Solve the gold nugget mysteries to find more gold - make a big find someone else has ignored. 

I was watching this with my 5 year old daughter and she points at the TV and says " look Dane it's your gold teacher!" She's got an eye for gold! She always points out nice specimens in vein outcroppings on the surface when we're out and about. The gold around here is epithermal I believe because the deposits are usually closer to the surface and historically we have had lots of geothermal activity which formed this area.

One of your best videos so far in my opinion. Thank you for taking the time Chris! Excellent!

Chris your videos are packed full of valuable life long learned skills , Thank you so much for sharing it with us!

Hi Chris. I got your book! For anyone looking for really usable info on mining techniques with the background info needed to be able to interpret your findings this book is excellent. I have read a lot of books on the subject but not brown-nosing, yours is the best I've seen. The reason I say this is you cover such a wide range of info that the reader is able to put 2+2 together and come up with... you guessed it 4. I found a nice site that was giving me an ounce per 8 hours of dredging with a 5 inch dredge. California's "antediluvian" attitude of stop all dredging just in case there may be damage stopped me but the lessons were learned. I have watched at least 90% of your videos, and the thing I liked the most is the wide range of your instruction. I have a lot of personal experience at this point but still I pick out "nuggets" I can put to use. Thanks again for your sharing the vast knowledge you have garnered over the years to help us newer prospectors.

Ahh nothing like waking up to a video by Chris👍. Funny of you to say something about a 6 in vein. Because just before the weather started to turn here in NIdaho. I went for a hike that was fairly remote. While making my way up a water fall system up to my Dmark location. I came across a horizontal quartz vein. It is a little over a foot wide by 40 ft long. Before I loose visibility due to its angle into the ground. Very deep in depth I have to imagine at the end of it, starts at 10 ft. I didn’t trace it past the waterfall into the mountain. But what I did notice is there are no visible indicators that anyone has been across it to sample it. This stuff is very mineralized. A lot of black sooty material. I know, indicative of silver and there is visible gold. I broke open one of the larger pieces I kept just last night. Probably 5x4x3in. And silver like I’ve never seen before. It’s actually quite beautiful the way it makes it’s way through the quartz. Seems to be on the face of every angle. Now I happen to live near a historic silver producer but this area is not claimed. So come spring I’ll do my thing and pull what I can from it. I’ve also made some great discoveries. It just takes a little motivation to get out and look. Thanks for the good advice Chris. You make some of the best videos!

Here in the Snowy Range Mountains in Wyoming, we have a little no name Creek that I Have been getting super fine gold and small flakes. Some of the gold is so small it takes a jewels loop to see it in the black sand. I keep hoping to find the pocket of larger stuff. Thank you again Chris for sharing your knowledge with us.

Valuable Content as always Chris 👍⭐⭐⭐

I enjoy all of your videos and always get something out of them. I found this one particularly helpful! Can't wait to carry some of this knowledge out into the field here in Montana!

Thanks Chris, I was just studying on this and got notified that you posted this!

You're videos are so informative thank you for educating us on the pretty shiny

Great information Chris, thanks again.

You are a freaking superhero for sharing all this sacred knowledge Chris. This is "worth it's weight in gold". I have always wanted to know more about geology and gold as I spend most of my time exploring the Wildlands. Now maybe I can find enough shiny stuff to support my adventure habit.

Thanks Chris, You RoCk! I'm truly grateful you share your knowledge so that we can have the upper hand!

I enjoy the lessons, explanations, and guidance you give back to help others. You have really helped so many people including me gain the knowledge to be successful at finding gold.. thank you Chris. You are awesome!

Really good vid Chris, Thanks, MSC

This video is spot on. I've always been a fan of going against the grain in prospecting. If the old timers left it that means your looking for seconds, yes sometimes those seconds are good but finding something that hasn't been run are usually better. Thx to this video you did open up alot good areas for me to prospect this year. Thx for sharing your knowledge with us chris!!!

Thank you for sharing your wisdom Chris! Very informative. Greetings from Liberia, West Africa!

Thanks Chris. I live Adjacent the South Fork of the American River in the El Dorado Foothills. I have been prospecting for a couple years now, mostly panning, and recently started metal detecting. Your videos have helped me better understand basic geology, thank you. Sometimes when I walk around my neighborhood I come across large spots of bedrock which have been exposed by erosion or when developers carved into the hills. I have often thought about running my detector over them for fun. Think I'll give it a try.

Thanks Chris great class

Great presentation, very informative.

Cheers Chris👍👍👍

Thanks for the video. It has given me some thoughts to chew on.

Your book is Awesome really enjoy reading it.

great video. I live in Western Colorado and have prospecting partner and so lots of gold around but tough to find good spots. You're video gets me some knowledge and a bit excited for summer

I love your videos I've learned so much from. Them it's rilly cool that you r trying to get the information out there and you can tell you know what you r talking about good job keep them coming 👍 👏 😉

Great information Chris. Thanks for making this video. I'd love to hear your thoughts on reading an alluvial fan downhill from a lode area where there is no indication of a former stream.

I enjoyed this episode

Love your videos man. Not selling anything. Asking nothing in return. Just spreading knowledge. Hope you never decide that this isn't worth your time.

Thanks mate

Glacial deposits I heard are another way placer can be deposited. Great info!

Great video Chris ! Very good education. The old-timer's were smart fellows for the most part, however, they did leave a few deposits behind. Probably focusing on high-grade zones. My claims meet your first category. The old-timers used dry washers for the most part. They avoided areas of heavy clay for various reasons. Fortunately for me, they left behind many virgin areas containing good gold. Just need to have the right equipment to extract it..... I remember reading a story about Six Mile Canyon regarding a gray sludge kept clogging sluice box riffles. It wasn't until someone finally decided to assay it, discovering it was silver. They followed the sludge up the canyon, and the rest was history... If this is true, I'm wondering if one could find remnants of this sludge in the canyon today ?

I love gold. Im metal detecting this year and its highly addictive.

Thanks

Chris is a human encyclopedia of geology and gold prospecting. In fact a few of his videos have made me suspect that he's probably a geology teacher as a side gig, or was in the past. Such a kind and helpful guy in his RU-vid videos. That said, I wouldn't ever want to get on his bad side. There's something about him that reminds me a little bit of Walter White. Maybe he's the Heisenberg of prospecting lol!

I have the most frustrating (hobbyist) gold deposit ever. Gold is in hydrothermally altered rocks and clay. Lots of gold in the rocks, in particular. However, it's almost entirely gold dust. Definition of irony. Lots of good gold but can't extract it economically (as a hobbyist). Still, fun to play.

Please keep us posted on the whereabouts that you will be in Northern California. I’d love to help you dig up some of the shiny stuff!

Love the video, do have any videos covering heavy black sand removal, I am having a issue with my box being filled with black sand but it has good colors, maybe I can send you a 5gal bucket of the material and maybe could give some insite, love this channel 😀 😊

i live in new mexico and ive heard its the western state with the least amount of gold. but with the local geology and geography you would think there would be tons of gold in the mountains. atleast on par with arizona my theory is that millions of years of erosion has turned most nuggets and exposed veins into microscopic dust and that all the historical lead silver ore production means most peoples who have settled here never really spent alot of time looking for gold. compared to easy silver extraction.

I really like your video, I think it was very interesting. I got a mini sluice box & a couple gold pans. I been interested in this for quite some time, but can't really find a good spot to set up. I tried a stream not far from the house, but no black sand, and very little quartz. I still never gave up, since this idea of finding my own gold is so very very interesting. Is there like prospecting maps somewhere? I also came up with this really great idea, you know coverts that go across under roads? well they have ribbed riffles just like riffles in a sluice box, well the water does usually push some dirt down the coverts you know. Well in the dry seasons, a person could easily crawl through one with a vacuum cleaner and flash lights getting all the material caught in the riffles which could potentially have gold, I think. I don't know, its just a theory.

Nice explanation of why you might see it and why you wont

Hey Chris! Should we head to the California gold fields?! Perhaps the rain has uncovered some sediments containing gold ?

Hey Chris I'm moving over 20 miles east of Showlow AZ new territory for me. Lots of volcanic rock I'm going to be doing some billygoating I've found far more silver than gold in the senator hywy area's

There has been a lot of rain and snow out west, enough to put a dent in the megadrought (Thank God!), and it looks like there's much more on the way. Do you think all that run off is going to release a lot of gold that was previously inaccessible? May the Golden Goddess smile upon you.

Hey Chris, I have a geology related questions. For years I've found gold in the old timer dry diggings on the sides of hills. Here and there there is rough pieces of quartz float. But alot of these places have mostly round smooth quartz rocks and are not even close to a water course where they could have gotten water worn. How did these quartz rocks get round and smooth? I'm sure they didn't come out of the vein being that round. Thank you again for another informative video. Been Watching for years. Good luck on your next golden adventure.

I have a doubt, which may be many. As a beginner in mining, I am using the government platform where the mining licenses to identify areas with incidence of gold, and gems. And at the same time I check the geology of the area to justify the incidence of the lavras. However, here in Brazil there is information among miners that many companies request a license to research and exploit certain minerals, or only one of the minerals, for example Sand only, or quartzite sand only, or... Clay, gravel, gabbro, kaolin, limestone, quartz, quartzite, granite, gneiss, slate, iron, copper, silver. And they don't mention the incidence of gold, but the geology of many areas justify the possible incidence of gold, that is, the companies do not mention gold among the geochemical hosts in their research and extractions of gold,and even diamond, uranium, paladium. In this way, many companies pay taxes on minerals such as clay, sand and all mentioned above, which are many with lower added value than gold, diamond, uranium, palladium... and carry with them the gold present in the tons they take out of countries, or separate within the company itself from the tax-registered mineral base. We know that in every ton of iron there is a lot of gold dust, as well as among other minerals mentioned above. First question: Do companies not mention gold only sometimes because the incidence is low to justify its extraction legal and fiscal? Or how clever not to pay for what will come "inside the cake"? In this sense, I justify my curiosity with the main focus of my inquiries: For us small prospectors, what is determined as low content by big companies, for us it can be a lot! 1 kg of gold in the month is excellent!! for a company of less than 20 to 30 kg per month, it may not be interesting to assume that they are extracting gold, being that they can simply take this amount inside the base mineral registered!? Since you yourself mentioned in one of your videos that there are technologies to separate gold dust from iron and other host minerals. Second question: In this sense, do you advise that we autonomous prospectors who use the government's mining maps as one of the means to identify the areas with incidence and registered with gold and other gems, we must doubt from those areas recorded with other gold host ores? and based on the geology of the site and on tests? because as I said: the little for a big company can be a lot for us autonomous!!....

I wonder what the source of gold is in Hemps Creek in LaSalle Parish Louisiana.

Chris Jb from Australia could you clue us up on supergene deposits

Ok we need to go find some Lodes !!!!!!!!!

A friend of mine gave me some Alaska gold he panned. When they lowered Toledo Bend Lake on the La/Tx border to work on the dam I went to the end of the lake fishing. Nobody was supposed to be behind the dam but me and a guy went to look at the bedrock there. I found a lot of flour gold in holes worn in the bedrock. I collected samples but forgot and left them in the guy`s truck and he threw the cup away it was in. I know for a fact it was gold and there was a lot of it directly behind the dam. I tested it on the bumper of his truck by smearing it with a knife to show him but he laughed at me. He`d never seen gold before. I saw a comment on a forum from a guy who claimed he used a dredge in a boat in the Sabine River below Logansport, La and he claimed he found large nuggets. Before they made the dam there were bedrock slabs in the river visible when it was low that looked just like what I saw behind the dam.

have you done much prospecting in the mountain ranch , ca area?

I am from Nova Scotia, Canada. Goldboro Gold Mine is only kms away from where I would like to prospect. Granite rock for as far as you can see. Quartz seams all over the area. I would like to see some granite/quartz show or podcast. Is metal detection good for determining if a quartz seam has gold in it? Can quartz seams in granite be dug out with pick and shovel ?

Man dude Chris Ralph! YOU ARE NOT JOKING WHEN U SAY WHAT U KNOW DIRECTLY AFFECTS THE AMOUNT OF SUCCESS YOU HAVE PROSPECTING. The more I learn about why the gold is where it is, the easier it is to find and the better specimens I get. I live in the peninsular ranges of Southern California. My city is like built on Goldfields and the vast majority of folks don't know, aren't interested and wouldn't even believe u if tell them and show them a crystalline nugget and a diamond. There's little hints tho in the names of the streets, many of the names are of places or people that have some association with gold and gold tellurides. The history of the local mining is very deceiving by my city hostorical society, it's kinda decieving. I intend to stake my own claim as I've found several rich epithermal gold deposits here as well as a diamondiferous kimberlite pipe.

I have an ancient river channel running through my property period the rock is so old and brittle that it fractures into pieces making it hard to notice the round river erosion of the rock. It took me many years to realize this. Luckily I had a job 😅 And The old-timers cover the pay with downed Trees and limbs and bark period they really went out of their way to do this and they did a great job period I finally cracked the code.

You can also get rough gold far from the source if the host rock travel's down stream before it is broke down to release the gold

I live in victorville CA. I believe that there was dredging here I noticed that after it rains on the hillside there are little veins that traveling down and stop at the bottom and makes pile when it dries it resembles a miniature 🌋 volcano. It's mostly lighter than the rest of the surrounding dirt ,shiny, mud is what it looks like. Is it gold I don't know but there's piles of it here in my backyard

The whole schist thing has me curious, I work in a geological wonderland, but it was never known for gold…BUT there are all the signs and the insane geology and other minerals and metals that are abundant…I wish I could just show you in person! But I do know of a spot, that has 2 tunnels that go back into a basalt cliff, one of them is directly on a vein of something but no idea what it is or what they were looking for…

I live & play off of south fork tuolumne river , lot of mysteries not too much written , more exploration and documentation needed

Sometimes veins that are small erode away and the gold stays in place or not far from origin even thow no vein there left to be sent

Supposedly the lodes around here were already eroded down. Waldo district Southern Oregon. Illinois river, Sucker Creek, and Althouse Creek watersheds.

My mom's on a creek, tributary of Medina river, in Bandera county TX and I've always been curious if there is any in there, you don't hear much about gold in the TX hill country.

I don't have any 6" Miners however I do have a 10" Pianist. Unfortunately my musician won't perform on my Organ. Won't even place Tulips on it. :(

I have located a good placer in Iowa, but its more than 100ft underground so its very hard to exploit :(

I have a question Chris Ralph. Okay I sold my impact Mill to a gentleman. He has a degree in biology been through college whole nine yards. He's mining decomposing granite out of Nevada but he's able to extract Platinum group medals. Is that possible? He would roast a sulfur out. Take the magnetite hematite out of it magnetically. Electro win I don't know if I'm spelling that correctly then put it in a pressure vessel up to 2500 lb PSI

Heyyy! Don't be telling everybody this stuff! Took a lot of years and hard work to learn all this!

I have 151gram gold nugget found in kite ga

I recently discovered your channel, and you and Myron Cook are my new favorites! I know Utah is known more for fossils and gemstones more than any valuable minerals and ores, (excluding kennecott copper) but I was wondering if you knew of anything in Utah that is worth prospecting with possible locales (I was thinking cobalt or lithium in the southeast quarter specifically around the San Rafael swell? Thanks!

Hi Chris how are you been trying to find a way to speak to you about a mine in the Dominican Republic would their be a way to contact you ? I sent you a message on Facebook if that works please reach out to me thanks