Recreational Prospecting Progression

Hello all,

First I want to introduce myself. My name is Philip and I am currently a graduate student at the Colorado School of Mines. I had my first experience gold hunting with my wife this weekend in Clear Creek just above Golden. Possibly because of my inexperience in panning, or just otherwise newbieness, we didn't find any gold in 2.5 hours of panning. Nevertheless, I am totally hooked!

My question is what is a good progression into the hobby of prospecting? Being a graduate student, I don't have a bunch of money I can through at a Gold Cube (however much I'd like to). Right now we simply own a pan, a shovel, and a snuffer bottle. I realized on Sunday that using only a pan is tiring work and really limits the amount of throughput that we can manage. My thought is to purchase a 1/8" screen to start and go from there. Let me know if you have any suggestions on what to purchase and in what order to maximize my cash.

I look forward to many more gold hunting days to come!

Thanks,

Philip

Well first off , WELCOME to the site ! and your off to a good start with your education !! This alone will put you ahead of a lot of propectors that are starting out !My advice is simply keep doing what your doing currently until you gain good panning ability and find others that are in a club to help broaden your skills and don't buy anymore equipment until you decide what is going to be your method of prospecting and eventually getting your gold. Try all types of equipment ,(i.e) highbanking ,using detectors ,dredges ,etc.ask different people that have these types of equipment if you could help them to see what is going to be type you like to do. We all were in your situation at the start so I say , go slow and learn BEFORE you jump in head on ! Hopefully theres a club near you so you could attend their meetings. GOODLUCK on your new adventure ! and fill your holes and bring out the trash that some slob left for others to pick up.!!

Phillip,

Sorry for not seeing your post earlier than now... WELCOME to the Gold Adventures Forum!!!

Well.............also...............welcome to the fun and rewarding hobby of gold prospecting...

Progression? Like Russ mentioned above, normally folks start out with low buck/simple hand tools and equipment.....like a pan, classifier screen, sluice box and shovel.

Then, IF they keep the faith...........the Gold Fever..........they normally progress up to some sort of powered ops like a battery powered Gold Cube............or wheel/mini-sluice/bowl................and THEN, maybe on to bigger, more expensive gas powered high bankers and suction dredges.....or powered dry washers in really, really dry areas.

The first thing of course is to become a good...........really good & fast gold panner.

The second thing is to get used to finding gold whenever you go out hunting "wild" gold.

The third thing is to then evaluate your wants/needs/desires and how much time/effort/money you want to dedicate to your hobby/sport of recreational gold prospecting...

Like Russ said above, being a member of a gold prospecting Forum, such as this, making friends with other seasoned prospectors will allow you to learn a LOT for free, avoid newbie and costly mistakes as to equipment, poor techniques, etc.

I advise new folks to "ask the board" and get as many opinions as you can before going to a certain area, buying some piece of equipment, running your equipment a certain way.... Learn from others' mistakes. Lord knows I have made a few, happy to share...

FWIW, I have a YouTube Channel as well, and over 300 short gold prospecting videos of me out panning to suction dredging. I have been on Clear Creek several times in the past, from right in downtown Denver to up closer to Central City. Always found some color...

Check out my videos here: https://www.youtube.com/user/C0017A/videos

Probably have to page back to like 2012 and 2010 era to see some I did while on Clear Creek.

If you want to call me sometime to chat, happy to talk prospecting: 1-719-395-2081

Randy Witham Buena Vista, Colorado "C-17A"