The old saying “gold is where you find it” is perhaps one of the most well-known adages in gold prospecting. While it is true that gold can be found in places deemed as void of gold by most people, gold is much more prone to gathering in certain places than others. For instance, in rivers, streams, and creeks, experienced prospectors know that gold tends to concentrate along the inside bends, just to name one example. So where should you look for gold in rivers or creeks?
Gold in rivers or creeks tends to be found in the following locations:
- Along Inside bends
- Behind/in front of bedrock outcroppings
- Behind large boulders
- Right after sudden widening sections.
- On bedrock or below false bedrock
- In natural moss
- Below waterfalls
In this guide, you will learn some of the most common places where gold tends to be found in rivers, creeks, and streams. But most importantly, you will learn the critical skill of analyzing rivers yourself to find out where you are the most likely to find actual gold!
Let’s start by looking at how gold travels down the river and forms paystreaks!
Table of Contents
How Pay Streaks Form in Rivers: Essential Basics!
The paystreaks that most prospectors are searching for generally fall under the category of”placer deposits”. In short, placer deposits form through the erosion and removal of rocks and minerals that contain, among many other minerals and metals, gold.
The gold is then transported with the help of wind and water until some of it gets carried away by a river, where it gets trapped in crevices or forms pay streaks. This occurs mainly during the flooding stages when the current is strong enough to lift the heavy gold particles and transport them downstream.
Let’s take a somewhat more detailed look at the process. It will help you read rivers and landscapes, and ultimately, increase your chances of finding gold!
Phase 1: Residual to Eluvial to Alluvial Deposits
As soon as the gold has eroded from the main lode, we refer to it as residual gold. As long as it doesn’t move too long from the original source ( a couple of feet or so), it goes under this name.
However, as soon as the gold starts to move from the original source, it’s called eluvial gold. Sometimes it’s also referred to as hillside placer deposits, as it normally travels down a hill. For gold to remain eluvial, it must not have made it into a stream or river.
When the gold finally makes it into a river, it is referred to as “alluvial gold”. As you know already, this is when the gold starts to get sorted by the running water and creates deposits in the river.
Phase 2: Paystreak formation
As you probably know already, gold is really heavy. To be precise, gold is:
- 18 times heavier than water,
- 6 times heavier than most other materials in the streambed.
The sheer weight of the gold particles will ensure that they are much less easily moved by the flowing river, than for example regular gravel.
As a result, gold will tend to follow its own path together with the heavier streambed materials, and also deposit at places where the lighter gravels are simply washed away by the current.
To give one example, gold will tend to take the shortest route available as the river or stream twists and turn. This means that it tends to deposit along with the inner benches of the river. (covered soon)
Since gold is so heavy, most of the gold is generally transported during the yearly floods, when the water flow is powerful enough to move even the heaviest of gold particles. As the water level increases during these stages, it means that paystreaks may form at places that are dry during the summer months.
With this short introduction, you now know the very basics of how gold deposits in a river.
Let’s move on to the meat of the article, namely how to read a river for gold!
Best Locations for Finding Gold in Rivers & Creeks
In order to read a river in a sensible manner, you need to interpret its shape and form to get an idea of where the gold is likely to deposit. This not only includes analyzing the twists and turns, but also the streambed itself.
Gold tends to concentrate in places where the current loses speed and force, causing the gold to drop. These areas are often called “low-pressure areas”. As you will see, this is the case in all the examples below.
Let’s look at some of the most common places in a river where gold tends to concentrate!
Along inside bends
As a river twists and turns, the gold tends to deposit along the inside bends, especially on the far end side of the turn. This is mainly due to two reasons.
- When the river makes a turn, the gold will take longer to change direction due to its high weight. This will cause much of the gold to hit the inside bend.
- The flow along the inside bends will be slower, as the water has to cover a shorter distance to cover the turn. In comparison, the centrifugal forces ensure that that the water running along the outside bends accelerates. As discussed earlier, a slowdown of water flow will cause much of the gold to settle.
Due to the above reasons, most gold deposits where the river twists and turns are found along the inner bends. While this isn’t always the path gold takes, you are recommended to focus your prospecting efforts on those areas.
On Bedrock
If your river has a lot of exposed bedrock, there is a high chance that any gold that flowed by managed to get into small cracks and crevices along its surface. In that regard, exposed bedrock very much functions like a sluice box.
As a matter of fact, it wasn’t uncommon that the old-timers used long outcroppings as natural sluices. Today some prospectors focus especially on cracks and crevices, performing so-called “Sniping”. Often surprisingly large pieces of gold can get trapped in tiny cracks!
Bedrock situated below a layer of gravel also tends to capture gold well. As gold is so heavy, it will work its way down the gravel deposits and rest against the solid bedrock. There it may lie for tens, hundreds, or thousands of years, provided that the layer of gravel remains intact.
Behind Large Boulders
Another thing to look out for is different types of obstructions that cause the current loses some speed. Boulders are perfect examples of this.
A large boulder that is heavy enough to withstand the vehement torrents of the spring floods will create zones behind and in front of the boulder. If the boulder is residing inside a streak where gold happens to flow by, it is very likely that some of it will concentrate within the low-pressure zone.
Protruding Outcroppings
Bedrock that protrudes into the river often serves well as a gold trap. Depending on the size and shape of the outcropping, gold could gather either in front of or behind the obstruction.
An outcropping facing downstream tends to concentrate gold behind the outcropping itself.
An outcropping facing upstream tends to concentrate the gold in front of the outcropping.
Tip: If the river twists and turns where the bedrock extends into the river, you could use the tendency of gold to concentrate along the inside bends, to focus your efforts on those areas. Of course, this applies regardless of the obstruction you are looking for, but it’s worth mentioning one extra time.
Sudden Drops
Sudden dropoffs into deep water can act as great gold traps, and if you find one in a gold-bearing river, there is a great chance that gold has concentrated nearby.
A dropoff works just like any of the other gold traps; as the water runs into the dropoff, the volume of the river suddenly expands massively, acting as a brake on the current. If the flow has slowed down enough, the gold will fall to the bottom and get trapped.
It’s important to recognize that the gold might not drop right at the drop. The speed of the current will ensure that the gold manages to travel a shorter distance before it finally falls down to the riverbed.
Where the River widens
If the river channel suddenly widens from a quite narrow channel, the speed of the current diminishes as more water can pass through. Again, this means that gold carried by the rapid current is likely to drop off and concentrate on the streambed.
In some cases, there will be quite some boulders that have gathered close to where the river slows down. Just as gold, boulders are heavy and hard to move, and will, therefore, move in a manner somewhat similar to gold. Seeing a group of boulders could, therefore, be a good indication that there is gold to find nearby.
Where the river levels off
Another place where the current usually slows down is where the river levels off, often in combination with a widening or deepening of the river channel. As you probably can guess by now, the reason why this works is that the current slows down enough for the gold to fall to the bottom.
Waterfalls
Waterfalls are quite similar to sudden dropoffs in that the water often falls into a hole by its base, eroded by the constant pounding of water. If the hole is deep enough, there is a chance that any gold that goes with the stream will be caught and stay there.
However, in many cases, the current is strong enough to sweep all but the heaviest gold nuggets out of the hole.
One thing to look out for is if there are a lot of small boulders caught in the hole, as they will act as natural gold traps. If there are, you might be up for a pretty sweet find. There are quite some stories circulating about gold miners who were lucky enough to dig out waterfalls containing really large quantities of gold.
Undercuttings
One quite interesting place to look for gold is where the river cuts into the benches. The reason is very simple!
Any gold that’s inside the bench will fall directly to the bottom. Therefore you will often find rich concentrations of gold right below the undercutting running along the river.
You should especially focus your efforts on obstructions close to the river bench. There is a high chance that any gold from the undercuttings will flow along the edges of the river, and therefore get trapped if there is something in its way.
Moss
Moss functions as a natural gold trap since gold will get caught in its fibers. Some prospectors have had quite some success with gathering the moss, putting it into a water-filled bucket, and squeezing the moss to release the gold.
Make sure that you clean out the dirt underneath the moss. A lot of gold can be trapped there, especially if it extends into crevices!
Bedrock Gold and False Bedrock
Finding bedrock, be it naked outcroppings or bedrock covered with a thick layer of gravel, is something every experienced prospector knows the potential of. Forming an impenetrable layer at the bottom of the riverbed, it acts as the last barrier for gold that has managed to work its way down the riverbed.
This means that a lot of gold might be found if you just manage to get down to the bedrock. In a really good scenario, the bedrock hasn’t been exposed for thousands of years, meaning that gold has been able to concentrate during the same amount of time.
Real Bedrock Vs False Bedrock: What is false bedrock?
What many prospectors don’t know, is that it’s not only true bedrock, comprised of the host rock, that will act as an impenetrable barrier. False bedrock will have a similar effect.
False bedrock simply is an impermeable or nearly impermeable barrier above the true bedrock that traps gold as it works its way down the river bed. It often consists of clay that has been compacted to form a floor, effectively stopping gold from going any deeper into the riverbed.
Even though it typically consists of clay, false bedrock can be surprisingly solid. Therefore it’s able to stop the gold from falling further into the riverbed, which can present some really nice opportunities!
It should be noted that false bedrock can be found at depths as shallow as a few inches below the surface. In other words, you might not have to dig as deeps, compared to if you were looking to reach the host bedrock.
Look above and Underneath the False Bedrock
Considering the fact that gold falls onto the false bedrock and gets trapped, you might think that there is nothing to collect underneath it. Well, think again!
In some cases, a lot of gold is residing below the false bedrock. As you might suspect, these gold-bearing layers were created before the false bedrock formed over top.
Crevicing: Capturing the gold in exposed bedrock
One somewhat different approach to gold mining in rivers is to focus on the small crevices and cracks in exposed bedrock on land. As the spring floods broaden the river channel, a lot of the bedrock that lies above water level during the rest of the year is exposed to the forces of flowing water. This means that a lot of gold might be found on land that’s dry and easily accessible during the summer and autumn.
The only things you need to get started crevicing are a hammer, a screwdriver, and a gold pan. This will be enough to get into the crevices, loosen the rock inside, and scrape the material out into your pan. Then you carry on with the normal panning process.
How to Sample for a PayStreak (Important)
As we now have covered some of the places in a river where it’s likely for gold to concentrate, we’ll now move on to the next important step, namely sampling.
Sampling for a paystreak should be done in a systematic manner to increase your chances of finding the most gold dense parts of the river. Paystreaks in gravel don’t show up in every river, but where they do, they can be extremely rich.
However, they are usually not more than a few inches to a few feet wide. This is why we need to adopt a meticulous approach when looking for it.
Still, the process is really easy and will radically improve your chances o finding the real paystreak. Here are the steps:
- Once you have identified an area of the river that seems interesting (such as an inner bend), start sampling from the one end to the other.
- Take a sample each couple of feet or so, and work yourself across the river. Make an approximation of the number of gold particles in the pan for each sample, and make a note of it.The image below shows an example of a river where 6 samples have been taken. As you see, each sample is accompanied by a number showing the number of gold particles found at each location.
Sampling for gold - Now you can figure where you should focus your efforts. In a best-case scenario, you’d want to have one sample point with really many gold specks, surrounded by sample points with declining numbers.This is also the case in the image above, and we can see that the paystreak is likely to be located around the second sample site counting from below.
- Now continue to sample around the spot that had the richest concentrations of gold. This way you will map out the paystreak and know where to concentrate your efforts.
While the process above can be tiresome and time-consuming, it’s a really effective way to map out a river. In the long run, this will save you time, as you can focus your hardest efforts only on the locations where there actually is gold!
Smaller Creeks VS Major Rivers
It should be noted that gold tends to concentrate slightly differently in creeks than in major rivers. In simple terms, gold in major rivers follows the rules better, while findings in smaller creeks tend to be somewhat less consistent and rather spotty.
The main reason is that smaller creeks generally have less water flowing through, which gives the gold less time to concentrate in the places it would in a larger river.
In a bigger river, the large amounts of water will ensure that the gold gets enough time to deposit more along the lines of what we may expect.
Conclusion
Gold can be found in various places in a river, such as close to inside bends, behind large boulders, along undercuttings, and where the river widens or deepens.
While it’s important to note these locations, it’s even more important to understand why gold concentrates near them. That way you will be able to reason out the locations in your particular river that are the most likely to contain gold.
Another important topic covered in this article is the process of sampling for paystreaks. Many prospectors just pick a place here and there, following no system whatsoever. A solid method as shown in this article will take you one step closer to becoming a proficient prospector, and ultimately, finding more gold!
Happy Panning!