Possible to find un-discoverd gold bearing areas?

[loamer]

Copper and gold most certainly go together. Take Burra SA for example - to the north east of the town there is a run of alluvial workings that are on a track-side verge, there was/is also a privately owned working goldmine, small scale. We did some work up there in the 70s when the copper mine was open and I clearly remember heading out to the alluvial gold bearing areas. Certain areas looked like prime gold bearing locations - they were in a national park and while the 70s was pretty flex with the rangers for panning and running early VLF detectors, I feel pretty sure that they would now be no go areas. The Flinders Ranges also looks very promising but I am led to believe, a no-go area. Look but don't touch. You would be better off, and probably not earn the wrath of the Parks people, by heading to the legal areas in the Adelaide Hills, or heading over to Victoria, your closest 'large scale' detectable goldfields.

As for looted out (flogged) - yes a lot of areas are. The new PI detectors are finding smaller gold, as are the new Garretts, Minelabs and Whites, running small coils on flogged ground. Where people are coming unstuck is too high expectations in that they park, detect close to their cars in known gold bearing areas, have no luck and get frustrated very quickly. The key is to get away from the 'easy' areas and pretty much walk into the more remote fields, auriferous gold bearing areas.

 

[Magilla]

Reading this thread reminded me of a conversation I had with an old mate about 35 years ago. He was in his seventies at the time and had done it pretty hard during the depression in his younger days.

We were on the old Braidwood Road southwest of Nowra at a lookout that overlooked Tianjara Falls. There was no sign of any habitation for as far as you could see and I made the comment that some of those gullies may never have seen a white man as the country was so rugged. He had a chuckle to himself then told me that back in the 30's if you were to stand where we were you would have seen hundreds of camp fires from all the prospectors that were camped on every creek in the area.

What really struck home with me was he also said they never found much through the area but that didn't stop them putting up with the hardships of living in such a remote area.

He said that it was the same all the way down the South Coast of NSW so I would assume it was the same within travelling distance of most Australian towns.

At the time he was living with his wife and child in a bark hut on the outskirts of Nowra, the footprints of his and other huts are still there.

Lucky we have the ability to prospect further afield and have access to detectors that will find gold that they couldn't because if they would have had what we have there would not be much gold left now.

 

[nuggetino]

Thanks for sharing Magilla. Really puts things in perspective and like you say technology is improving and with it new finds will come. The way I see it is finding gold is still far better than playing the lottery. Least in the goldfields I know with every swing of the coil I'm improving my odds of finding a nugget

 

[Goldtarget]

Allot of detectorists have trouble detecting known areas. Went out and hit a piece of melted lead about 7 gram size if it was gold in one of the most heavily surfaced areas in the district yesterday. A steady stream of machines drift in every year yet that has been left. ..... The real challenge is to put that coil in exactly the right place. Or the shovel, but many give up or don't employ some sort of system to increase the odds of finding spot X consistently. But New patches are found, as for new areas well I say good luck is a big big country to decide where to put that coil or shovel. Not much has changed for the new chum, the same old methods that worked then work now.

That's the struggle, you just have to take a guess?
When you say a lot of detectors have trouble detecting known areas, do you mean that as they are looted out?

Unfortunately even the technology advantage there's still many hurdles. Emi, access, green movement, 20 years of pis, junk, and the fact a lot of known shallow areas aren't whets the real returns were, and are taken up by the old timers in droves. Every now and then I see raking but its not the norm, waiting for prescribed burning for clearances means depth is still a issue. It would be a high percentage of detectorists that are novices, most detectors average use would be a very small proportion of the daylight hours available in a year because it's a past time not an occupational pursuit.

I know how hard it is to hunt out a park, grid it up and use the detector to its potential, let alone walking into a gold field and chasing down the nuggets. I get lazy and is a tiring thing swinging one around. But hey alot of ground has been coveted and a lot of holes dug to win it so put the pick in and hope you come up Golden. Be nice to be the first one on it

 

[The Green Wanderer]

Dont forget that every time there is a big storm, natural disaster or simply erosion all the ground you covered yesterday could have changed dramatically. A detector only goes so deep and a pan/ sluice only finds what is shovelled into it.
Point in case, look at old photos of the palmer river bridge then look at plamer diggers photos from earlier this year.
All that water flowed through gold bearing ground, imagine the turbulence on the river bottom and think,of all the silt and sand moved.
Thats an extreme case but the same thing happens during a severe storm anywhere.
Now the trick is to imagine where the gold was and where it got pushed into, uncovered from or buried under.
TGW

 

[Hunting the yellow]

yep shore is I found a reef today un touched and full of gold there's still good ground out there you just have to look

ps I've found 4 gold baring reefs so far in 3 different places and 2 at/near each other just have to know what you are looking for and go to remote areas sometimes where the old timers haven't been