Trip to Clermont: great start... but now a little perplexed?

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Joined
May 10, 2024
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Location
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Dear members,

As stated in my introduction I am now in the middle of my 10 day solo trip in Clermont, and it started with a bang! (well, at least for me...😁)
On my first day, and on a new place, I walked about 100 metres from my car in a straight line heading towards the centre of the prospecting area, after that I turned my detector on, walked another 10 - 15 metres following the same straight line, got my first signal - which was a screamer! -, thought of walking over it but because it was a new ground decided to dig it out... and at only 150 mm deep I found this 2.5 gr nugget:
1716270777272.jpeg

1716270840546.jpeg

So... there I am, very happy and excited, what a way to start the trip, and it was a new place for me so it was really promising!
I then spent the next three days on that spot going "low and slow", remembering the wise words by the late and greatly missed Wal not to "walk too quickly away from gold", clearing a 5 metre radius all around the spot where I found the nugget, lifting heavy logs, eliminating thick bushes, even "surfacing" the area by removing a 50 mm ground layer but, apart from another small .35 sub grammer, I couldn't find anything else.
Now, I am perplexed... Was that nugget alone (with the exception of the sub grammer)? Have I missed something (which is always possible, of course)? Or is it perhaps more probable that the area has been previously flogged (I saw some signs of other detectorists' passage, with a few foot scrapes and holes here and there, but nothing too extensive), but incredibly so they missed that nugget? (Which by the way wasn't difficult to stumble upon because it was a screamer and also because it was right in the centre of a sort of "perimeter" delimited by fallen trees?
In conclusion: here I am, not sure of what I should do... if you could be so kind, please let me have your thoughts on this.
Shall I insist or move on? Is it possible that nuggets like that can be alone in a specific area?
What does your experience say? Insist because "there must be" something else there? Or thank your incredible luck for stumbling upon it in such a manner and move on?
I'll be in Clermont until this Sunday, so any advice or suggestion is greatly appreciated, thank you! 🙏🙏
 
Dear members,

As stated in my introduction I am now in the middle of my 10 day solo trip in Clermont, and it started with a bang! (well, at least for me...😁)
On my first day, and on a new place, I walked about 100 metres from my car in a straight line heading towards the centre of the prospecting area, after that I turned my detector on, walked another 10 - 15 metres following the same straight line, got my first signal - which was a screamer! -, thought of walking over it but because it was a new ground decided to dig it out... and at only 150 mm deep I found this 2.5 gr nugget:
View attachment 13866

View attachment 13867

So... there I am, very happy and excited, what a way to start the trip, and it was a new place for me so it was really promising!
I then spent the next three days on that spot going "low and slow", remembering the wise words by the late and greatly missed Wal not to "walk too quickly away from gold", clearing a 5 metre radius all around the spot where I found the nugget, lifting heavy logs, eliminating thick bushes, even "surfacing" the area by removing a 50 mm ground layer but, apart from another small .35 sub grammer, I couldn't find anything else.
Now, I am perplexed... Was that nugget alone (with the exception of the sub grammer)? Have I missed something (which is always possible, of course)? Or is it perhaps more probable that the area has been previously flogged (I saw some signs of other detectorists' passage, with a few foot scrapes and holes here and there, but nothing too extensive), but incredibly so they missed that nugget? (Which by the way wasn't difficult to stumble upon because it was a screamer and also because it was right in the centre of a sort of "perimeter" delimited by fallen trees?
In conclusion: here I am, not sure of what I should do... if you could be so kind, please let me have your thoughts on this.
Shall I insist or move on? Is it possible that nuggets like that can be alone in a specific area?
What does your experience say? Insist because "there must be" something else there? Or thank your incredible luck for stumbling upon it in such a manner and move on?
I'll be in Clermont until this Sunday, so any advice or suggestion is greatly appreciated, thank you! 🙏🙏
Maybe just the the leftover from a previous patch.
 
I've spent many a day chasing more gold after finding one nice piece, "There has to be more gold around here" only to finally move on and find more gold somewhere else, I would think everyone has done the same, but sometimes the extra time you put in to an area pays off. We were about to move on after spending a full day without a find when we found a patch of small pieces that the older detectors didn't pick up.20240505_170359.jpg
 
Thank you very much Dave's Office and grubstake, I needed encouragement more than anything and I am receiving it here!
Thanks also grubstake for the appreciation of my nugget, it is my best so far!
Most likely what I'll do is try to give that area one more day of hard work, and then I'll move on looking for the next nugget!
Great to be on the forum!
Cheers
 
Hi Mountaineer.

I’m not sure that I would even give it another full day to be honest. 2 hours of gridding, 2 more hours of wider zig-zagging to try and extend the area and if no good, move one.

We found 5 ‘1 piece patches’ last year in W.A. and they looked to have either no or very little other work done. But buggered if we could find any of their friends 🤷‍♂️ It wastes time but has to be done - but don’t waste days on it 👍

Nice 2.5 gram piece first up and congrats on your biggest bit. Best of luck for the rest of your trip 😉
 
Thank you very much Northeast, what you are saying is very wise, I guess the hardest part is to admit that it is a "1 piece patch" and move away. When I stumbled on that nugget just 5 minutes into a new place I probably must have thought for a second: "Wow, this place must be paved in gold!"...😂 Anyway, perhaps there will be other "1 piece patches" waiting for me just a stone's throw from that one! I'll give it my best tomorrow, fingers crossed! 😊🙏
 
A bit late now as you have prob departed, but when you have gone over a patch, cleared any hot rocks and scraped it flat you can generally run your detector at a higher gain/ mode than normal especially if you go very slow and constant height/scrub coil, which you will be anyway.

You can run it where you wouldnt normally use it ie with it falsing a bit. Since you will be going over the same area with multiple swings you can soon figure out if the signal is false or not and taking off another 50mm in that spot and dropping your gain back will confirm it either way.
 
Luckily I had a look at the forum just before venturing out in the field, so thanks so much XLOOX for your imput! I will try to do what you say right at the start of the day, and perhaps, as suggested by others, if after a couple of hours there is no result I'll move away and venture deeper in to the place.
Hopefully I'll return with other good nuggets, I wouldn't want the first to remain alone any longer! 😂
Thanks again 🙏
 
It can be frustrating, have found many "one spot " nuggets over the years, at least it lets you know there is gold in the area. I see you walked a hundred metres from your vehicle before you turned on the detector, I have found a number of nuggets within a few metres of where I have pulled up, Yep some of them a one off too :rolleyes:. That nugget was a nice find hopefully you have pinged a few more, Cheers.
 
I would forget that you found it and do a "patch hunting mode" of an area of 50 metres or so in all direction (on flattish ground) from it. To me you have found a easy nugget on the fringe of an area so a rough detect looking for more gold might get you a good spot.
 
Thanks so much Ausgold, yes I could have turned on the machine sooner but, funny enough, I just wanted to get deep into the forest and then start searching... it was just mind blowing (it still is to me!) that walking in a straight line, without any zig-zagging here and there, I stumbled upon THE ONLY nugget in that area!:p I mean, good for me, but what a lucky chance! Pity it was a loner... I'll see what happens tomorrow in a new place (of the same prospecting area!) Cheers
 
Thanks geof_junk! I actually sort of did that today (and in a way the three days prior) because I did return to that patch and search a bigger area, perhaps yes, sort of 50 mt radius, in pretty much all directions, but you know how it is here, it's all thick forest, grass, bushes, fallen trees, leaves etc. so of course it wasn't a very good job but I did my best and... nothing! I honestly also hoped that it could have been an easy nugget on the fringe of a patch but I guess I must now accept that it was a loner. You know?, the funny thing is that in the 4 days in that area (which is enormous!) I walked, according to my GPS, for more than 5 kilometers through all sorts of different terrains, including gullies and creeks, and... of course nothing! I know it is not true, but at times I think I found the only nugget in that prospecting area! 😂 Anyway, tomorrow's another day, I hope I'll find a sister for the nugget I already found (bigger sister, of course...)! 🙏👍
 
A little update with the results. Tomorrow, Sunday, will be my last day here in Clermont: in the end I didn't find a sister for my 2.5 gram nugget 😢 but I did find two more sub grammers (.55 and .35) in another point of the same prospecting area, once I moved away from my "one piece patch". Funny enough, talking about patches, I found those two in what was clearly someone else's patch, with a large area flattened and stripped of dirt and leaves, various foot scrapes and holes here and there. It is a mystery how the other operator missed those two, especially the first one, which was just 1 and a half metres from the stripped ground.
All in all I am happy with the results (just shy of 4 grams), even though I must confess that such a great find right from the start gave me hope that I had stumbled upon a rich patch! 🥲
I'll see how it goes tomorrow, but in any case I'd like to thank all the members for their kind support and informative opinions. Cheers 🙏🍻
 
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