Knowing Where to Look for Gold

Some have said the gold might be located underneath current streams, while others have said that it might be many feet under volcanic debris. What is definitely known is that once this area is located, with it will be found the treasures of the Mother Lode.

The greatest discoveries of gold have come from lodes rather than placers but particles of gold might be broken down from another piece. When a nugget is flattened or rounded, it usually indicates that it has been knocked around a lot more then the rougher pieces. The ones that have their original crystalline form have most likely not traveled that far.

Another thing that has been discovered is that the older the placer, as well as those that have gone through a lot of re concentrations, have gold that has a higher and better degree of fineness in comparison to the ones that can be found in locations that are close by or in which the gold has not been deposited for a longer period of time.

This might be because the alloyed silver has been removed due to the action of the surface waters.

Rich placer deposits do not just happen by chance. In the region of the Mother Lode a lot of factors can be looked into. There used to be a lot of mineralization with rock that decayed rapidly as well as stream patterns that were well developed and this make up set up nice rich deposits for the people that flooded in, in 1849. 

Gold is still waiting to be recovered from the streams of the Mother Lode to this day and a lot of prospectors have claimed to have found gold in a lot of the creeks and river beds they have worked on in the area.

While it is true that most of the mining that was done in the days of the gold rush was placer mining, lode mining or hardrock mining was also done and actually started in 1849 at the Mariposa mine in Mariposa County. In order to crush the quartz ore, the first stamp mill in the state was acquired.