Digging for gold in Alaska

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Reno Chris

Well-known member
Joined
May 5, 2011
Messages
274
I am just back from a two week prospecting trip to Alaska (11 days of digging). Here is 42 grams (1.3 ounces) of gold dug from Alaskan soils. The largest one is 0.75 ounces, but it was only about 2 inches deep and honestly could have been found with any metal detector. The nugget was in a hole dug previously and made a very loud down-up signal (as you might expect). The previous digger walked away from it, assuming that it was trash. I decided to get it out of the hole as big loud trash can overwhelm smaller more subtle signals from nearby gold. I was pretty shocked when I took two swipes at the bottom of the old dig hole and out popped this big flash of gold!
The other large piece is a specie which is one of those where you can debate if it’s a nugget or a specimen. It has lots of quartz, but there is more gold than quartz by volume. It weighs 8 dwt and was a good, easy to hear hi-lo signal. It was down a good 10 inches from the surface, which is good depth on something like that. The SDC 2300 does very well on specimen gold. The third largest piece weighs just under a pennyweight and was a sharp lo-hi signal at 4 inches deep. In Alaska I used the SDC 2300 in wet brush and rain every day, and one of the great things about it was that it was nearly false free. Hunting heavy brush is rough as most metal detectors will regularly chirp as the coil or cable contact brush or rocks. These chirps need to be investigated as they sound much like gold. The SDC saves the operator a lot of time not having to deal with that problem.
Anyway, I had a great time with friends and got some nice gold too.
 

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Only saw one bear the entire trip, and that was while we were in the car driving 40 miles an hour. The bear turned tail and ran as fast as he could as soon as he saw the car. In the area where we were detecting I only saw a very few bear prints. Lots more moose and caribou prints. I wasn't too worried about the bear. We faced far more danger each day when we drove out to the mining area from commercial truck drivers who drove too fast down the middle of the narrow road. We saw one RV that was litterally run off the road by a truck - he chose to roll his motorhome over the edge and down the hill rather than head on with a fuel truck.
 
Some nice nuggets n pickers there!
We in UK,watch the Gold Prospecting progs in Nome,and beyond. on Sky Tv with envy!!
Always nice to see some color in ur pan!large or small.
 
justinhcase said:
Very Nice ,lady luck was with you.
Not sure I would know how to keep my eyes down looking for color and my head up looking for Bear at the same time.
Look forward to seeing what you find next.
Justin
That's an easy problem.... just turn your head sideways !!! :lol:
 
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