Sluice legalities Victoria

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hi guys and girls just wondering if any one could inform me if sluice boxes are illegal in Victoria thanks mark :)
 
are you allowed to dive in rivers just with a snorkel and mask, using a pump set up to a sluice ? :)
 
NO, NO, NO, NO,
That is called dredging and is illegal here in Australia
I smell a mouse
 
Just to clarify, you can use a pump to move water into your sluice and shovel the gravel into the sluice. You cannot use a pump to move the gravel to the sluice, which, as thesmithy says, would be dredging, not sluicing. A miners right permits only the use of hand tools to move the gravel etc that you want to treat. Generally, sluicing (and prospecting generally) is not allowed in National parks, though there are currently some exceptions. The Victorian government recently announced changes that will prohibit sluicing in all national parks.

Hope this helps,

Chris
 
You can technically run a floating hopper box running up into your "sluice" as long as you feed gravel with hand tools into the hopper. Just a though I had few years ago"
 
thanks everybody for your replies,.,just thought that would of been an awesome and exiting way to find gold,ive been a keen spearfisherman of the coast of vic for 20 years,and love the water plus lets face it,how many people would be keen to into icy cold water,,thanks heaps, mark :)
 
Hi. I am new to prospecting of late. However I was into it many years back with detecting and dredging (when it was legal). However I am getting back into the hobby now and have purchased a high banker sluice. I will at no time be digging banks as I believe that any gold is carried down stream by the flow of water and does not jump out sideways into banks. I will be digging into creek bottom to try and recover gold from where I expect it to be. My question is if my sluice requires a pump to supply water flow through the sluice, is that legal. I thought it was but now after reading articlees I now wonder. I will not be dredging as such but simply usein a pump to feed water folw to the sluice. I know some sluices lay in the water with natural flow of water but mine requires a pump to supply water flow. I wish to stay legal. Can somebody clarify on this.
 
wombat digger said:
Hi. I am new to prospecting of late. However I was into it many years back with detecting and dredging (when it was legal). However I am getting back into the hobby now and have purchased a high banker sluice. I will at no time be digging banks as I believe that any gold is carried down stream by the flow of water and does not jump out sideways into banks. I will be digging into creek bottom to try and recover gold from where I expect it to be. My question is if my sluice requires a pump to supply water flow through the sluice, is that legal. I thought it was but now after reading articlees I now wonder. I will not be dredging as such but simply usein a pump to feed water folw to the sluice. I know some sluices lay in the water with natural flow of water but mine requires a pump to supply water flow. I wish to stay legal. Can somebody clarify on this.
Hi mate at this stage if you are NSW they are illegal
However in saying that do not get rid of it just yet
keep it for a while and that law may change as we have people that are fighting it
 
"I will at no time be digging banks as I believe that any gold is carried down stream by the flow of water and does not jump out sideways into banks."

Interesting, the bank that is could be a stream that was.
 
Search on the forum for the list of exempted rivers wombat.

There is a hundred or so that are forbidden for prospectors due to a stuff up by govt.

The rivers were originally marked as illegal to be occupied for prospecting

The intention of that law was to stop people camping on their claim / dig site on the rivers edge due to the risk of flash flooding however govt now chooses to interpret the law as being illegal to do prospecting of any kind.
 

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