Gold Prospecting at Moonan Flat

[Nugget]

A good friend of mine (goldiesilver) as his known on the forum and I headed out on a road trip a couple of days ago. Our original intention was to do a bit of panning and sluicing at Moonan Flat NSW, but upon arrival it was apparent that there's really nowhere accessible to do this. Most of the river around Moonan Flat itself is on private property, you can access the river next to the bridge but to be honest it wasn't very inviting.

We drove around for a while eventually asking one of the local farmers for advice on where to look, he seemed like a nice bloke who more or less confirmed our suspicions.

So just in case anyone is thinking about heading out to Moonan Flat for a bit of prospecting in the future, I'd say try somewhere else. But in saying that I will mention the town is quite nice and has a friendly country feel to it, so it's probably still worth visiting on that alone. We plan on returning someday for a camping trip.

 

[Chimpy]

G'day

Yeah had pretty much the same experience and not much different at Stewarts Brook down the road. I did have a pan in the creek near the common and tennis courts but got nothing. These were never areas that gave up much alluvial gold in comparison to other places.

Cheers

Chimpy

 

[Land Rover]

Always been a closed shop !!!! a few years ago a couple of bloke from maitland area tried to metal detect the area they had the same experience,,,,, all locked up to strangers!!!

L/R

 

[Ditherer and Son]

I spent almost a week up on a property at Stewarts Brook, with the property owner's permission. I panned like mad, got 1 speck, but I did find lots of very small gemstones, mostly tourmalines and sapphires - though very very small. I detected around the area got nothing, and dug some dirt out of a little tributary in the backblocks which yielded about 3 specks of gold.

There's lots of quartz in some locations, but the gold was mostly got from tunnels into the quartz veins high up on the hillsides, the quartz was then crushed before sluicing.

Not much alluvial gold at all I am afraid.

 

[Chimpy]

G'day

There's some nice gems to found up that way. Near Polblue there are pink sapphires but I think the NP boundary near the camp ground cuts off most of it. There may be a small area left on the Stewarts Brook SF side. I've been meaning to check it out for some time now but might wait for better weather.

Cheers

Chimpy

 

[Land Rover]

Ya dead right Chimpy ,,,,Remember what happened to the brass monkey !!!!!!

L/R

 

[Ben78]

I have been lead to believe that in the swamps in the top of the Manning River where they run through a rather large property owned by a wealthy Australian there is some ruby mines. I had a quick look on google earth and there is certainly some 'quarry like" activity up there. Might be worth a look in the area around there?

Apart from that, have you tried looking in areas that gold doesn't occur? On a recent trip out we dug our wash from a straight section of creek with no definition and got gold from it... Corners and rock bars probably get hammered by every prospector that crossed that creek in the last 120 years!

 

[Chimpy]

G'day

Stay well away from Ellerston. Visitors not welcome . Years ago he used to employ boundary riders that would send you on your way in a rather physical manner if you strayed to close. An old mate found that out the hard way while he was prospecting his way across that region in the seventies. I have heard stories that he used to let one old fellow on his land to camp and pan by river for decades but nobody else. The stones were marketed as 'Ellerston Pink Sappires' and were profitable for a while but no longer being mined I believe. Any of the old drainage systems off Barrington Tops should contain assortments of shiny goodies and nearly every DIGS report I've ever read on the area mentions gold and gems in terrace deposits. The other big miner in the area is Cluff Resources who recently stopped mining rubies near Gloucester

Cheers

Chimpy

 

[Ben78]

Good work Chimpy, I've only ever fished there, walking the manning up from the Watergauge. Never saw anyone on the ellerston part of the river though. I know the fishing club releases trout from the bridge over the manning near the mined area which is how I came to know of it...

Some chunky tigers up there too lol

 

[bazza2210]

Good work Chimpy, I've only ever fished there, walking the manning up from the Watergauge. Never saw anyone on the ellerston part of the river though. I know the fishing club releases trout from the bridge over the manning near the mined area which is how I came to know of it...

Some chunky tigers up there too lol

Hi Ben78 - I also used to fish the manning for a couple of K's up from the water gauge in the early 90's the story I heard is that Kerry Packer purchased the property we walked through and Rubies were discovered when new house foundations were excavated at the site of the old house , all those times I walked that area of the Manning and didn't bother to look for any gemstones.

 

[HeadsUp]

G'day

Stay well away from Ellerston. Visitors not welcome . Years ago he used to employ boundary riders that would send you on your way in a rather physical manner if you strayed to close. An old mate found that out the hard way while he was prospecting his way across that region in the seventies. I have heard stories that he used to let one old fellow on his land to camp and pan by river for decades but nobody else. The stones were marketed as 'Ellerston Pink Sappires' and were profitable for a while but no longer being mined I believe. Any of the old drainage systems off Barrington Tops should contain assortments of shiny goodies and nearly every DIGS report I've ever read on the area mentions gold and gems in terrace deposits. The other big miner in the area is Cluff Resources who recently stopped mining rubies near Gloucester

Cheers

Chimpy

i stopped in there a month ago to pan the creek , the owner was down like a shot but after i spoke to him for a bit he said i was okay to continue.

Nice intelligent guy if you have a bit of respect for them.

Found very little gold there for my efforts but i would love to photograph the old homestead there , that place is a mansion

I have a photo somewhere of the huge bronze statue at the gate .

do you know they have 10,000 acres in their little plot ?

 

[cleapatra888]

im going up to stewarts brook can you please tell me were exacly can i get a good lot of gems thank you catherine

 

[HeadsUp]

im going up to stewarts brook can you please tell me were exacly can i get a good lot of gems thank you catherine

not sure about Stewarts Brook , there is no water in the creek there except for small isolated puddles and the local farmers are using these puddles to water their cattle so it wouldnt be a good idea to go panning in there until some rain returns , (the cattle are worth more than the gemstones).

you could go for a walk there if you wanted to , maybe use a pick to loosen up the ground and sort through it by hand with sieves but it would be very slow

look out for snakes there by the way , scan the ground ahead of you before you walk anywhere

best wishes