Learn Gold Prospecting

Over thirty years ago when panning, dry washing and hard rock mining went on in small scale, the serious amateur prospectors of that day often times had their gatherings around and campfire. These days however, people that are interested in panning, dry washing etc have campers, trailers, tents, and prospectors like these can be found all over the place. If you were to include in all the people that do prospecting as a sport or weekend miners, you would be shocked at the results. This type of activity though is not only something people that live in the west do, it is also something that people that live in Alaska, Georgia, Canada and other main locations do as well.

So why are there so many different people that do weekend prospecting and what has brought on this big amount of growth? There are a lot of people that believe that it is due to the fact that a lot of new, comfortable, light and portable tools have been made while there are others that believe that this growth is due to the price gold is at these days. The invention of new modern tools definitely helped light the spark that has caused this big boom and the price of gold has helped to increase the whole deal for everyone.

One of the biggest reasons there are a lot of weekend prospectors now is due to the long time artificially low price of gold. When it was set at the thirty-five dollars per ounce, almost all the commercial miners were driven from their jobs due to economical causes. Around the beginning of the 1950’s almost all the commercial gold mines in the West were shut down. After this all the weekend prospectors started coming into the picture.

Another important factor is that there have been a lot of new discoveries done by individuals and because of the fact that there still remains to be a lot of gold in a good number of the western streams. Remember that each time it rains or when winter snow melts down it causes there to be more gold that comes down to refill the gold that had been taken out before. Even though there are a lot of weekend miners that take a certain amount with them every season, there is still plenty for those people that have patience and are interested in knowing how to find it.

While it is true that the pointers we have mentioned above do in great part have a lot to do with the fact that so many people are mining, the truth is that it is a great thrill to find some yellow color or find a nugget. Even though there are times in which the amount you find might be worth a very small amount money wise, it will still stand for an accomplishment you have achieved and this, this is the one of the main reasons people love doing panning, dry washing, digging etc.

While it is true that someone that is new at this will learn the basic advice, and the basic principles are quite easy to follow, there is still a great deal that can be learned and studied up on for the amateur prospector.

There are many small articles and pamphlets that in a few words describe or introduce the subject of prospecting however they do not always give enough information. There are of course excellent books, magazines, sites etc you can look into that do have a great deal of information and that get into describing the very technical terms and the principles of mining professionally and prospecting.

This site is geared towards those that are not completely clear about prospecting and to show a person that is beginning how to get started and how to become a advanced and capable at prospecting and small mining operations.