Colorado Gold Miner

When prospecting for gold in Colorado, especially along the Arkansas River, you rarely see nuggets and pickers are pretty rare, too. But, there is loads of fine gold when you do find a hot spot. The challenge then becomes on separating that fine and flour gold from the black sands without losing too much.

There are a multitude of items out there that say they will seperate your gold from the black sands and give you a 90+% recovery rate. I’ve tried the mini-sluices, spiral wheels and shaker tables and all have been effective… It sure beats the heck out of trying to pan it down… but, you can do it that way, also.

The first thing you need is a good black sand magnet. They are relatively inexpensive and worth every penny, because you will remove a ton of material that you normally would have to pan down. On the Arkansas River you will have some black sand that will not pick up with a magnet. Save it separately from your magnetic black sands. It is silver(usually)… Now it isn’t over $1000 an ounce, but $16 an ounce isn’t exactly pocket change, either, when its as abundant as what I’ve gotten in certain areas.

If you are going to try to separate your gold and black sand with a pan, it is best to do it in a tub. Add a drop of dish-washing soap to the water to keep the surface tension down and make sure to get the bigger gravels out of the way so they are not pulling your gold out with them. Once you have your material panned down to a manageable amount, take it easy and let the water do its work. When most of the black sand is gone, tap the side of the pan with the heel of your hand to concentrate the gold in one place.

This takes a little practice, but once you have it down your gold will line up in the edge of the pan and the black sand will separate away from it. Then all you need to do is suck it up with your snuffer bottle and start the whole process over again.

A quicker way is with a water hose fed mini-sluice or recirculating mini-sluice. Classify your material down as far as possible and then slowly add the material to the sluice. You will probably still have a bit of black sand after you run it through the first time, but there’s nothing wrong with hitting it a second time to get it cleaner.

Mini-sluices are inexpensive and you could even make your own if you had some ribbed matting and an old piece of roof guttering lying around. I’ve done it in the past and it worked out just as well as the $50 sluice I’ve used.

The spiral wheels are a bit more expensive but, in my opinion, are well worth the extra bucks if you are dealing with lots of fine gold. While its true that you are only feeding a small amount at a time into the wheel, its still quicker and more efficient than trying to pan it down… Plus, its a lot easier on your back.

The last item is a shaker table. This piece of equipment takes up some room and the cost is probably a bit more than the recreational prospector would want to spend. With a good table, you can move much more material than with anything else that I have seen for processing fine gold and it does an excellent job of getting rid of the bothersome black sand.

Separating your fine gold from your black sands is not all that hard. It can be time consuming, but hopefully I’ve helped you out there. Remember the quicker you can get it processed, the more you can go back and find.

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