KIVA

[Rob]

OK, I'm in now  ;D.

[kashi]

Welcome Rob.

Up to 8 members now. 

[Dennis]

Glad to have you onboard Rob. :)

Dennis.

[Dataman]

Welcome Rob!!! Now we are 8. 
I can see right now that if I am to be a member of this team, I have to get me a REALLY COOL hat!!!!  biggrin

[veebee]

hmmm, sounds like an idea... we should all wear a "special" hat for our profile pic there... (will have to go see whats going on to make you say that Dataman...)

[LawryB]

Damn the hats, tell me about the GOLD Dennis

[Dennis]

Want anymore information just message me. :)

Been prospecting gold as a hobby for around 15 years now, used to be one of the managers of the biggest MSN group on gold prospecting until MSN groups folded.
We used to have group outings in which we would train newbies on how to find gold, and how to build and use the gear.
I am not into using a detector, might get a detector one day but find walking in circles waiting for a "beep" so boring, I use sluices, banjos/highbanker etc, which means digging the gravels.
How I find gold?
I research old maps (some hand drawn) of the old goldfields (have around 6Gb of old maps on the computer), amazing how much those old timers left behind!  Then try and transcribe the old maps over current maps.
Go to the area, read the river, creek etc  and pan a small area, grid pan it, am looking for more than 11 specks in the pan, once I start getting decent specks I take note of what other rocks are in the pan as well, these are called indicators.
Look for indicators in the area that I am going to work and do test pans to see if there is decent gold in the area, if their is set up my banjo (what I am using in my profile pic) and pump and get to work.
I have a tray in the top of the banjo (before the sluices) which will catch 90% of the gold, after working the area for around 15 minutes will pan out the tray, this tells me if what I am running through the banjo is worth digging.
I also shut down a few times after around half an hour to do a clean up of the sluice area of the banjo, this is to "tune" the gear into the area, if I am showing gold in the sluice, it has gone past the tray and I need to work out by trial and error what I need to do to change the water movement through the banjo, might be change the angle of the sluice (the fall, up or down) or maybe throttle the pump back.
The pumps we use are little 1 inch pumps, everything is kept small so it all fits into a backpack - pump, hoses, fuel, banjo, tent etc, this is to get into those areas where you might be bushwalking for up to 10 kilometres.

My main regret after years of doing this is not learning the gemstones, in the raw they look nothing like the finished polished item that you see in the jewelers , at Eldorado in VIC they even run to black diamonds, and quite a few different gemstones, would hate to think of what has gone through my sluice there, my loss!

You really have to have a interest in basic geology, bushcraft, bushwalking, camping, the mateship of like minded people etc.

And are you going to get rich overnight, you could find the big one, but highly unlikely, but then again look at the price of gold these days.

What it boils down to is research, you might research an area for months before even going there to work it, and if I find a really good area and don't have the time to work it right out it goes into the GPS (marked as "retirement 1" "retirement 2" etc), I then make the area look like I have not been there, have left a couple of good areas before only to come back the next weekend and they have been cleaned out.

Another thing we do, and all fossickers should do, is before we leave an area that we have worked our holes are backfilled and we make the area look as much as possible, like it was before we got there, is also amazing the amount of rubbish I have brought out of some areas, and very little of it was mine!

At the moment the gold fossicking is on hold, I have been on long service leave/annual leave/family leave for around the last 4 months and am carer for my terminal ill father, as of November my 36 year career in the Fire Service will come to an end, I run out of leave so will be leaving work and will be a full time carer.
Watching dad go downhill quite quickly is an eye opener, this could happen to any of us in our old age!

My other hobby is genealogy and family history, do we have any members from Mount Gambier, SA lol?

Dennis.

[LawryB]

Thanks Dennis I do appreciate all that info.   I did the gemfields in Queensland way way way way back.  I teamed up with an old fellow who worked on the cattle station.  He knew everything and passed it on as long as I didn't "forget him" when I hit colour.  Did OK but in the end it got too crowded and I got too lazy to dig anymore.  Good fun though.

Mate you have my deepest respect for being the carer for your dad.  I did it for two years with my mum.  More power to you Dennis.

[Dataman]

Cool Dennis. I live about 15 kilometers from Sutter's Mill where gold was discovered in California that set off the California gold rush. The area I live in is known as the Gold Country or the Motherload. We still have two small working mines in the area; the largest being The Gold Bug Mine. Before 1900, entire mountains were washed away with high-pressure placer mining and huge floating dredges destroyed whole river systems. Now dredges are limited to a 4" hose and placer mining is illegal. Mostly people use metal detectors and small dredges in the rivers. What amazes me is after 160 years of intense mining is they still find gold. Mostly gold dust but some nuggets too. About 10 years ago, a dog ran off after a deer about 5 kilometers from my house. The kids came back with with the dog and a nugget weighing over two pounds (1 kilogram). The dog  (and kids) got their picture in the paper.  biggrin

Three days of heat. The forecast is for 108F (42C) Wednesday.  :cry2: That kind of heat is really hard on my Great Dane. It is hard to cool a 130 pound mass with only a wet tounge. I use frozen two-liter water bottle to keep them cool. I use beer to keep me cool. 

Cheers!

[Dennis]

Dataman, if you moved the airconditioner off the computer and onto the dog might help!

With the Californian goldfields they are very similiar to the goldfields around Bathurst in NSW over here, I actually have a very good area near Bathurst I prospect at now and again.

Dennis.

[veebee]

That kind of heat is really hard on my Great Dane. It is hard to cool a 130 pound mass with only a wet tounge. I use frozen two-liter water bottle to keep them cool. I use beer to keep me cool. 

Dataman, using a "cold brick" is a good way to keep animals cool, but whatever you do, don't give a dog, ESPECIALLY when it is really hot (both dog and weather) iced/ icy cold water.

Apart from the fact it doesn't help them cool down any faster, it can start muscular spasms in their stomach and gut, leading to gastric torsion (aka "bloat") - a horrible thing to watch a dog go through.

Just water at tap or ambient temperature works fine... you are more interested in maintaining hydration as opposed to trying (in vain) to reduce their core temp.

[Dataman]

That kind of heat is really hard on my Great Dane. It is hard to cool a 130 pound mass with only a wet tounge. I use frozen two-liter water bottle to keep them cool. I use beer to keep me cool. 

Dataman, using a "cold brick" is a good way to keep animals cool, but whatever you do, don't give a dog, ESPECIALLY when it is really hot (both dog and weather) iced/ icy cold water.

Apart from the fact it doesn't help them cool down any faster, it can start muscular spasms in their stomach and gut, leading to gastric torsion (aka "bloat") - a horrible thing to watch a dog go through.

Just water at tap or ambient temperature works fine... you are more interested in maintaining hydration as opposed to trying (in vain) to reduce their core temp.

Yes that is very true.Their water is ambent. I have had Great Danes for 30 years. They do the same thing with a pile of frozen water bottles as they do with the wood stove in the winter. They compete for the "perfect" distance from the stove in the winter and the "perfect" distance from the bottles in the summer. They know what makes them feel best. 
Its going to be HOT for three days and then rapid cooling.

[veebee]

At the dog shows here in Summer, many exhibitors have lots of fans, around 20 - 24" diameter, blowing onto the dogs... dont know how effective they are, but I suppose they MIGHT help with cooling the blood in tongue and ears.

Dogs only sweat on nose and pads of feet so there isn't much area for evaporative cooling.

[LawryB]

My two have a plastic kids wading pool each.  When they get hot they dunk themselves and then get under a tree or the nearest aircon duct.  Concur heartily with beer for human cooling.

[Mike Mitchell]

In the old days, our cattle dogs would disobey every order to "get back round" and cringe off to one of the cattle's water troughs. Jump in, splash around a bit, drink a bit, then run off after the cattle again.

Damn kelpie's, so damn cute you could never be angry at them for long. Ours were jet black with slightly long hair, not altogether great at rounding up the cattle and not altogether pets. Definitely not show dogs.  Looked like this.