North east vic

[Tommy4711]

Hi guys,
I have been doing a lot of reading on this forum the last few weeks, some great info and interesting stories.
Possibly this forum saved me a fine one day as I had no idea about all these restricted rivers and creeks or requiring miners rights.

Iv been gold panning in all the rivers around Myrtleford havilah bright all my life. Even more than that iv had the police come and see me while I was at the ovens river and their only concern was I pick up my empty beer bottles before I left.. One of the parks guys drove past me in eurobin on the ovens river asked if I got any gold, he didn't say anything about it being illegal. Now I'm not sure if it's because I'm local and know just about everyone or they don't care to much about a gold pan..
It's why I'm so surprised these are all restricted and you can be fined..

This summer I'll ask the question when I see him..

One thing I'm interested to know and can't find a good resource on is how small of gold did the dredges collect. Because I have never got any gold around 1+ gram...

And what's your thoughts on the ground that was dredged, some sections they dredged is 100 meters wide and probably only gets a wash in servre floods, would it be worth panning, it looks terrible to try and shovel though.

I was going to try all along Morse's Creek this year but now I'm thinking of sticking to private property so I'm not disturbed with a massive fine.. Personally I think it's ridiculous to restrict gold pans for environmental reasons.. I remember swimming down the ovens in summer when they were watering tobacco and all the suckering oil would be washing into the river and making your eyes burn, the department never seem to care about that...

There is a few people I know who pan up towards Harrietville too and they never had any problems, so I wonder if these fines are geared more towards people using pumps and sluices.

Has anyone ever been fined for gold panning?

 

[Gappa44]

If you want to know abit about those big dredges watch season 7 of gold rush from episode 3-7 you can see the gold they are catching in size wise and also you will have to move a lot of over burden to get to the dredge tailings as the fine tailings came out right behind the dredge and then the big rocks dumped over the top of those fines in saying that though those dredges were hard to set up and in that series you can see there first or second run pulled out like 100 ounces but the 3rd one they had to much water and only got 20 ounces which makes me think that in some spots they would of had problems and there is a lot of fine gold in the tailings it's just getting to those tailings that's the hard part !

That's how I seen how they worked and my opinion anyway mate I could be wrong but you never know

Cheer Gappa

 

[dirtyharry]

Hi Tommy

I have seen a few rangers over the years & not once have i been asked while gold prospecting for my miners right
Different story with fishing, i cant count the number of times Fisheries Inspectors have asked my to produce a valid fishing license

Not sure what the deal is with park rangers & gold panning or sluicing. Seems in the North East the locals prospect the streams with the rangers blessing
I guess it may all be a bit too hard to prosecute prospectors, not sure you would receive the same attitude if you were dredging

I am not in any way advocating prospecting in banned streams

Regards

Dirty Harry

 

[Tathradj]

I am starting to find out that it is quite surprising the amount
of National Parks Rangers who love prospecting. LOL

 

[XIV]

I am starting to find out that it is quite surprising the amount
of National Parks Rangers who love prospecting. LOL

Funny thing, I was talking to one of the rangers the other week, out east gip.
he reckons the only way you can find good gold is with a dredge.
so I said, but the gold wouldn't cover the fine. His response " who is going to fine you, ME, pffff. that requires to much walking through the bush to find you, take some happy snaps, then a SH1Tload of paperwork that I couldn't be bothered doing" "plus its a DPI problem not mine"
NOW at this stage I was gobsmacked, and not sure if he was on his right medication.
In no way am I condoning using a dredge, think the ranger likes prospectors.

 

[greencheeks77]

well I would take the rangers job if it was offered! lol no wonder that dredges are starting to slowly make their way back...

 

[cecc]

Tommy Harrietville,love it, was there in 2008....lovely part of that region. With dredging I know years ago just out from Corryong Vic where I come from, some young local guys were dredging in this creek where I first started prospecting, and they found some nice nuggets, I knew thew blokes really well. It wasn't long before people living right near the creek and relied on it for their water supply started complaining about the dirty water, well the authorities kicked these guys out

 

[DeathKiss]

I am starting to find out that it is quite surprising the amount
of National Parks Rangers who love prospecting. LOL

Funny thing, I was talking to one of the rangers the other week, out east gip.
he reckons the only way you can find good gold is with a dredge.
so I said, but the gold wouldn't cover the fine. His response " who is going to fine you, ME, pffff. that requires to much walking through the bush to find you, take some happy snaps, then a SH1Tload of paperwork that I couldn't be bothered doing" "plus its a DPI problem not mine"
NOW at this stage I was gobsmacked, and not sure if he was on his right medication.
In no way am I condoning using a dredge, think the ranger likes prospectors.

who said you need to state in the declaration the exact location of the find?
can make up location ...go there and dig ahuge whole.....cover it up , and when they ask where you found it ....voila ...spot is in the permitted area

 

[bend]

I've been asked for my miners right by the DELWP blokes a couple of times, but then again they've only asked when I was standing in the bottom of a 6 foot hole. I don't think they worry too much if you're not making a mess, too many other idiots dumping rubbish everywhere I guess.

 

[Joshua1021]

Just thought id let u guys know. I have been sluicing for 7 yrs now. Never had any problems with anyone. But the one yr i decide to spend money on a good highbanker. I was investigated and had photos of me taken working and had earth resorces at my door giving me a verry sten warning not to go back to that area or i will be fined 60 to 100k. And that was the best season i had. Best day out there was 14.21 gms with 5 gms of nuggety gold. So just be careful out THERE 8.(

 

[jamiealdridge]

Just thought id let u guys know. I have been sluicing for 7 yrs now. Never had any problems with anyone. But the one yr i decide to spend money on a good highbanker. I was investigated and had photos of me taken working and had earth resorces at my door giving me a verry sten warning not to go back to that area or i will be fined 60 to 100k. And that was the best season i had. Best day out there was 14.21 gms with 5 gms of nuggety gold. So just be careful out THERE 8.(

hi there - this was in Vic was it? I've heard of people being pulled up on the Buckland - one was tracked down to his home in Melb via number plates.

 

[Aussiedigs]

The Buckland is on the banned list but its tributaries are not.

 

[i8work]

I have never even seen a ranger? but I always have my minors permit at the ready...

 

[LONEWOLF]

I know several Rangers in Nth NSW that love their Gold and Dredge for it... Complaints and Videos have been taken and Nothing has been done about it.....

LW....

 

[CreviceSucker]

As far as i know the banned / exempted rivers were created that way to prevent people camping on their claim on the riverbanks because too many were being drowned in flash floods.

The legislation was not intended to ban prospecting , it was intended to ban occupation for the purpose of prospecting , ie no camping on the river.

In years that followed local councils decided to form their own special interpretation and completely ban prospecting from those locations.

Pity we dont have any qualified lawyers among our members as the definition and context of the legislation could be challenged.

 

[CreviceSucker]

Hi guys,
I have been doing a lot of reading on this forum the last few weeks, some great info and interesting stories.
Possibly this forum saved me a fine one day as I had no idea about all these restricted rivers and creeks or requiring miners rights.

One thing I'm interested to know and can't find a good resource on is how small of gold did the dredges collect. Because I have never got any gold around 1+ gram...

Dredges in the old days were very rough and couldnt catch the fine gold , probably anything smaller than 20 mesh would wash straight through the sluice boxes , they also mostly used bucket conveyors which missed the best gold which was in the bottom few inches of gravels on the bedrock.

If they had used suction dredges like you see these days being used to clean up shipping lanes and for beach reclamation they could have vacuumed the bedrock and crevices and would have put 95 % of the gold through the sluice boxes.

As an example to you , most of the dredges that worked the Shoalhaven river went bankrupt because the gold was so fine they had a LOSS RATE of 94 %..... yes they caught only 6 % of the gold :brokenh:

Modern professional sluice designs could now capture 99 % of gold put through them down to 200 - 400 micron.