Panning for Gold??

[cheeptrick]

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I JUST might DO this!! LOL

 

[ticks]

I know a place in Vermont to pan for gold. It is the Brewster river.

 

[Paegglvr]

When I was in the Air Force I was stationed at Beale AFB in Northern California. Went prospecting all the time, and found some decent gold. My buddy even bought a dredge for us to use.

From my experience, if you find $1000 worth of gold... you'll put more than $1000 worth of time and effort into finding it. But it's fun....

 

[Davaroo]

Done it. Quit. Got a metal detector.
Here's my advice:

- GO. Have fun.
- Dont expect much.
- Fall in the water before you do anything else. It will happen eventually, might as well get it over with.
- Toss the metal detector, its junk.
- Take a fishing pole.
- Take Ben-Gay. A lot of it.
- Knowing is more important than luck. Read about panning - where, when, and most importantly, why THERE?
If you dont know, dont go.

Am I just going to be digging DIRT and breaking my back??

For the most part, yes.​

 

[cheeptrick]

Elderoo...LOVED your tips!!

Does anyone know any websites with downloadable topographic maps that will tell you terrain and geologic conditions. I used Google Earth...but it doesn't tell you geologic conditions. Think I'm going to Google...
White Mountains country is hiked, skied, and probably every square inch of it has seen humans. NOW I'd LOVE to find some old insulators or a NICE GIN!! Maybe I'll abandon the creek bed and look for the town dump instead!! LOL

I'm MAD with treasure hunting...

 

[Davaroo]

Ahhhh, so were a budding treasure hunter are we? Been doing that for 20 years now. Remember, what you see NOW isn't what may have been. The forest grows, the earth shifts and the hand of man comes and goes. Look beyond the obvious and KNOW where something happened.

Otherwise, the same tips apply.

 

[Tutter]

Yes, for example, we have a place in the forest here where there was a cabin which had their dump next to it. Decades ago. Great hunting!

Also, right along one stretch of RR tracks, there was once a rail town. Also good hunting. Etc.

We were finding things, and old timers filled in the blanks. Their stories led us to the good place next to the tracks.

Oh, and dig carefully. Nothing's worse than breaking something which was intact. We've found quite a few rare bottles. Very old. Also interesting ones, like a coke bottle dated my grandmother's birthday, though not as old as she would have been. It's a rare color, 1916; and pharmacy bottles from a local pharmacy with the name on it, (No label, but raised on the glass.) from 1907. You just don't want to break things like that.

Anyway, whatever you hunt, have fun!

 

[HorseFeathers]

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I do "hunting" more like this. Every summer I go out to Great Diamond Island, which was an army base in WWII. When the army left they tossed most of their supplies. You can find TONS of seaglass and pottery on beaches there dating from quite a long time ago! You can also find artifacts on land, too- bullet cases, sections from lookout post roofs (so that they wouln't ahv to light anything and call attention to themselves, the roofs have sections of lavender glass to let light come through. Why lavender? No clue), etc. It's an awesome place.

Never found gold though.

 

[cheeptrick]

We are right in the center of a lot of the OLD glass factories in Colonial New England...Peterborough Glass works...Keene Glass. We went diggin' in Keene last year...in an old creek bed that traveled thru the old dump. Found a few embossed old Bixby shoe polishes...1 broken INK well (my favorite are the amber), and some spring water aqua bottles. The only embossed we found though was the Bixby...the embossing is more desirable>

My Dear Uncle was an old bottle digger...he's been featured in the Antique and Bottle Collectors Magazine. He's taught me a ton. I love his old STORIES of when he used to follow the construction crews up the East Coast when interstate 95 was being built in the 60's and 70's!! He found a TON that way...he also recommends following old rail lines...the linemen used to CHUCK the insulators when changing them out.

EnviroGirl....MAINE is the BEST Bottle searching place...mostly untapped!! Go to your town hall and pull the old maps to find dump sites...and then ASK permission...your sweet little Treasure HUNTING FACE will always get you in the DOOR!!

We also have the annual Keene Bottle Show...been going on here for like 60 years or so!

My uncle has been to Christie Auctions in Boston...in the 70's he had this old van that he tricked out like traveling salesmen suitcase...every door had a cabinet that folded out. IT was very cool and I used to love it when he came to visit while showing...it was ALL Shag KERMIT green carpet floor to ceiling!!

DU is on ebay...sells a ton...OLD antiques dealer in Richmond VA...called STUCKEYS Antique Emporium he sold out a couple years ago....to retire...but he's alive and well on ebay!! HIS seller rating is INTIMIDATING!!

 

[Krysstyllanthrox]

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*cracks knuckles* I'm a geolgist so I'll try to give you some links and tips.

www.terraserver.microsoft.com Has topo maps that are free to look through, you'll need at least a town to be able to find the location.

Google "Whichever State (ie, Oklahoma, New York, wherever you are) + geologic map" and you might turn up a geologic map that way.

Google "About + geology + State" and it will pull up a list of the state geologic maps. Be warned, not all states go into great detail on what they will release on the internet. Some states I can get right down to the nitty gritty, others...not so much.

If you have a university near you, check if they have a geology department/professor. They might be willing to let you look at their department maps.

Try the state geologic survey. Google "State + geologic survey". You might have to pay for maps this way or they may have a map in the office you can go look at.

Those should at least get you started on tracking down the geology, so long as you know what Formation you are targetting. Now, if you are expecting to find a map that says "Find this rock, gold here!", that isn't going to happen. The map will list the formation, not what is in it.