Is that a Skunk I Smell?

Well today we got skunked, as in shut-out, struck out... got no gold.

Anyone who thinks it's easy to just go up there in the mountains where all the gold is, and actually get gold, has another think coming. It's not easy.

We went up with our friend "Red" of Gold N Sand fame to test a couple of new spots. While I won't disclose where we were, the pic is from earlier scouting trips when the water was much to high to access.

Both spots look great and undoubtedly have gold there, but this one we have been waiting since spring to get back in there because it has a beautiful looking ancient alluvial gravel deposit along the opposite shoreline on an inside bend in the stream. The gravel deposits appear to be quite old and are very hard packed and difficult to chip away much less dig. The color of the material was that orange rust color dirt that usually means good gold, it also had streaks of very black dense sand along it.

After crossing a smaller tributary stream and then climbing a steep incline tying a rope off to a handy tree, then repelling down a snow covered steep incline to the ledge in the pic above. I slowly chipped out 4 buckets of nothing from there by tying another smaller rope to the handle on the bucket (with a lid on it) and throwing it out in the river for Ryan and Red to "reel" in and test. I pulled one more bucket from behind a large boulder at the edge of the stream in the same spot before retreating back to the car to warm up and get some lunch at a nearby eatery.

With our tails tucked, we decided to make a last minute quick stop at the confluence of the S Platte River and Clear Creek on the way home and ran another 4 buckets through the Gold Cube and ... eureka - gold!

When we take guests out on gold adventures up in the mountains, they always find gold... good gold, sometimes nuggets from our proven spots. However, finding new proven spots is never easy I guess, but darnit I sure don't like to get skunked!

Montana City: Ghost Town Gold or Bust?

I received an email from one of our Goldstrike Adventure customers (thank you Kevin) asking about the ghost town of Montana City as a possible location to include for our gold adventures. I had heard of Montana City and I had also researched the gold strikes at the confluence of Little Dry Creek and the South Platte River with some success, but had never put the two together... till now.

From Wiki-
"Montana City was the first settlement in what was later to become Denver, Colorado. It was established during the Pikes Peak Gold Rush on the east bank of the South Platte River, just north of the confluence with Little Dry Creek, in 1858. At the time, the site was in the Kansas Territory.

The site selected because it was adjacent to placer gold diggings along the South Platte River. However, the gold diggings at Montana City proved disappointing, and the site was soon abandoned in favor of the settlement of Auraria, a few miles downstream.

The Montana City site is now Grant-Frontier Park and includes mining equipment and a log cabin replica."

Two main groups of gold-seekers came to Colorado in the summer of 1858. The "Russell" group from Georgia founded Auraria while the "Lawrence" group from Lawrence, Kansas laid out Montana City near where present West Evans Avenue crosses the Platte River in Denver.

The "City" was abandoned by the winter and the group laid out the St. Charles townsite on the East bank of Cherry Creek. This letter was sent by a member of the Lawrence group.

"Here I am in the Gold Mines (so called) & I guess it is properly named, for I have seen the gold...There is quite a rush here to the mines, as there are within a few miles of this place over 500 persons. There were only about 30 or 40 when we arrived."

So, Kevin and I are going out on Friday to do some "testing" at Montana City together... hopefully you will see it added to our growing list of locations to choose your next gold adventure from.

UPDATE: Friday Oct 14th 10:30pm - Montana City is no bust!

Met with fellow Goldstriker Kevin and also a guy named Ron who has been coming down to the Montana City site for a few years now, emailed me about today and I now know why Montana City is his favorite place to pan.

First, what a beautiful place, once you get down into the river itself you are completely unable to see any sign whatsoever of a building or city... even though you are in the middle of one of the oldest industrial and business parks in Denver, the trees and riverbank shield the view. Simply beautiful I must say.

Oh yeah, about the gold. The clay false bedrock is down only a few feet at the most and in some cases is exposed. We found good amounts of fairly decent sized (12-20mesh) gold with lots of 100-400 mesh stuff underneath lots of dense black sands.

We have immediately added Montana City to our list of Goldstrike Adventure Locations. Call us if you'd like to try your luck at Montana City with our state of the art equipment.

As Kevin said today.... "Wow, you have all the toys".

"At your service", I added!

Betsy, A Story of Prospecting and "Progress"

Betsy kept to herself, busy panning one pan after another the entire day while we ran our high-tech equipment nearby. At the end of the day, we were hauling all our equipment up to the worlds biggest blackest dually van, when I saw Betsy coming down the Clear Creek bike path carrying her pan, bucket and a bag with her trash from the day in it. She stopped about every 50 or 100 feet to take a little rest break before moving along toward the parking lot where I was sitting.

I managed to get my legs to work so I hurried down and helped her carry her things the final few hundred yards to her pickup truck. We sat and talked a minute or two and she told me that she started coming down to this spot over 25 years ago when she retired, she is 85 now. She also told me that she has collected about 7 ounces of gold in that 25 years, one pan at a time. I had to smile, here is a little gal, 85 years old who comes down there by herself and has a wonderful time, bothers no-one and got over 7 ounces of gold in the process.

Now there are those who want to outright ban gold panning at this spot and other locations without any regard for people like Betsy, or the history of our state or the rights of prospectors. Jeffco and Adams County are both considering plans that would significantly impact the rights of prospectors and panners.

Betsy is a special person, like so many who have been prospecting along Clear Creek and other streams long before the highways, bridges and sewer treatment plants came along and pushed them and now us out of the way.... for the sake of "progress".
I am sorry I didn't think to get a quick picture of her, next time I see her I will ask if that would be okay.

Gold Unlimited Statement on Possible Destruction of TU Fish Habitat

During conversations with various organizations regarding the formation of the new GOLD UNLIMITED non-profit, I heard some very disturbing news today which requires a public response, even if not true.

Those of us at Gold Unlimited are working very hard to develop a positive relationship between gold prospectors and other groups like Trout Unlimited, the Cities of Golden and Arvada and other related organizations.
However, I was informed by a reliable source at a water resource agency that gold prospectors were moving boulders that were just set in place by Trout Unlimited and Jeffco Open Space people to create fish habitat on upper Clear Creek near Mayhem Gulch on HWY 6.

Really, are you kidding me?
So, as many of us are working to begin to undo the couple hundred years of irresponsible mining and bad press, local recreational gold prospectors are tearing up areas of Clear Creek which were only created by TU as fish habitat the week before. Unacceptable.

C'mon guys... and gals, fellow prospectors, if we don't start digging and mining responsibly, then there will not be anywhere left to dig in a very short period of time. Seriously.
Cities like Boulder and Wheat Ridge have already banned gold prospecting and now possibly even Adams County is doing the same... unofficially of course, but the landscape for prospecting is shrinking rapidly and it's time to start reversing that process.

Gold Unlimited seeks to preserve the past by educating and informing, creating pride in our heritage while securing the future by taking the steps to make certain our great great grandchildren will still have the right and the ability to pan for gold should they desire to do so.

Only by policing ourselves, prospecting responsibly and educating the public can this be achieved.

Therefore, Gold Unlimited publicly condemns any action by anyone which destroys public or private property, damages fish habitat or our waterways in any way. We are actively soliciting responsible gold prospectors in Colorado and across the globe to join us in our efforts to preserve the past and secure the future.

We must work together to protect our rights to pursue our favorite recreational activity, whatever that may be, in these streams, creeks, rivers and waterways. Take care of it or lose it completely, that is our choice.

Please take the time to research the location(s) you are considering prospecting to make sure you are not doing more damage than you think, take time to care. If you see someone prospecting irresponsibly, please take the time to educate them yourself or simply call me and I will get in "Bertha" the worlds biggest black Ford dually van, drive over there and "educate" them myself.

Prospect responsibly, respect private property signs as well as fish habitats and please, leave no trace!

RD Finley
Vice President
Gold Unlimited Association of America
Arvada, CO

cell- 405-464-3782

email goldunlimitedorg@gmail.com

Clear Creek: Dredging, Highbanking and the Gold Cube

Ryan and I went out this morning and spent the entire day on upper Clear Creek setting up and using a 2" suction pontoon dredge, a monster self powered highbanker that you can shovel material right into without classifying as fast as you can dig, a new Gold N Sand battery powered mini-highbanker on wheels, the new GOLD CUBE and oh yeah, ...a shovel and pan.

It was quite a site and also quite an experience and a little bit overwhelming at first, but Red from Gold N Sand was there to get us going in the right direction and keep everything running smoothly.

If you have never had the opportunity to run a dredge system it is quite fun but not easy by any means. Keeping the nozzle from clogging is an art form and getting the big rocks out of the hole is a never ending process but holy cow it does a fantastic job of sucking up the gold.

Working behind big boulders is dangerous and should NOT be taken lightly, with the constant force of the stream behind it, only a small hole dug in the wrong spot can entice a boulder to move very quickly. Done properly, you can make the boulder go where you want it to go... if it goes anywhere at all.

The new big highbanker is just a gravel eating monster, feed it as fast as you can dig with big rocks mixed in with the fine sand- whatever, no problem.

The new Gold N Sand mini-highbanker on wheels is the slickest, most compact and user friendly highbanker on the market period... and I'm sorry but it is just plain cute and I mean that in a good way. We are taking it out on a gold adventure tomorrow morning for an eleven year old birthday-boy and his younger brother and dad... I know they will love it.

Our new GOLD CUBE is amazing. Once you've classified the material to 1/8th inch you can feed the gold cube with a small shovel as fast as you like and it catches ALL of the gold. After 16 buckets of gravel you will end up with about a cup of black sand and gold super concentrate.

If you are interested in a gold adventure where YOU get to use the biggest and baddest and best equipment possible, including a floating dredge system, then contact us at GOLDSTRIKE Colorado Gold Adventures and we will hook you up!
REMEMBER, Only dredge where dredging is allowed!

Meteorites Delivered Gold To Earth

Originally published by Leila Battison BBC News

Scientists have shown that the Earth's surface became enriched with precious metals by impacting meteorites.

The Earth's crust and mantle has considerably more gold than expected from favoured models of planetary formation.

A study from the University of Bristol looked at some of the oldest rocks on Earth, demonstrating that gold was delivered by meteorites long after their formation.

Their results are published in Nature.

While the Earth was forming, iron sank to the centre of the planet, forming the core.

Any precious metals in the planetary mix would have gone with this iron and concentrated in the core, leaving the mantle devoid of elements such as gold, platinum, and osmium.

But this is not what we observe. In fact, the silicate mantle has up to 1,000 times more gold than anticipated.

Several reasons for this enrichment were proposed in the past, including delivery by meteorites, although until now it has not been possible to prove.

By measuring isotopes in rocks that are nearly four billion years old from Greenland, the team has managed to date the gold delivery, and to relate it to an event known as the "terminal bombardment".

Impact theory
Earth formed by a snowball-effect known as accretion 4.55 billion years ago. The iron core with its accompanying mixture of precious metals formed very soon after that, within just a few million years.

A final impact of a Mars sized body with the Earth formed the Moon and finalised our planet's formation. By this time all gold would be locked up in the core.

A final burst of meteorite impacts around 3.9 billion years ago is known as the "terminal bombardment" and caused the cratering that we still see on the Moon.

"The proportions of gold and other precious metals are difficult to measure because they concentrate into nuggets, and we need to analyse a lot of rocks to get meaningful data." said lead researcher Dr Matthias Willbold.

They have therefore developed a way of telling this remarkable story of gold's extraterrestrial origin using a completely different element - tungsten.

Tungsten acts very similarly to precious metals like gold, but importantly it comes in different forms, or isotopes.The team have looked at the proportions of the different isotopes in modern rocks and in the most ancient rocks in Greenland.

They found a small but significant difference in the proportions, indicating that the modern rocks had received a dose of tungsten, and therefore also gold, from meteorites.

The Greenland rocks showed no such enrichment, giving a date to the input of gold. This date corresponds to the time of the terminal bombardment around 3.9 billion years ago.

During this time, the Earth would have been hit with 20 billion billion tonnes of asteroid material, although "it is not clear whether this would have come in the form of many small impacts, or just two or three mega-impacts", Dr Willbold said.

The research group at the University of Bristol are the first to successfully make such high-quality measurements of tungsten in ancient rocks, but so far have only analysed samples from Greenland.

"We hope to find more," said Dr Willbold, "and look at a time sequence for one billion years after the Greenland rocks, to see how the tungsten anomaly develops."

Related Stories...
Life origins clue from meteorite 28 FEBRUARY 2011, SCIENCE & ENVIRONMENT
Life-from-asteroid idea bolstered 26 JANUARY 2011, SCIENCE & ENVIRONMENT

GOLD CUBE - New Technology Gold Recovery For Todays Prospector

If you haven't had a chance to see the revolutionary new GOLD CUBE in action then you need to check it out. (video below)

The beautifully simple yet high-tech design will change the way you think about gold recovery.

Imagine a compact portable multi-level device that can handle 16- 5gal buckets of 1/8th inch classified material PER HOUR! That equals about 1,000lbs of material per hour folks.... try that with your sluice-box or portable highbanker. Ideal for the person who needs to maximize the time they have and get the most gold possible.

The truly amazing thing about the GOLD CUBE is that it takes 16 buckets (1,000lbs) of gravel and turns it into about a half cup of super-concentrates in that hour. The exclusive patent pending design along with new vortex matting assures recovery of even the finest gold.

We had the pleasure of meeting with "Red" the owner and co-inventor of the GOLD CUBE at the Denver Gem and Mineral Show this weekend, where they had a Gold Cube running right in their booth and folks lined up to see it work.

After a couple hundred years of prospecting and mining with the same technology repackaged, it's time to step into the 21st century and join the new revolution in prospecting.

When you get serious about getting serious gold, get the Gold Cube...

With anything else, you might as well just be panning by hand.

The video-

Goldstrike Launches Panning Kits, Paydirt and "Adventures To Go"

Goldstrike Colorado Gold Experience is now offering Historic Gold Adventures for you to enjoy in the comfort of your home.

Included are historic home panning kits, historic paydirt and even full Colorado Goldstrike historic full-on "Adventure To Go" packages.

Goldstrike Home Adventure Panning kits come complete with a 2lb bag of Goldstrike Historic raw paydirt classified to 1/8th inch from your selected location, a printed history about that location, a 10" gold pan, snuffer bottle and glass vial to display your gold.

Goldstrike Historic raw Paydirt is classified to 1/8th inch and comes in 2lb or 3lb sealed plastic bags packaged inside a rustic burlap bag with a classic drawstring at the top and a complete printed history of your Goldstrike Paydirt location.

The Goldstrike "Adventure To Go" Package is available in either half-day or full-day packages just like the real Goldstrike historic gold adventures. The 'half day Adventure to Go' includes 8- 5gal buckets of raw material run through our state of the art equipment then bagged "as-is" straight out of the Keene A52 sluice. The full Day Adventure to Go includes all of the concentrated material from up to 16- 5gal buckets of raw gravel!

Every speck, spot, flake, picker and nugget that is collected during your 4hr or 8 hr adventure goes in your "Adventure To Go" bag with the concentrates from the entire adventure for you to pan out at home.

Also included in the Goldstrike "Adventure To Go" Package is a photo dvd accounting of the entire process of digging, classifying, sluicing and bagging your specific Goldstrike material, a printed history of your Goldstrike location, a 10" gold pan, snuffer bottle and pennyweight glass vial to display your gold.

Now available for your panning pleasure at Goldstrike Colorado Gold Experience or save money on ebay.

Coming Soon: "GOLD UNLIMITED" - A New Generation of Prospecting

A new non-profit organization is being formed, based here in Denver, CO with the mission of creating a new presence and a new identity for recreational gold prospecting, while protecting the rights of recreational gold prospectors that hopefully will parallel the great work of "Trout Unlimited" and what they have done for sport fishing.

Gold Unlimited will actively and legally protect existing recreational gold prospecting sites and locations while working to develop new sites.

Gold Unlimited will take the lead in forging a new image for gold prospectors as ecological conservationists leaving behind waterways that are cleaner, more inhabitable for fish and wildlife as well as being more enjoyable for future generations of prospectors.

Gold Unlimited will lead a new generation of gold prospectors seeking to leave behind a legacy of responsible mining for future recreational prospectors to follow.

Gold Unlimited is planning, in cooperation with the City of Arvada, it's flagship project, which will be the cleanup, restoration and preservation of Ralston Creek from it's headwaters, all the way downstream to it's confluence with Clear Creek at Gold Strike Park.

Ralston Creek is historically known as being the first gold discovery in Colorado. Unfortunately it is now known as being uninhabitable by fish and dangerous for recreation because of the buildup of broken glass, trash, sewage and debris in the streambed. In September 2011, Gold Unlimited will launch a systematic section-by-section cleanup of Ralston Creek, working with Trout Unlimited and the City of Arvada, calling on members and non-member prospectors to volunteer their time and equipment for the massive 5+ mile cleanup.

Gold Unlimited is also laying the foundation to challenge the cities of Boulder and Wheat Ridge on what many believe to be their unconstitutional ban on gold panning, rock collecting etc.

Watch for the official Opening Day launch in the next few weeks of the biggest thing to hit gold prospecting since..... gold itself. And become a proud member of the new generation of prospectors dedicated to leaving behind a stream more healthy and in better shape than we found it!

Coming soon.... Gold-Unlimited.com

Challenging Spots for Gold Panning - "Cherry Creek"

From the Colorado Geological Survey, Department of Natural Resources, Denver, CO 2009

Challenging Spots for Gold Prospecting and Panning in Colorado

The Cherry Creek Divide Area
Araphahoe, Denver, Douglas and Elbert Counti

This area boasts the locations of the significant gold strikes of 1858 by William Greeneberry Russell and his party, which led to the "Pikes Peak or Bust" gold rush of the following year.

The first worthwhile goldstrike was on the South Platte River, in Denver County, near Overland Park between 8th Ave and Jewell. The most productive deposits found were on Big Dry Creek, Newlin and Russellville Gulches in the Cherry Creek drainage in Douglas County and on Ronk (now called Gold Creek) and Gold Run gulches to the east of Russellville gulch in Elbert County.

These placers were abandoned by the end of 1859, as the miners left for the richer goldstrikes at higher elevations such as Idaho Springs, Central City and elsewhere that same year.

However there has been both gulch and drift mining in the Cherry Creek drainage from time to time since, especially individual and small-scale operations during the depression and at other times as well.

The gulches in which the placers lie drain the Cherry Creek Divide, which is capped by the Oligocene Castle Rock conglomerate. This formation forms "Castle Rock" overlooking the town of the same name. To the NE of Castle Rock town the conglomerate has been eroded by streams and now is represented only by remnants capping buttes along the divide. Many hillslopes have residual pebbles and cobbles on them derived from the erosion of the conglomerate.

These are terraces or benches at many places along the streams. Along the S Platte the terraces are 40 feet above the level of the river. These benches extend into Cherry Creek and its tributaries, their height diminishing upstream.

Gold has been found in the terraces and in the stream beds. Testing has shown that gold in the bench placers lies on or near bedrock but gold in the stream beds is nearer the surface.

The Castle Rock conglomerate contains gold at numerous locations in this area.

In upper Newlin gulch near the forks, the lens shaped beds of gravel were found to contain up to one ounce of gold per ton in individual samples. These lens shaped deposits were 5-40 feet above modern stream levels, near the base of the Castle Rock formation itself.

The gold in the Castle Rock formation/Cherry Creek drainage placers was typically fine-grained - 10 to 50 colors per milligram. Miners described it as almost flour gold and complained of the difficulty of its recovery from the clayey gravel matrix. Even so, colors up to one-sixteenth inch diameter were found. The Castle Rock formation gold is among the purest placer gold on earth, characteristically about .990 fine!

The source of the stream and terrace placer gold is the Castle Rock conglomerate and fossil stream placers in it. That the source is fossil stream channels explains the erratic distribution of gold among the gulches and also the erratic distribution within each of the gulches.

Access is difficult because of the extensive development in the area. There is little water and the gravels must be packed out.

Remember to always get permission before entering any property, backfill all holes and leave your site cleaner than you found it.