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Date Posted: 16:24:42 05/29/02 Wed
Author: Steve Herschbach
Subject: Ganes Creek, Alaska Gold Finds


14.4 Ounces of Gold from Ganes Creek
Found by Steve Herschbach Memorial Day Weekend 2002
Largest Nugget 3.25 Ounces

Hi Everyone,

There is a prelude to this report. A week ago my wife and I flew down to Reno for our youngest daughter's college graduation. Her older sister was also there, and the last night of our visit we went out for dinner. The place had Asian food, and we all got fortune cookies. My fortune:

''You will have gold pieces by the bushel.''

I put it in my wallet.

I'm working on a detailed story, plus aerial photos and maps showing our nugget finds for the visit this weekend, plus last summers visit. Our extensive recon work should help put people in the gold more quickly than normal.

It's spring at Ganes Creek, but the weather has been hot lately, and so the only ice was left on some ponds and along the creek. Daytime temps are hitting the 70's and 80's, but it's into the 40's at night. Many fires in Alaska due to our abnormally hot, dry spring are making for hazy air, and at times you can smell the smoke. The mosquitoes are not yet out in force, and headnets were not needed. Unfortunately, this will change soon.

Jeff went up Friday morning, and Brian and I met him Saturday morning. Brian was feeling a bit competitive and worried Jeff would get a big jump on him, but my hopes were to see a lot of gold on our arrival.

I've been a bit worried that perhaps our visit last year was a fluke, and that gold might be harder to find than we thought. So I was not happy when Jeff reported only one nugget for a long days hunt just upstream from where I had found the 4.95 ounce nugget last year. And only a pennyweight nugget at that. Not very promising!

I had my heart set on hunting some old dragline piles next to the airstrip. We had hit them a bit last year, with no results but some trash. But I felt there had to be gold there, so off we went. I walked up onto the pile and in ten minutes had a 1.11 ounce nugget!

That set the tone for the last three days. I had numerous areas I wanted to try, pinpointed from my aerial photos. At most we hit I had the first nugget, in about ten minutes. Sometimes the other guys found gold, sometimes not. But basically, I was unusually lucky this trip. I just kept putting my coil over the gold.

Still, Jeff found his largest nugget ever, a one ounce nugget not 50 feet from my first in the ''Airstrip Pile''. Brian also found his largest nugget ever, a 1.33 ounce nugget from a pile within a couple hundred feet of the camp, christened the ''Cabins Pile''. I found a 1.89 ounce nugget in this same pile.

The third day I was off my game, but caught up at the very end of the day with a 2.45 ounce nugget off the ''Airstrip Pile'' down in the brush.

The last day, yesterday, I went clear off the scales. We went over a mile upstream above the camp, and I found a .97 ounce nugget. Another tall tailing pile by the runway with the windsock stuck in it, the ''Windsock Pile'', gave me 9 nuggets, 5 a 1/4 ounce or better.

I wanted to try the old bucketline tailings way downstream, and within ten minutes found the largest nugget of the trip, a 3.22 ounce gold/quartz cobble. Finally, trying above the cabins upstream on the tributary, Potosi Creek, got three more nuggets; 4.2 dwt., 6.0 dwt, and 11.3 dwt.

The bottom line is I could do no wrong with a detector this weekend. Brian got 2.5 ounces, Jeff 2.81 ounces, and I ended up with an incredible 14.4 ounces! The last day alone I found 8.14 ounces of nuggets. Grand total for three people in three LONG days - 19.72 ounces.

So is it all gone? Did we get it all? No way. We did not scratch the surface. The place is vastly larger than you can imagine. There are a couple areas we have given pretty good attention, but none I would not hunt again. All hunting was with Fisher Gold Bug 2's or White's GMT's with 14'' coils, which full rejection of any iron targets. Only solid good signals were dug, and all scanning was ''speed scanning''. All the areas that produced gold should produce more with careful work.

I have lots of hints, and lots of notes. I promise to make it all available on the Alaska Gold Forum at Alaska Gold Forum over the next week or two. I'm going to be detailed, so it will take some time to put together. All I can say now is there is plenty of gold to be found, and after everyone gets through hammering the creek this summer I will go up again this fall, and find more gold to prove it.

But really, what do I think of the odds for finding gold at Ganes Creek now? Brian is relatively inexperienced compared to Jeff and I, and was learning a new detector. I'd say his finds were about on par with what I expected of him. Jeff was way off... a real cold streak. He should have found twice as much. And I was hot as could be. I found about twice what I would expect. All this is based on bare gut feelings, but I'm thinking 1-2 ounces a day is a sort of average. But any number of nuggets will blow that away... and bad luck could shoot anyone down.

The big thing here is the ''nugget factor''. You can find nothing all day, then end up with a couple ounces in one nugget. I was just plain lucky in that regard. I simply happened to place my coil over more large nuggets. They add up fast, and so really get you ahead fast.

So the biggest advice I have is never quit, never give up, never slow down. We put in about 16 hour days, and used them well. But if you are easily discouraged, you'll have a tough time at Ganes Creek. Persistence is the name of the game. And a good fortune cookie might help.

The newer dragline/bulldozer tailings are vast in extent, and seem to have more nuggets, but more trash, than the old bucketline tailings. But I can't help but feel that really big nugget is in the bucketline tailings. They are relatively trash free, and so require real patience. You can hunt for a couple hours with hardly a signal, and those are usually large steel. It's easy to get the feeling there is not much gold in the cobble piles. But in all those cobbles I just have to believe there is a fist-sized cobble of gold/quartz lurking. Just like my 3.22 ounce piece... but larger!

But if you do not mind more trash targets, the dragline/bulldozer piles seem to have more nuggets in general, and would be worth the most attention for most people. All the areas we found gold in would benefit from attention with a Minelab SF/GP detector.

So about that $2500 a week fee to visit Ganes Creek? At a paltry $300 an ounce the over 7 ounce share I owe Doug (I'm splitting 50-50 with him) is worth about $2100 for three days. But we all know this kind of stuff is worth more. Alaska nuggets are averaging from $700-$1300 an ounce currently. So the 10 ounce share we are going to hand over to Doug is worth about $7000 for three days hunting. Jeff & Brian were at the other end of the scale, but even at the rate they were going would finish out a week with about 6 ounces of gold each. The bottom line there is we'd be better off paying the flat fee!

So if you are balancing this all in terms of gold and money paid, you'll have to use your own set of scales. Guys with little detector experience will have a tough time unless they get real lucky. Experienced operators should clean up. I just hope everyone that is going to Ganes Creek is going for the adventure and the CHANCE at a big one. If so, there will be no losers at Ganes Creek.

For what it is worth, I'm going to do all I can in the next few weeks to give everyone the best shot possible. And for the guys there the first week, I'll be in for two days to help any way I can. Finally, if you are in Anchorage and would like to see the gold, stop by Alaska Mining & Diving Supply!

Much more info soon at the Alaska Gold Forum, plus answers to any questions posted here. See also the Ganes Creek Gold site at http://www.akmining.com/ganes.htm

Steve Herschbach


Steve's Larger Nuggets From Ganes Creek

White Quartz/Gold Cobble - 3.22 Ounce
From bucketline dredge rows just upstream of old machine shop, relatively near road.

Large Solid Gold Piece Far Right - 1.89 Ounce
From pile in camp in front of cabins. Pile created when Doug excavated drainage ditch and piled material next to ditch.

Darker Quartz/Gold Piece - 2.45 Ounce
From ''Airstrip Pile'' midway of airstrip to south. This is an old dragline pile. Was on backside of pile down in the brush near base of pile.

Long Square-Ended Nugget - 1.11 Ounce
My first nugget of trip. From ''Airstrip Pile''. Found near top of pile in center.

Nugget Far Left - .97 Ounce

Found about a mile upstream on large bulldozer push-up pile with light brush covering.

So there you go, and idea of some of the different kinds of material that produce nuggets at Ganes Creek. In a nutshell, almost anything! The only thing I'd really tend to avoid is material with lots of wood and silty brown material in it, as it is probably stripped overburden. But you never know untill you scan it.

Any material with ''ripped'' fragments of shale bedrock came off the bottom, and this kind of material is extremely common. If I saw material with no sign of angular/fractured bedrock in it it would interest me less. But again, gold is where you find it!

Steve Herschbach

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