Dredge Tailings

Paper Hangers Huh...  I have never thought of that before but it makes sense that people would do that.   Thanx for the heads up I will keep it in mind.

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		Quote:			Posted by Okletsee
	I think I've seen some quartz with red in it, rummaging thru the tailings, but my MD didn't hit on any of it so far.

If you have a Loop, check it out for little yellow spots!  LOL!

Some Monzonite has payable levesl in it but too small for the detector to see it.    A little Falcon Detector is good for that stuff.

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Gotta build ya one on these.

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Thats a good area, keep looking and you will find something. In that general area it's been worked with everything from sluice to big dredges over the years as it was a hotspot back in the day, and still is due to it's relative closeness to Boise. One thing to remember in tailings and dredge piles you are gleaning someone else's leavings so you don't find gold clustered like you will in undisturbed locations, just hit or miss. Still never know they might have let a big ol nugget roll off the dump belt. That's where a detector is the way to go in my opinion. Good hunting!


 

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		Quote:			Posted by Okletsee
	Thanks Idaho.  I'm still learning and sorta just documenting some of it along the way.  I haven't found much written on how to "read" tailings.   Some have heavy sediment in them and others are clean as if the rocks were double washed.  All in the same vicinity.  Consensis is that if the dredge was in the gold at least some of it was going out the back into the tailings as the technology wasn't that great.  A trip the the museum in Idaho City is on the horizon to find out more about the dredges of the day.

You can save yourself a bit of trouble and effort by researching the mining company that created the tailing pile. If they filed the proper reports, you can find their yield for the area and guess the content of the tailings. As a rule of thumb, I have found in the past that the yield in a tailing pile is less than 10% of the yield of the company by reports. If their yield was $20 per ton, the yield  will be no more than $2 per ton to you. That's hardly working wages, mate. Even at today's prices, that cranks up to about $20 per ton. Without heavy machinery, moving that much to find tiny bits of ore seems to be a hobby that will make you fitter but not much richer. To do it according to the laws of most states, you also have to restore the appearance after you finish so double your work effort and figure out the outcome.

As to determining the actual content of a tailing pile, here's a very small tip. Use the sunlight to your advantage. Gold, even in ore that has no visible gold, can be seen from a short distance in reflected sunlight. When you look at a tailing pile, you can increase your yield of recoveries by looking for the faint yellow glint in the reflected light. It's there to the trained eye. The best light for this is between 11:00am and 1:00pm when the sunlight reflection is most mellow to your eyes at the ground level. You can practice with ore that has a known gold content if you have any. Be aware that you can be fooled a bit by pyrites or mica so use a magnifying glass or metal detector in conjunction with this process.

Good luck and happy hunting. Your arms and legs will become as gnarled and rock hard as the roots of an oak tree from your work.

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