This last week or so with the warm weather has melted the snow and made for very high water levels. One of our favorite panning spots is now under 4 feet of water. After driving for two hours, we decided to test a new hole above the water line.

We dug down about 3 1/2 feet through the overburden until we hit the paydirt. After digging through about a foot and a half of pay, we hit an under water spring, which quickly filled the hole with water.

Checking the gravels for color. Found 5 nice size flakes and some smaller pieces. Not a bad test pan.

Loaded some buckets with pay to run through the pro-pan. The first run we did consisted of three and one half buckets.

Panning the last of the buckets. If you have never used the Pro-pan, I highly recommend it. You quickly pan down until there is only 2 inches or so of material, and keep adding and panning. It takes all of about five minutes to process the 3 1/2 buckets.

The 3 1/2 buckets yielded just over a quarter gram.

In addition to the gold, we found some very interesting pyrite specimens and some nice jade pieces.

All in all, it was a great trip with perfect sunny weather. The high water forced us to dig in areas we normally would not have prospected. Some nice mineral samples were recovered, and our total gold take was 3.6 grams. Can’t wait to get back there when the water goes down.