and fishing trips when you need a change of routine and such a stress reliever. @Islander wished I got into it earlier than I did. Just like fishing, if you don't get anything everytime you go (and you don't) when you do it's a celebration and a stress reliever where you can actually decompress things like missing that damn 4 point buck. LOL