Miner’s Horn

Surely you have seen small sized gold pans that are anywhere from six to eight inches in diameter and you have probably asked yourself what this teensy pan was used for. These small pans are actually very useful and some of them have the shape of a horn and are sometimes called backpackers gold pans.

These devices are called miner’s horns and in the past the old time miners used to make them by using a frying pan. Now a days these horns look like miniature gold pans and are easier to use and are so cheap they should be part of every placer operators tools and are essential for a lode prospector.

A miner’s horn is utilized for testing a deposit to see if it has gold values in it. They are used in the same way as the gold pan but the panning in this case is done by hand and on occasions sideways. The good thing about them is that a sample of three or four tablespoons can be correctly testing by only using water from a canteen.