# Panning gold from storebought sand ? Yep



## yonderfishin (Apr 9, 2006)

Some of you might find this interesting. I wondered about what might be in the sand you can buy at the store. After reading about people finding gold in it I decided to try it , I could use the sand this winter anyway even if I didnt find anything. I bought 2 bags of all purpose sand at Lowes and I am actually finding some gold dust in it. Maybe about half to two thirds through the first bag and the results have been pretty interesting. Yeah , I know it isnt something to do for profit but its fun to see what shows up. The quickcrete company says the sand bought in this area came from Ohio or Michigan , which means from a glaciated region and the presence of gold , and they dig or dredge it up from some surprising depths sometimes where the gold is , then they package it neatly for you.....so its not as silly of an idea as it first seems. I know its been washed , processed , and mixed but I am finding quartz and stones up to about the size of a dime or nickel so there is atleast "potential" for some decent nuggets to turn up now and then. Its giving me something else to putter around in the garage with when the weather is nasty anyway. Here is a video I made of it and posted on youtube.


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## RiverDoc (Mar 12, 2010)

Sounds like fun. Have you picked up any magnetite or garnet? I would be surprised to see metallic copper - you almost never find the native metal but bound in a silicate matrix. I don't want to insult you but have you ruled out pyrite? I look forward to your final assessments.


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## yonderfishin (Apr 9, 2006)

There was some pyrite or mica in there but not as much as I see panning river dirt. I dont know if its evident in the video or not but I passed up some of the specks and did a doubletake on others while pointing out the gold , thats because mica or pyrite reflect light but go dark as you move the light away and gold keeps its color with a luster of its own even when I move the light away from it. The copper colored thing in there I am not sure about but when I go back through what I found later I can look at it closer. I am finding plenty of black sand and pieces of quartz and very tiny garnet.


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## Carpman (May 18, 2005)

I already have a sluice......gonna try this.


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## yonderfishin (Apr 9, 2006)

One other thing I should point out though is that the water flowing over my water table magnifies everything and makes it look bigger than what they are. Here is a picture where I tried to show the size of what Im finding , so far this is what most of it looks like , below the dime and slightly left. It was more visible before I resized the pic so I can upload it. This is one of 3 I spotted in the pan before putting the concentrates in the bucket , to then be run on the table. Ive stopped looking for them in the pan now , just trying to get it all concentrated down. If anybody wants to see the pic before resizing I can send it email but its too big to upload. This pic makes it really hard to identify.


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## Lowell H Turner (Feb 22, 2011)

Quickest test for gold: small flat nosed punch on top and tap with a hammer. Crumbles? Fool`s gold. Flattens out? The REAL DEAL ! Also, surprisingly, small DIAMONDS can be commonly found in certain areas of Ohio in gravel deposits.


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## ezbite (May 25, 2006)

how many dimes did you find in that bag.lol.JK, i never would of thought of gold being in there.


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## yonderfishin (Apr 9, 2006)

Heres a better pic.


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## c. j. stone (Sep 24, 2006)

I think if I ran a sand and gravel pit, I'd find some way of washing the sand before I dried and bagged it to collect this stuff!!(maybe they do??)


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## yonderfishin (Apr 9, 2006)

c. j. stone said:


> I think if I ran a sand and gravel pit, I'd find some way of washing the sand before I dried and bagged it to collect this stuff!!(maybe they do??)


They do wash it , and there are a few places out west from what I read that are set up to process sand and gravel to get gold out of it but thats in gold rich country and they actually find a lot more gold , and still people out west find a lot more gold in their sand bags. The sand and gravel guys around here arent likely to put extra money and effort into processing for gold because there isnt enough to justify the cost of extra handling. But Im happy with that


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## LmitingOut (Mar 11, 2011)

you should call discovery and tell them you have a new show GOLDRUSH:Home Depot


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## dmills4124 (Apr 9, 2008)

Back in the 70's I worked for a sand and gravel company in E. Mesa Az called Granitereef sand and gravel. The plant is still there. It is set up at a diversion dam for the salt river. The water is diverted into two canals for irrigation in the phx area. To keep the dam from filling up with sand they continue to dredge the sand from the bottom of the lake behind the dam. The sand is placed in a holding pond to settle out and the water is drained off. They then feed the sand into a plant for seperating the sized gravel and wash the sand for use in gunite machines. A giant screw moves the sand up and out of the plant to a conveyer belt. Here is the place to get rich. In the tank at the base of the screw Gold and other heavy metals collect which was cleaned out once a month. When I worked there we got better than a pound of gold out of there a month. It was a lot of work to clean out all the wet sand and get the gold out of the cracks in the metal seams but it was worth it then at $35 an oz for gold. The copper and silver was only worth pennies but the odd wedding ring was worth a little. The river feeding the dam was a popular river float tube recreational area. Cold water hands shrink and rings fall off, making its way to the sand plant. Thought someone out there might enjoy that little bit of history. I did a google earth lookup and the plant is still there just like it was in the 70's.
later ya'll
donm


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## Lowell H Turner (Feb 22, 2011)

To the North of the Great Lakes there used to be the Canadian Shield mountain range. 3 major glacial periods have all but ground them away, creating the Great Lakes and exposing their basalt and granite foundations. They are known to have had deposits of precious and semi precious gems, gold, siver, copper, platinum, iron ore and molyberium. Their height was more tham 15,000 ft at 1 time and there was volcanic activity there in the far ancient past. As the mountains were ground down, all those mineral treasures were literally bulldozed far south, some of it ending up as far away as southern Tennessee. Geologists think that this area was as rich in gold deposits as modern South Africa is now. It isn`t surprising that dredging gravel also produces gold "by product".


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## flounder (May 15, 2004)

Great, there goes the price of sand through the roof.


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## yonderfishin (Apr 9, 2006)

Lowell H Turner said:


> To the North of the Great Lakes there used to be the Canadian Shield mountain range. 3 major glacial periods have all but ground them away, creating the Great Lakes and exposing their basalt and granite foundations. They are known to have had deposits of precious and semi precious gems, gold, siver, copper, platinum, iron ore and molyberium. Their height was more tham 15,000 ft at 1 time and there was volcanic activity there in the far ancient past. As the mountains were ground down, all those mineral treasures were literally bulldozed far south, some of it ending up as far away as southern Tennessee. Geologists think that this area was as rich in gold deposits as modern South Africa is now. It isn`t surprising that dredging gravel also produces gold "by product".


And when you think about it , where would the best sources of good gravel and utility sand be ?......in glacial moraine and eskers , etc. and thats where the gold is. I like all these "nuggets" of information you post on here Lowell , part of the fun of doing this is learning about history and geology. I am even getting into chemistry now learning about extracting and purifying gold and other precious metals.


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## Lowell H Turner (Feb 22, 2011)

Apparently they stretshed West almost to the very young Rocky Mountains at that time. Imagine the eternal question: what happens when an immoveable object is capped by a glacier almost 2 miles thick? It GETS ground down and MOVED, abeit in much smaller pieces. Interesting ly as the middle glacier retreated, the remaining foothills backed up the run off and for several thousands of yrs created 1 of the LARGEST fresh water lakes to ever exist prtially over the majority of the current Great Lakes and central Ontario into eastern Manatoba. There was a single outlet that was close to the height of Angel Fall in South America and 8 or 9 times wider than the current Niagara AND Horseshoe Falls widths combined, the ancient ravine carried close to 2X the volume of the Amazon River to the sea. More accurately the ancient lake was an inland sea, and was close to 1,000 miles long...


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