The Placers

[29prospector]

Good evening everyone. Now that my brain has returned to a cooler temputure, I shall attempt to give you an update on our Placer site. Doc and I have been suffering from cabin fever and decided to get stupid and go mining. This little adventure taught the both of us a few lessons, of which I shall share with you.

1. I don't care how good the gold is, I will not work in 118 degree weather again.

2. It is best to move all overburden before 8am.

3. There are no BEE's out when its 118.

4. A 5 gallon water jug is not big enough for 1 person let alone 2.

5. Tools are very hot when trying to load them into the truck

6. I believe late Sept. or mid-Oct. will be a good time to go back out.

Now you would think that a man who has grown up, worked and relaxed in the desert would know better, well we do, but the damn wind got to us and wispered in our ear "go get some gold", and we listened.

Bob

[Ridge Runner]

Bob

You know when you can hear the sweat boiling on your arm that should say something about hot it was. Is that the same hole you and Doc have been working on for a while? I've been out in AZ hunting with a detector but not that hot.I hunt some then go back to the shade of my truck then hunt again after cooling off. Don't you have a big tarp to setup over your work area?

One thing I've found that helps is wet down your cap are hat to keep cool!You and Doc be careful and always drink alot of water.

Chuck

[29prospector]

Ridge Runner,

Ya its the same hole. It keeps changing as we go . Seems that there is no pattern to the gold. It just keeps coughing up gold .

We have umbella's that we use and wetting down the hat works for about 2-3 minutes, then it turns to steam. It was a crazy idea we had, well planned out with lots of water, just no energy in that kind of heat. I'll tell you this, the A/C in my Toyota works really good .

Bob

[Guest keninla]

3. There are no BEE's out when its 118.

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Bob,

sounds like you have some very smart bees there.

Ken

[Frosty]

Bob & Doc,

It's amazing what that elusive yellow metal will do to a persons thought process even when it hits 2000 deg - like you said - a tiny voice kept saying come & get me & you both said OK. Glad to hear you both made it back alright.

I mentioned in another post that it can take up to 13 days to get yourself rehydrated at the cellular level if you get dehydrated - a good practice is to start drinking fluids 2 - 3 days before you head out & then drink them as you prospect. Beer & pop DO NOT hydrate they dehydrate A general rule of thumb is 1qt. of water every half hour - or 2-3 gals/person/day. If you find that during prospecting that your mouth is dry then you are in the danger zone - you're dehydrated. Salt/salty foods will help retain the water in your bod, sport drinks help but drink water also. These are gen. guidelines to help all of us stay healthy while prospecting, work with a partner and keep an eye out for your brother.

Takecare out there & keep on beeping -Frosty

[29prospector]

Frosty,

Thanks for the reminders. We sometimes forget them. I go thru 5 gals. of water each trip out and 8-10 hydration drinks. It was just plain hot and we worked til we could'nt anymore.

Bob

[nuggethunting]

Hello 29Prospector,

Sorry I've been kind of idle on your posts. I really enjoy them cause I used to do a lot of drywashing myself. I really enjoy hearing about drywashing, vac-pacing, dredging and other methods besides just electronic prospecting. Sounds like the hole is producing good values. Amazing the old-timers didn't work the area more, or did they in other spots nearby?

Also, just as a suggestion when you make a post, you don't have to hit the "reply" tab on people's post. This will make a "Quote" on every post. It's easier to just scan down to the bottom of the page and hit "Add Reply," which will elliminate the "Quote" to be posted on every post. You can do it either way, just wanted to tell you how to elliminate the quote section.

Talk with you soon,

Rob Allison

[whats4supper]

AAAAHHHH! so damn hot yet the ground is not dry enough where I regularly drywash.

I guess you could do the thing I do and work at night. get some 6 to 7-foot 5/8" or 3/4" rebar and pound them in at perimeter points around the site. Get a piece of 1 1/2" to 2-Inch pipe, and some barbed-wire diagonal hangers, and weld those to a section of pipe (give or take 18 inches long). the notches will hold the lantern bail, and you can work with light in the coolest part of the day (night, actually). You don't need to see the gold, and can move material. That way, you can spend parts of the day, under a shade awning, working only the concentrates.

If that doesn't work out, invest some funds at EBodyBoarding.com, and hang out catching waves at Huntington Beach or Oceanside. If you wanted to, take your GB or goldmaster to the beach, and wade around in cool water and pick up coins and jewelry using the superior circuits of a gold detector in a salt environment.

My recommendations on a sponge board: for all you geezers, get the big bruddah (light and easy to carry), or the Wahoo board (will float anything almost and good wave action for the prone rider). Don't forget to get a decent leash and drool wipes for all the girls walking by in a string.

[29prospector]

Whats4supper,

I like the sound of the ideas. Actually we have 2 sets of lites, I just haven't been able to convince Doc that nite work is good. Now, as for the beach, thats a very good idea but I think I'm going to Colorado for August. I want to visit with an old friend in Cripple Creek.

Rob,

Thanks for the advice. I've been trying to figure that one out.

Bob

[whats4supper]

Cripple Creek?

maybe you can get a tour. visit Jack Potts old place.

Jack Pott worked a particularly rich gold mine in the basin, and people would regular remark to someone coming into some cash as hitting the Jack Pott lode.

Jack Pott became jackpot!

[29prospector]

Thanks partner, that came at the right time

Bob

[buffaloearl]

Hey guys, I just read on another forum how to handle the bees. This guy says that the bees attack you as they are looking for water or moisture and your sweaty body has it. He says to wet some towels and throw them down on the ground well away from where you are working or detecting and the bees will swarm the towels for the moisture and leave you alone so you can gold mine or detect. Interesting concept. Just my 2 cents. Buffalo Earl

[29prospector]

buffaloearl,

Not a bad idea except that the sun would dry the towels out in about 5 minutes. A friend of mine that lives in Bouse, Az. told me that his doctor recommends wearing a long sleeve shirt and rubbing Flex-All or Ben Gay on your clothes. He claims that the bees can't stand the smell. Well I can say this much, when its 118 out the bees don't come out and play.

Bob

[29prospector]

Rob,

I didn't get time to answer your question last nite. I think that the oldtimers were to busy looking for lode veins. The sink hole/valley that we are in is fed from 5 washes. Any of the work that has been done on 3 of the washes were done between 1988-1995, and even that was sparce. The wash that we started in is feed from 3 sources and one of those hasn't even been touched. Denny, David, Joe, my partner Jeff and myself have run the detectors over it and I found 2 small pickers in the hillside about 2 feet up from the wash.

The majority of the work has been confined to the wash we are in at present. This fall we hope to open up 5-8 more spots so as to get a better feel for what we really have. Our sink hole is directly below the 2nd largest producer in the district(gotgold I hope I'm right on that). Hopefully this fall you can make a trip out for a day or 2.

Bob

[FlakMagnet]

Bob,

We may have run detectors over some of that ground, but there is

one serious amount of ground that still needs attention.

Can't wait til it cools off (to 100).

Stay cool...

[whats4supper]

I like the water barrel idea for the bees and wasps, but you have to haul it in, and that may be wasted effort.

No baby! get the bounce fabric softener towels. keeps the bees away, allows your partner in the hole to stand next to you and maybe enjoy it, and stoppin at the bar on the way back into town, people will think you just got out of the shower.

Only your hairdresser will know for sure....

[FlakMagnet]

Whats4supper,

While I am all for keeping bees and such away,

I tried Bounce one of the last times I went out beeping

and while I do think it had some effect,

I have to say the smell was, shall we say, memorable,

and long-lasting.

I can just imagine Seldom Seen Slim or Shorty Harris with Bounce

tucked in their shirt collars.

Those single blanket prospectors would've died before they did that.

I'll bring the barrel up Bob...

I don't think you guys would let me come into camp smelling like that...

[nuggethunting]

Hello Flak,

Speaking of those "Bounce" tissues! I'm not convinced it wasn't a joke for the Alaskan Mosquitos. One of the days at Moore Creek the bugs were getting a bit bad so I remembered about the Bounce. I was carrying a couple in a small pouch on my backpack. The minute I pulled out the "Bounce Tissue" about a dozen Mosquitos rushed to it!!! I said, "What the F ......!!!" I tossed the tissue down realizing it must have been a joke, they swarmed the tissue like it was no tomorrow.

I'm not convinced Fabric Softener Sheets work.

Rob Allison

[whats4supper]

Maybe the competition for mosquito food is extreme in Alaska. Perhaps you should have been the litter bug and placed sheets all around your area. that way it would attract the buggers to the sheet and away from you. Like anything else, what works in one clime or locale may not work in another (like metal detectors)

just think of how it would work towards your personal security if you had a sheet hanging out of all your pockets, out of the waistband, stuck in your headband, and where ever else. Why no sane person would ever approach you to try to rob you, and everybody would let you go right on by, knowing that you are coming blocks away, thinking you was just some derelict. Why, I bet your own dog would even bark at you.

Folks at the bar may even buy you free drinks on the condition that you drank outside, coming in only for a refill or a new handout. Why, many patrons may even give you money if you would give them space. It could turn out something more lucrative than killing yourself in 110, and the only holes you'd have to dig would be to stash your cash.

No, the best bug repellent is the Vitamin B6. but you sure as H won't smell like bounce.

[FlakMagnet]

Rob,

What it must have been is;

some of those Alaskan mosquitos must have migrated (legally, of course),

to the desert southwest... the Bounce didn't really slow these bugs down much.

Whats4supper,

As far as someone buying me a drink at the bar while I'm wearing Bounce?

Don't think so...

I keep remembering a character in a book called '92 in the Shade' by Tom Maguane,

who dressed up as a moth and went to a bar,

only to have the c*&^ beaten out of him by the locals.

Can't help but feel that Bounce would have a similar effect.

...Man it's been a slow summer huh guys?

[whats4supper]

No, it's having all these rags hangin out and lookin the down and out part, only smellin difrent.

[29prospector]

I'll tell you guys this much, I don't care what I have to hang on my clothes just so long as the BEE's stay away . Of course when its 118 out, the bees are hiding . Somehow I feel like a fool, either I get stung or I work in heat unfit for humans . Somehow I can't seem to win.

Bob

[whats4supper]

take it from me, all losers are real winners.

signed: A Loser

I tell myself that I go out digging and waving the wand for a variety of reasons: outdoors, the getaway, solitude, but the real reason is, I want gold. The fact that I have my little hoard and want to add to it.

Not that I've sold much gold lately, but its the prestige and bragging rights about the stuff and the methods I use to get it. Hey, even I can make somebody else's day by making a gift of some of it. Gold fever affects everybody, some to the point of delerium. Not me. I don't get enough to get to that point. steady eddies never win.

its always the next guy who finds the hoard 2-inches from where I quit, or two inches beyond the range of my detector, or simply, a 2-inch nugget right where I stood, camped, slept, or set up the lantern. two inches next to where I changed the flat tire or took a leak.

If I know anybody who finds it after I left, I always tell them to tell me about it if the chip is around 7 pennyweight or less. If its bigger than that, I really don't want to know about it, because all it would do is P--s me off. Some things are best not revealed. you can't tell me that God doesn't have a sense of humor and plays it out on some unsuspecting dope that comes along.

People who know what it looks like and have the expertise get skunked a lot more times than the one who knows nothing and scores really, really big. More big fortunes have been discovered by people stumbling over the GD thing. It goes back to the "You always find what you're not looking for" syndrome.

Yep, I know my place in the scheme...

signed, A Loser.

[29prospector]

Well whats4supper,

At least we know who is in the boat with us as we row. I think sometimes that we adults(to what ever degree) need a little 10 year boy's view on things. My grandson and I went prospecting yesterday to a new spot that Doc had found. So here we are sitting under the umbella and my grandson says to me, " grandpa, just look at that out there", I turned around to see what he was looking at and we had a beautiful view of the valley below. Then he say's to me, "I love prospecting with you". After wiping the tears and sweat away, we ran 4 buckets of material and he wanted to pan it, so I said go for it. Ya, you guessed it, 2 cute little pickers right off the bat. He says to me " the view is getting even better".

BoB

[dave wiseman]

Well whats4supper,

At least we know who is in the boat with us as we row. I think sometimes that we adults(to what ever degree) need a little 10 year boy's view on things. My grandson and I went prospecting yesterday to a new spot that Doc had found. So here we are sitting under the umbella and my grandson says to me, " grandpa, just look at that out there", I turned around to see what he was looking at and we had a beautiful view of the valley below. Then he say's to me, "I love prospecting with you". After wiping the tears and sweat away, we ran 4 buckets of material and he wanted to pan it, so I said go for it. Ya, you guessed it, 2 cute little pickers right off the bat. He says to me " the view is getting even better".

you got it right Bob.After all is said and done it's the experiences that linger on.The gold one finds is exciting at the time,but the luster seems to wear off.I'm what's for supper will find some more good pieces.Non prospectors seem to love the golsd you show them,but enjoy the story of how it was found just as much....Dave

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