CO n00b looking for techniques and locations Options

[benjamin]

Howdy, I just discovered this hobby last week and have been to a few places on the Cleer Creek west of Golden and found.... zilch (!).

I built a large bilge pump gizmo for hand dredging but so far I think I need better valves because it doesn't work well at all. I have managed to vacuum a couple shovels worth of stuff off the rocks in Cleer Creek and got a lot of black sand and some red things. Interested in knowing where people go (while there is still snow covering the Breckenridge area) to see even the slightest hint of gold. So far I could claim that gold does not exist in Colorado, having never seen even the tiniest speck in the 10 or so pans I've sloshed. Seems like I was following all of the lore regarding where to look and how to dig but I guess not :\

Anyway, I'll try to attach a pic of the red things and the black sand that came out of just 2 cups of material I got when my pump was working. Seems like a lot of black sand for so little gravel... and zero gold for that. Hmmm. There is a learning curve.

I'm in Superior if anybody has any suggestions.

Thanks!
Ben

[jim]

Welcome to the forum. YOU WILL FIND GOLD. You have found the best site on the internet for prospecting in Colorado. Dan and Denise (owners here) have a finger on all the info (just about) that you need to find gold in Colorado. Take a few hours lol and look through the whole site for lots of prospecting information. Then if you have questions you can email the D's. They are very helpful in numerous ways. You can also visit the chat area where at times you can find many seasoned prospectors.
I am not a gold prospector myself. I am a rockhound and I do some lapidary.From what I can see in your pics you have got the panning down.You got that black sand really clean. You must have gone to a place where all the gold has been taken. With that much sand it seems like you would have gotten a speck or two. As far as the red pieces go they may be garnet.
Anyway... welcome and come often for a lotta good pics and great info. enjoy Jim

[benjamin]

Welcome to the forum. YOU WILL FIND GOLD. You have found the best site on the internet for prospecting in Colorado. Dan and Denise (owners here) have a finger on all the info (just about) that you need to find gold in Colorado. Take a few hours lol and look through the whole site for lots of prospecting information. Then if you have questions you can email the D's. They are very helpful in numerous ways. You can also visit the chat area where at times you can find many seasoned prospectors.
I am not a gold prospector myself. I am a rockhound and I do some lapidary.From what I can see in your pics you have got the panning down.You got that black sand really clean. You must have gone to a place where all the gold has been taken. With that much sand it seems like you would have gotten a speck or two. As far as the red pieces go they may be garnet.
Anyway... welcome and come often for a lotta good pics and great info. enjoy Jim

Thanks for the info, Jim. I did spend several days poking around the site before joining. I guess I just need a nudge or two in the right direction so I can learn the last few details I need to look for in a site. Stuff like - go to the X turnout in route 6 and dig down 18 inches, etc. I'm all about exploring for myself, but if it takes me 3 months to see my first speck, it's gonna be less fun :P

Anyway, I used a couple of rare earth magnets under the pan to help get the iron in one spot, that way I could really go through the classified tiny bits and see what I (didn't) have. People keep saying there is invisible gold in the black, so I thought I should start saving that stuff. I know a mining engineer on another unrelated site who says that a 5 gallon bucket of good black sand can contain 30lb of gold. zoiks.

[CP]

Hi Benjamin,

Welcome to the CP forums, make yourself right at home browsing the entire CP website.
Thanks Jim, we do try to keep good upto date info on the site for all prospectors.
30"lbs" per 5ver......WOW!! That is some killer stuff, we all want 2......I'll pay shippin' fer' mine.

You can also find some good info in our plans and tips page for panning Benjamin, the area you visited, (Clear creek) should give you some specks panning just about anywhere in Jefferson county's open space along the creek. Remember though, the specks may be very small and you have to pan them very delicately or they wash away. There are several other tips on that page too including seasoning new pans if you've got a new one.

Hopefully some of those tips help out in the field and good luck next time. Don't forget to take the camera for pics to post in the forum here too. Everyone loves to hear about the adventures and finds.

Oh, X marks the spot sometimes, but those are hard to come by.

CP

[Chet]

Thanks for the info, Jim. I did spend several days poking around the site before joining. I guess I just need a nudge or two in the right direction so I can learn the last few details I need to look for in a site. Stuff like - go to the X turnout in route 6 and dig down 18 inches, etc. I'm all about exploring for myself, but if it takes me 3 months to see my first speck, it's gonna be less fun :P

Anyway, I used a couple of rare earth magnets under the pan to help get the iron in one spot, that way I could really go through the classified tiny bits and see what I (didn't) have. People keep saying there is invisible gold in the black, so I thought I should start saving that stuff. I know a mining engineer on another unrelated site who says that a 5 gallon bucket of good black sand can contain 30lb of gold. zoiks.

I realize that this is a little late, but... Hi Benjamin!

As for the red stuff in your picture, it is almost assuredly garnets. Which means you're on the right track! Just not quite there yet.

On Clear Creek, I would suggest to go the shovel method for now, rather than the sucker. The sucker won't get you much material, even under the best of circumstances. A few shovelfulls from behind a boulder, on a gravel bar, etc should almost guarantee that you've got at least a couple specks in your pan on Clear Creek. I think at this point you should just go for a bit of a more bulk-processing method until you've got it figured out enough to use a sucker in the right spots at the right time.

Also - make sure you're digging stuff that was deposited from the stream, not the pinkish gravel used to construct the road. But overall, I'd say to make an effort to dig deeper (~1ft, maybe), a shovel will help you do that much better than a sucker will.

Since so much of the stuff that I see on Clear Creek is fine fine stuff, less than the width of mechanical pencil lead, I do have another suggestion that may help you see what you're looking for. If you work a panful down to a wee bit of black sand but don't see anything, don't toss it out. Leave that little bit of material in your pan, and throw your next batch of material in on top of it. Work that down, check again, and continue a you feel necessary. That gives you a bit more of a... concentrated view on things. 5 specks of gold grouped together are much easier to see than one single one.

As for the 30 lbs of gold per bucket of black sand - zoiks! I'd say that is a bit of an overestimate, unless someone is REALLY terrible at panning some REALLY good dirt. Depending on your panning skills, I'd realistically estimate it to be more like a few pinches worth for even a moderately skilled panner. It would absolutely knock my socks off if there were even a leveled off spoonful's worth. I have actually taken a microscope to my black sands before, and what I found was about 3 specks per slide covered in sand. 3 specks that you'd be hard pressed to pick up with a dampened needle (yeah, I tried).

[Coalbunny]

You panned on Clear Creek and found nothing? Really? I've had that problem on the North Fork, but everytime I'm on the South Fork I always find gold.

[Chet]

You panned on Clear Creek and found nothing? Really? I've had that problem on the North Fork, but everytime I'm on the South Fork I always find gold.

Even on the North Fork it's pretty tough to miss.