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Gold Pans
The first, most basic and most important tool for everyone that is just starting out consists of a gold pan. A gold pan is not only used for concentrating placer gold and gold nuggets but it is also great for recovering a lot of other kinds of minerals and gems. A gold pan is a wonderful testing device when working at placer deposits and it is indispensable in almost all kinds of lode prospecting.
A gold pan has the aspect of a dishpan that has been flattened out. The sides of a dishpan slope up at an interesting angle but the reason for this is to allow the gravel that is not wanted and water to slurp over the edge. This allows it to stay clean so that it is easier to see and so that the gold does not get covered in flecks of rust. Gold flakes are very small and if you think you can see them but are not sure, just use the magnifying glass as this will help.
Although the pan is such an old thing, it is still a basic element in prospecting both for people that are just taking up this hobby (or profession) as well as for the experienced professionals. In the past during the gold rush people would use all kinds of things as gold pans. There were even people that used to cook and pan out of the same frying pan.
Apparently the first ones to have brought a vessel to the gold fields which they used to separate precious metals from the sand and gravel of the stream beds. The Mexicans used to use a pan they called Batea. The Batea was wood carved and it was around sixteen inches wide, close to eight inches deep and was not exactly the lightest thing you can imagine, it was actually quite heavy.
The pans that we have these days though are made out of plastic, steel or copper. However, for people that are just getting into prospecting it would probably be wise to use the plastic pan due to several things: Plastic pans are molded with a set of riffles in the pan. The ridges on the pan help to keep someone new at the job from losing the gold (or as least most of it) by trapping the gold. A lot of the plastic pans are made in black because the color contrast will allow you to see the gold better and it makes it easier to separate it from the concentrates.
Experienced people can go ahead and get the steel pans but often times people burn them black so they can see the gold color easier. Plastic pans have the advantage also of not getting rusted or corroded if wet black sand is left inside of it. The professional prospectors many times use copper pans when using mercury to get to the finer gold.
