Is there gold on the Yorke Peninsula?
The simple answer to this is yes. We all know about Rex Minerals discovery of an IOCG deposit just outside of Ardrossan. However, this deposit is at a depth of 30-600 mt, and therefore not accessible to amateur gold prospectors like you and i.
So the real question is, is there gettable gold for the amateur prospector on the Yorke Peninsula?
After many hours of google search, talking to the older locals, and self deliberation i came up with zilch, nudder, not a thing. being the type of person that i am, i wasn't satisfied with this outcome. I mean, there was no evidence to suggest that gold had been found on the surface, but,there was no evidence to suggest that it couldn't be found on the surface either.
They had no idea there was copper on the YP either, until one day when a shepherd was chasing a wombat for tea, and he picked up some ore at the opening to it's burrow. The rest of that story is history.
Anyhoo, i pondered this question for what seemed like an aeon, and came up with a plan to settle my curiosity one way or another. Now, i had no previous experience at prospecting for gold other than detecting, so i researched how to prospect and pan for alluvial gold. Once satisfied that panning was in the scope of my abilities, i headed off to miners den in adelaide and purchased the necessary equipment.
My plan was to locate the culverts that drain the runoff under the roads around the YP, and sample the soil to see if i could find traces of gold. I reasoned that if there was any gold in the area, then some traces would inevitably find their way into the watercourses and possibly drop out where the water slows down as it builds up at the entry to the culverts.
After getting the nod from the local council, i took a tour of the area with google earth and marked some coordinates into the gps. I packed the car with the gps, buckets, pans & classifiers, and headed off for a sunday drive.
Upon locating a culvert i gave it a number and wrote the corresponding number on a tag, i then determined the flow of water and took samples from the head of each culvert, classifying the samples onsite and only keeping the concentrates. When all my buckets were full i returned to base and then began to pan off the contents of each bucket.
A lot of the buckets showed nothing, some buckets showed black sands or heavy minerals, and some buckets showed traces of yellow. I returned to those that showed sand and obviously to those that showed colour. I would then try to picture how the water approaches the culvert to try and determine where the heavies would drop, then take some more samples and repeat the process.
I'm sorry for such a long story (i kept it as short as i could), but i wanted to paint a bit of a picture of my endeavours and method to answer the question. Is there gettable gold for the amateur prospector on the Yorke Peninsula?
Anyhoo, they say a picture paints a thousand words, you be the judge.
Black Sands
Heavy Minerals
More Heavy Minerals
Answer to the question
Size Comparison
The simple answer to this is yes. We all know about Rex Minerals discovery of an IOCG deposit just outside of Ardrossan. However, this deposit is at a depth of 30-600 mt, and therefore not accessible to amateur gold prospectors like you and i.
So the real question is, is there gettable gold for the amateur prospector on the Yorke Peninsula?
After many hours of google search, talking to the older locals, and self deliberation i came up with zilch, nudder, not a thing. being the type of person that i am, i wasn't satisfied with this outcome. I mean, there was no evidence to suggest that gold had been found on the surface, but,there was no evidence to suggest that it couldn't be found on the surface either.
They had no idea there was copper on the YP either, until one day when a shepherd was chasing a wombat for tea, and he picked up some ore at the opening to it's burrow. The rest of that story is history.
Anyhoo, i pondered this question for what seemed like an aeon, and came up with a plan to settle my curiosity one way or another. Now, i had no previous experience at prospecting for gold other than detecting, so i researched how to prospect and pan for alluvial gold. Once satisfied that panning was in the scope of my abilities, i headed off to miners den in adelaide and purchased the necessary equipment.
My plan was to locate the culverts that drain the runoff under the roads around the YP, and sample the soil to see if i could find traces of gold. I reasoned that if there was any gold in the area, then some traces would inevitably find their way into the watercourses and possibly drop out where the water slows down as it builds up at the entry to the culverts.
After getting the nod from the local council, i took a tour of the area with google earth and marked some coordinates into the gps. I packed the car with the gps, buckets, pans & classifiers, and headed off for a sunday drive.
Upon locating a culvert i gave it a number and wrote the corresponding number on a tag, i then determined the flow of water and took samples from the head of each culvert, classifying the samples onsite and only keeping the concentrates. When all my buckets were full i returned to base and then began to pan off the contents of each bucket.
A lot of the buckets showed nothing, some buckets showed black sands or heavy minerals, and some buckets showed traces of yellow. I returned to those that showed sand and obviously to those that showed colour. I would then try to picture how the water approaches the culvert to try and determine where the heavies would drop, then take some more samples and repeat the process.
I'm sorry for such a long story (i kept it as short as i could), but i wanted to paint a bit of a picture of my endeavours and method to answer the question. Is there gettable gold for the amateur prospector on the Yorke Peninsula?
Anyhoo, they say a picture paints a thousand words, you be the judge.
