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Mother Lode Geology
The placer deposits in the Mother Lode have produced more than forty percent of the gold that has been mined in the state of California and as a matter a fact placer mining was the first type of mining that was ever done in the Mother Lode. There are different types of placer deposits such as beach, alluvial, residual, stream, and placer deposits, however the best and most important is the stream placer.
In the year 1849 the thousands of people streamed to the streams and rivers to find the precious metal, which they most certainly did. The streams of the Mother Lode were at that time packed with gold, as the gold had been dropping into them for a great number of years. This gold then washed down into the streams with the help of the rain and creeks flowing over the veins that were exposed and the cutting of older streams beds that contained gold, which are known as the Recent and Pleistocene stream gravels and uncovered Tertiary channels.
These two starting places have bore around one billion of dollar in gold, the first one actually produced almost two times the amount the last one did.
It has been said that some of the biggest remaining placer deposits in California are in:
- Deep deposits of gravel that are lying underneath various big rivers, like the Klamath and Feather.
- Remote high benches like the ones that are located in the Klamath Mountains (sometimes referred to as the Simon Mountains).
- Old gravels that are underneath inter bedded layers of volcano of the dredging areas along the west of the Sierra Nevada.
- Tertiary channels that have been buried and similar benches in the region between the Klamath Mountains and the Sierra Nevada that have been covered in lava.
- Tertiary channels that have been buried and the benches that are nearby that are located in the known of areas of the state.
The early miners were the ones that made the discovery of the Tertiary channels when they were searching for gold in the stream beds. Almost all of these channels were found lying uncovered high up on “flats”. The miners first exposed the channels and then tried to find the channels that were buried. Most likely a lot of money and time was spent on doing this job than on any other type of exploration that was ever done in the Mother Lode. Even geologists have admitted that following these channels has been unsuccessful.
It has been said that the geologic history and structure of buried channels is so intricate that even the most renowned engineers have struggled with them. One of the old channels that used to be very rich was called Big Blue by the treasure hunters and prospectors, and it was said that its gravels had a great amount of bluegray quartz. But only sixty five miles of the old river bed has been found. The standard production of the Big Blue was almost around $3,500,000 for each mile. Due to the fact that some geologists approximately calculate that there is over two hundred miles of this channel still remaining that has not been located, it has been said it has around one billion dollars worth in gold.
