Arkansas River, Colorado Sluicing -- 15 Nov 12

[C-17A]

Hey Gold Dredgers,

Time for another Trip Report by yours truly, as I endeavor to not let the Fall slipping rapidly into Winter stop me from burning some calories & getting some of the last fine Colorado flood gold for 2012...

Before Thanksgiving I went out to a friend's claim here on the Arkansas River, to make sure all was well, the garbage was picked up (if any) and sluice for a few hours in the cool High Colorado weather...

It's been well below freezing at nights for some time, usually in the low 20s or teens, so the ice is forming on the river & the river bed is starting to freeze solid. I try to go out after noon, as it's warmer and the sun thaws some of the material behind cobbles/boulders to dig & sluice.

I got to the river about noon, looked it over and decided I HAD to work in the sun to be comfortable enough, with a light breeze blowing out of the North.



Finally found a safe spot to set up my Le Trap sluice, and got to sampling dirt behind several riverbed boulders.



Found several unfrozen spots in the sun to dig:





Yep, black sand and little flood gold specks! If you don;t have black sand you sure won't have any gold here on the Arkansas. So, I enjoyed the afternoon for about 2 1/2 to 3 hours.....until the sun went behind a tall pine tree to the West of me, and then it got shaded & suddenly "cool" again.

Time for a Le Trap cleanup:



So, I packed up and headed home, with another High Colorado gold adventure in the books. Got some decent fine flood gold for my time, but the real "gold" was the peaceful time alone on the river, having a picnic lunch, watching the Steller's Jays, the Clark's Nutcrackers & other bird life going about their daily business of finding food...

Here's some of my flood gold:



So, I didn't get skunked, didn't fall into the river & had a great time.

It was 19 degrees again this morning (4 Dec), and after it warms up a little more, I'll maybe go back to this spot and see how iced over/frozen it is now, being almost 3 weeks later...

Hope you all get out as well, despite the Fall/Winter weather and give it a go...

Wish me luck!!!

Randy "C-17A" www.goldadventures.biz

[golden optimist]

Looks good! We may have to put a dredge in there some day. My little 2" would work good for the cracks between the rocks.

John's planning on going back upriver next year I think. Either place should be good.
Leonard

[russau]

Yup Randy you did real good! and had a great day to boot!

[C-17A]

Leonard,

Yep, looks good! With the water level so, so, so low.........low as I have EVER seen it, I was able to get way down into the river bed, and look hard at the top of the claim boulder field, and look for the piled up small rocks/gravels behind select boulders. IF there was a decent amount of black sand showing in the top several inches it was worth classifying & sluicing. If, however, there wasn't a goodly amount of black sand, time to move onto the next spot. No coarse black sand, no gold...

Yes.....your little 2 incher would be PERFECT for working as low in the river bed as possible and between all those boulders. No doubt in my mind you'd have a real good haul of black sand cons with a very generous amount of fine flood gold in it all.

With my 1/4 inch classifier & hand shovel, it's very slow diggin wet material, shaking the hell out of it to get a 2 1/2 gal pail of "dirt" to then sluice. Always takes me longer to get the dirt than it does to sluice it. With a small dredge you'd be able to just go & go & go....
no classifying, no carrying buckets, no delays.

This is where a Gold Cube would be perfect, as if you ran a 2 inch dredge day after day, you'd get a HUGE amount of black sand cons with constant cleanups. A Gold Cube would reduce those buckets of cons to a pail in no time at all....and oh my gosh, the time & effort saved would be off the charts...

Will keep you updated on future exploits as I can.

Thanks a bunch,

Randy "C-17A"

[Hoser John]

YAHOO that sure looks great to me. Watch that Le Trap carefully though as thieves cherish them above all others,or that's been my experience as lost 2 -at different times-and they left all the others!! YAA Le Trap has the thieves seal of approval = thanx for the ride along and tons a au 2 u 2-John

[getterdone]

Love my Le Trap