Placer Mining in New Mexico, Oregon & Utah

Placer Mining in New Mexico
The first production of gold was located in the Old and New placer Diggings located close to Golden in Santa Fe County, in New Mexico. Even though New Mexico has been prospected a great deal every since the 1820’s, it does not mean that all of the placer deposits have been found in the Jicarilla, Old Placers, Hopewell, Orogrande, Pittsburg, and Millsborogh districts, as well as a lot of testing of the gravels that had not been mined which could show big tonnages of good grade for large scale mining in the future.

Placer mining in Oregon
The placers in Oregon can for the most part be found in the southwest area of the state and is on the Rogue River and the streams of the Klamath Mountains. The most significant gold producing regions are the Applegate district in Jackson County as well as the Greenback area in Josephine County. The placer gold also occurs in a lot of the streams that drain into the Blue and Wallows Mountains. In the past the Sumpter and upper Powser River made a good amount of production.

Placer mining in Utah
Even though around 85,000 ounces of gold has been produced in the main placer deposits of Utah, the primary sources of a lot of the concentrations in this area are still not well known of. The origin of the placer gold that can be located down the Colorado River and the big tributaries remain to be unknown of. As a matter a fact, a lot of the sand bars that have gold in them along the Colorado and San Juan Rivers got inundated with the waters of Lake Powell that rose and that were formed by the Glen Canyon Dam in the north of Arizona.