Gold and Conglomerate

[Digger Bob]

Thought I would post a picture of this little find from last year. This is a great example of gold in conglomerate. Conglomerate is formed in the very heart of the ancient tertiary channels. These were the ancient river beds that the 49ers looked for and were heavily mined using hydraulic methods in the 1850's. Some times specimens like this can be found in the tailings and rubble left behind with a detector. This picture is a small sample. I can post a picture of a larger piece of this kind of rock along with a more detailed description of how this is formed and how the gold got there... if any one is interested. Things are a mite slow on this forum so it might liven things up a bit.

Digger Bob

 

[BuckAu]

G' Day Bob,

I'm very interested to learn more about how its formed that's one beautiful specimen, what detector do you use Bob.
Regards Buckau

 

[snakejim]

That's a nice one! Thanks for sharing the photo.

 

[Slopoke]

Nice piece Digger.
I'm interested in hearing more.
Thanks

Slopoke Bob

 

[Jonathan Porter]

That is one of the best examples of conglomerate gold I have seen and I would definitely love to see more.

How much was in that piece BTW?

JP

 

[Bugar In. USA]

That is NICE, tell us more, and do you remove the gold,?? if so HOW? or should it be left as is, is the value in CURIO type or Gold type ? I have never seen this=live in Indiana, Thanks for sharing.
Bugar

 

[Digger Bob]

In this particular case, I would not remove the gold. It's a unique specimen as there are multiple nuggets encased and you can see them. That's not always the case. The best way to remove them is to gently crush the rock in a mortar and pestle, freeing the nuggets. Small pieces of rock like this can be easily ground up.

Digger

 

[Digger Bob]

I have three detectors I use depending on the area. Whites TDI, Whites GM 3, Minelab 3500. All of them scream over something like this.

Digger

 

[fredm]

MORE MORE MORE...please!!!

awesome!

Fred

 

[Uncle Ron]

That is a very awesome find, Bob...How much gold do you reckon is in it? Up on the South fork of the Scott River, near Callahan, CA, there's a large run of cemented gravel where we used to find nuggets cemented in, but none as cool as that piece...They were a pain in the butt to recover...Like trying to mine a cement road...We always crushed it up for the gold because there was no market for chunks of cement with gold in them...Times have changed in the past 30+ years I guess! ... Great find... Cheers, Unc

 

[nero_design]

Absolutely stunning specimen. You can actually see the individual nuggets, all of which have previously been shaped and eventually cemented together. Just fantastic! WOW!

Marco

 

[Digger Bob]

Ron, as near as I can tell, there seems to be about 7 small nuggets in there, maybe 5 if a couple are the same ones with different parts exposed.
I'd say the total wt. to be around 5 to 7 dwt.

Digger

 

[IronMike]

That is pretty cool Digger. Have you ever wondered how many fines are in there too? My son found a piece one day and after we smashed all the gold out that we could find with the VSAT, the count was 69 pieces but often thought, I should have panned the rest.

 

[Gerry in Idaho]

Digger, You should post on here more often. Just as well as I should too.

That is a fine example and I enjoy you posting and sharing info on here for all the greenies we have picked up over the winter.

I look forward to seeing more.

Thanks for sharing.

Gerry

 

[Alan]

Nice specie Digger.
A multimeter might help you work out how many nuggets in there.

Alan