You Look Like Your Getting Weak!

gold, pan, mining, prospecting

This picture is a typical day of running pay dirt that is about a quarter ounce of gold if we run all day.  Lots of people ask me the question, “Does your Mine Pay for Itself?”  I always answer with,”Heck no no it does not pay for itself, but my family and me sure do enjoy being out there mining either rain or shine.”  I cant put my finger right on the exact reason we like it out there, maybe its working together, or running equipment, or playing save the puppy with my daughter(there always seems to be a puppy stuck in a tree).  I guess all of this can be summed up into to two words, Gold Fever, and we all have it.  People always use the term gold fever in a bad way, but that is not really what it is to us.  Everyone gets gold fever a different way, some cant get it at all.  My family and me are running a fever of 104.0 Degrees, and we don’t need any doctor to look at us.  A few more sunny days would be nice though.

Essential Items to Gold Mine in Alaska

With the below list and a bit of determination you should be able to successfully find some gold. 
1. MAP, so you know that your not claim jumping
2. Sluice box
3. Gold pan
4. Waders, at the least mud boots(Extra Tuffs)
5. Black sand magnet
6. Snifter bottle
7. Gold vial
8. Rubber gloves(elbow length are nice) to keep you hands warm in the water
9. Shovel
10. Crack pick
11. Turkey baster (this helps to suck the gold out of cracks in the bedrock)
12. Gun (or bear spray if you prefer)
13. Lots of bug spray
14. Bucket to haul material to creek

Thats my dog!

When we first acquired the mine on quarts creek the previous operator gave us a tour of the the mine. He pointed out places that had been worked, placed he thought there was gold and this spot.  We all stopped here and just took in the very amazing spot, while we were looking around the operator tells us that this was his lunch spot.  He and his dog would have lunch here whenever he was working the mine.  “The spot just helped me relax,” he said.  Then he says, “you see that pile of rocks there.”  He pauses for a second and then finishes his sentence with,”That is where I put my dog, under those rocks.”  We just left the pile of rocks and the dog, right where it was, and we now call this spot”Dead Dog Point.”

BEAR ATTACK!!!!

We had a little bit of an issue with a bear at camp who was not very happy that we never left any food out for him to snack on, so he tore up a couple canopy’s and I guess he wanted to see what My 4-wheeler seat tasted like.  The least he could have done was to eat the piece he bit off of the seat, but it was not a flavor he liked so he just spit it our right next to the 4-wheeler.  We took some large cans of finely ground black pepper and sprinkled A LOT of it around the camp and on every surface.  After that we have not had any issues with bears in camp.

Dreams of finding “PAY DIRT!”

This is a photo of me in a sample hole I dug inspecting my handy work and collecting samples to run back at camp.  There was hardly any gold in this hole.  I found out later in the season that the reason I did not find any gold here was because I dug to deep/not deep enough.  The gold in this seems to be in one of two places, we find it sitting on a clay layer and we also find it sitting right on the bedrock.  This hole I dug just past the clay layer but not to the bedrock.