Remote Prospecting?

[Geowizard]

Our area of interest;

Our focus can be defined as a 144 square mile area.

Access:

Go to Fairbanks.

Note: There is a 3500 foot runway at Van Curler's Bar (permission to use may be required).

Stick around, there's more!

- Geowizard

[Geowizard]

Van Curlers Bar;

The single largest placer GOLD mine on the Middle Fork is Van Curlers Bar.

This may serve as a reference point to begin prospecting. Placer GOLD has been mined there for over 100 years. This mine has a 3500 foot runway. Tributaries of the Middle Fork have mining claims leading into the hills to the south. Mining claims cover most of the area on Middle fork.

Where did the GOLD come from? Can we find clues in the surrounding hills? Are there any inferred placer deposits surrounding this mine?

Stick around and find out!

- Geowizard

[Geowizard]

A survey line may provide a clue;

Here's a snippet of the profile of this anomaly.

The conservative length of the anomaly measures 5600 feet.

There's more to know about this anomaly!

Don't go away!

- Geowizard

[Geowizard]

Before you grab your stakes and run out the door;

Looking at mapper to check the status, we find that the parcel in question has already been claimed.

Not to be discouraged. We continue looking.

Don't go away!

- Geowizard

[Jim_Alaska]

Chuck, from having been over the ground there I can pretty much verify the existence of old river channels along the middle fork. Many of them are in the form of sloughs, where the river used to run before it diverted. This river is slow and lazy, even in breakup it gets high, but doesn't have the slope of the rivers down here. Consequently gold doesn't move down river very easily.

I did notice early on, before I actually started prospecting, that these sloughs all had rounded river rock and were shallow, just like the river. Even in the time I was there I would sometimes find that break up had diverted the river and a new channel was formed. The river winds around a lot and even doubles back on itself, making great places for the many fallen logs that come down during break up.

I did find gold on two creeks to the north of the middle fork. One is Ottertail and the other is DeMar. The bedrock in that area is shale/shist. In prying up slabs of shale there was always lots of gold specs in the mud between the slabs. One peculiar thing is, no back sand. What took the place of black sand in this part of the river was Red Garnet sand, very heavy and lots of it, it made cleanup difficult. I also found quite a few Black Garnets. They went from very small to about the size of a peach pit.

Not much in the river for large cobbles or boulders. Actually no boulders and most of the cobbles would go up the nozzle of a five inch dredge.

[Geowizard]

Jim,

That's an important contribution. Thanks for sharing that information. Prospectors that are new to the area can only find ARDF reports and those provide scant information. The information shared by other prospectors has the highest value to present and future prospectors.

I also would point out that the Pogo Survey is right in the middle of the Tintina Gold Belt.

- Geowizard

[Geowizard]

Shamrock and Ohio Creeks;

I would like to share a topo map of the erosion profile that can be inferred from the two combined tributaries (Shamrock Creek and Ohio Creek) that introduced GOLD into the sediments at Van Curlers Bar.

Don't go away!

- Geowizard

[Geowizard]

Deposit;

The Deposit is taking form with added survey information.

The Deposit is "juxtaposed.

The Geology:

Remote prospectors know Placer GOLD originates in LODE deposits that contain FREE GOLD.

What WE see is the large LODE deposits. Discrete anomalies "pinpoint" the highest concentrations of mineralization within those deposits!

Stay tuned! There's more!

- Geowizard

[Geowizard]

mineralization;

Prospectors are looking for mineralization. Minerals are like metals - they conduct electrical current. That's why when you turn on a switch in your house, the lights come on.

Metal detectors measure quality. That's how discrimination works! That's why we locate GOLD and SILVER and iron mineralization.

Magnitude (intensity) change from one ore deposit to another and even within a single ore deposit. That is because the mineralization is always changing from one spot to another.

If you understand all of that, YOU are well on your way to being a Geowizard!

- Geowizard

[Jim_Alaska]

Not being a geologist, or even much of a miner at the times I was there, I have to say that all of this backs up what I have always thought about the upper Chena . The most I had to go by for research was "feet on the ground", topo maps, and false color sat photographs. (extremely expensive from UAF)

But looking at the "lay of the land" it seemed to me that the gold at Van Curler's Bar almost had to come from all those creeks to the south. This is what got me to even consider dredging on the Middle Fork. I reasoned that if there were viable mines in the head waters, at least some of the gold should have migrated downstream.

All of the claims at Van Curler's convinced me that there was no room there for a little know nothing guy like me; so I chose to look further down stream.

Everybody I talked to about it, including a mining professor at UAF, insisted that there was no gold in the mid to lower parts of the river.

I know of some success in the upper reaches of Teuchet Creek by a lone individual. I had always wanted to get to the place he worked after he died, but it was just too far to hike in a day and even in winter, was too rough to get in by snowmobile.