THIRD  QUARTER, JULY 2014                               VOLUME 28, NUMBER 7

Newsletter By Dave McCracken General Manager

The beginnings of this story date all the way back to 1985, the year after I arrived on the Klamath River.  That is the year I bought a jet boat and gained access to the remote canyon on the Klamath River not far downstream from the confluence of Independence Creek.  That’s about 12 miles downriver from Happy Camp in northern California.

In those days, nearly all of my personal income was generated from suction dredging in the rich high-grade river-bottom gold deposits that were pretty consistent along that stretch of the Klamath River (and remain so). We did not devote any meaningful time digging for gold in the surface deposits in those days. This is because we were busy dredging.  But once in a while, someone would dig out a crack in the bedrock up on the side of the river, and we recognized that the very same gold deposits we were dredging under the water extended right up out of the water alongside the river.

Our first season with The New 49’ers was during the summer of 1986. Since then, for the most part, my responsibilities with the Club did away with my commercial suction dredging career.  I don’t have any regrets about that, except that I would surely love to see cracks full of gold at the bottom of the river once again before my own final chapter is over.  Uncovering rich deposits of gold is one of the most exciting things I have experienced during my time on this earth!

Over the years that followed, we have acquired an extensive amount of mining property, including nearly all of the mining property that extends its way through that entire 3 ½-mile stretch of mostly remote, gold-rich lower Independence Canyon.  I say “remote,” because the river winds its way down through more of a wilderness experience that is further away from the road.  Most of the stretch is not even visible from Highway 96.  There are some old mining trails that go down to the river here and there.  But it is only during these last two mining seasons that any members have even taken very much notice.

Even with the advantage of a jet boat, very dramatic rapids at the upper and lower ends of the canyon prevent deeper motorized access during the low water periods of the year.  If you want to venture into the deeper canyon where almost no prospecting has been done, you either need to float in with a rubber raft, hike in over one of several trails, or use a rope to climb in and out from places where the road is close enough to gain some access.

My own interest in the surface mining potential down in the Independence Canyon peaked from a series of events which have taken place this season.  First, a group of experienced members and I used my jet boat to gain access to the far side of the river on K-23AA earlier this summer – and in just a matter of an hour or so, we confirmed an abundant surface deposit which we are now mining during the weekend group projects.  In that place, we have set up one of our over-sized rubber rafts with an outboard engine to ferry participants back and forth across the river. Here is the story. Other members have since moved onto K-23AA and are using different types of boats and rafts to gain access to the richer deposits on the far side of the river.

Then about a month ago, two brand new members, John Hughes and Curtis Cox, used a single paddle board (like an over-sized surf board) to cross the river with a metal detector; and they found a beautiful gold nugget within about 15 minutes.  They had only been members in the Club for about two hours!  It was so exciting that I went right down there and captured their success on video:

• Crossing on a paddle board
• Found a nice nugget

In almost 30 years of managing The New 49’ers, we have not paid much attention to the far side of the river. This was because we figured it was too difficult for most members to get over there.  This perception changed when I saw how easy it was for John and Curtis to paddle across!

Just about that same time, Diane Helgesen crossed the river in a small rubber raft and dug a fantastic gold nugget out of a bedrock crack.  Diane told me that “crossing the river is a piece of cake!” If I knew that, I would have been encouraging members to access the other side many years ago!  I also went down and captured Diane’s story on video:

• Diane’s nugget

Several weeks ago, I received an email from Melissa Pemberton saying that she would be stopping in Happy Camp to introduce her husband, Rex.  Melissa grew up devoting long summers with her extended family and close friends (there were at least 10 children between the Andrzejewski and Kohler families) extensively dredging for gold along the Klamath River.  We all became very close friends.  Children grow up and pursue other interests for a while.  I say “for a while,” because I am amazed at how many kids grow up spending summers mining gold with us, and then return later as grownups and bring their own children to join with us in the great outdoor gold mining experience.

Even though I had not seen Melissa for a number of years, I have remained in touch with her parents, and I have followed her web page.   Talking about extreme adventure, Melissa makes her money these days as an aerobatic pilot. She participates in competitions and puts on shows all over the world.  You guys have probably seen the way they can put these stunt planes into summersault rolls in the air?  That’s what Melissa does, while flying circles around her husband that is in freefall through the air.  Unbelievable stuff!

When Melissa said they were coming to Happy Camp, I invited them for a jet boat ride down into the Independence Canyon where we could provide Rex with his first really good gold prospecting experience.  They were excited about that, and so was I.  For me, the excitement was more about discovering how a close friend as a kid had grown up into an adult 15 years later.

After introductions over some local (great) pizza in Happy Camp, we drove down to Independence and launched my boat.  I took an immediate liking to Rex the moment I met him.  He has this unassuming, natural, friendly way about him, while also giving the impression that he is quite capable of doing his part, no matter how difficult the task. Melissa is the same straight-up, happy personality as I remembered her as a kid.  I was really happy to see that all the good stuff was still there.

This was going to be a first jet boat adventure on the Klamath River for Rex, so I made sure to pass through the more exciting (and risky) portions of several class-3 rapids on our voyage down into the canyon. I love boating just about as much as I like finding high-grade gold!  Let me say that a different way:  I live for boating!  Here is some video:

• Running the river in a jet boat!

We raced about a mile and a half down into the canyon until we reached “Dragon’s Tooth,”a class 4 rapid, which is really about a 10-foot drop in the river (waterfall) with big ugly teeth protruding out in the center that make it nearly impossible to traverse with anything but a rubber raft.  Even the rubber rafts sometimes don’t make it. Check this out!  I say “nearly impossible,” because I have been through Dragon’s Tooth with a jet boat several times.  Never again, though.  You take more risks when you are young and invincible!

Since we were not going to go further downriver, the three of us looked for a stretch of exposed bedrock on the far side of the river where we could dig out a crack in search of gold.  It didn’t take long to find one.  Shortly thereafter, Rex was busy prying rocks free while I was wishing we brought along a pry bar.  The rocks were jammed tight in the crack.  I might have given up on the location; but Rex’s enthusiasm paid off, and pretty soon we were screening material into a gold pan.

Rex kept digging while Melissa watched me pan the material down.  I fully expected to uncover a good showing of fines; but when I swished the material around in the bottom of the pan to see what we got, both Melissa and I lost our breaths as several sizable flakes of beautiful raw gold were uncovered.   It was one of those “too good to be true” moments.  Both Melissa and I looked at each other and burst out in laughter, fully enjoying that moment of excitement and the renewal of long-established friendship.  Rex had piled up another pan’s worth of material by the time we returned.  When we showed him the gold, he let out a yell of exhilaration!  Too bad the gold is not that rich everywhere we dig!

Melissa & Rex, Gold from just 4 pans of material out of a bedrock crack!

It took us the better part of an hour to clean out the bedrock crack.  The material was screened and panned.  I gave Rex a refresher panning lesson on the fourth and final pan.  He took right to it.

I have to say; in all my years of gold prospecting, there have not been many places that turned up that much flake-size gold in just four pans.  We were all feeling really good.  Me especially, because I wanted to treat Rex and Melissa to a good experience. Afterwards, we just relaxed there for a while enjoying the surroundings.  These canyons alongside the Klamath River are about as good as it gets in the Pacific Northwest.  An osprey flew over us screaming out its own success of the moment.  We could see that she had a fish in her claws, probably on its way to feed her babies in a nest high above the river.

That’s when Rex asked me why somebody had not already mined out the exposed bedrock on the far side of the river.  Almost none of the far side on K-24A or K-25 has been touched by modern prospectors.  I explained to Rex that it was too hard to get down the hill and across the river.  We were looking up at Highway 96 just across the river, maybe a hundred feet up a rather steep hillside. Still, we could see that there were visible narrow foot trails which deer and other animals had forged down to the river. Rex suggested that he could park his car up alongside the road, tie off a rope, throw it over the side, and work his way both down and back up to his car without much difficulty.  I agreed it would not be that hard to do. “What about a boat?” I asked.  He said he could lower a kayak or rubber raft down the side; “piece of cake!”

That’s what got me thinking more about the more remote mining properties we have in The New 49’ers.  We have several of these extensive canyons. It is a lot of effort to get into them if you don’t think you are going to find any gold.  But if you knew how much gold we were recovering out of that exposed bedrock, it would be rather easy to get over there!

I brought the subject up to Rich Krimm and John Rose on the following morning.  Those guys are always up for prospecting adventure.  We started coming up with ideas about lowering rubber rafts and even smaller aluminum boats (with prospecting gear tied inside) down the hillsides into the canyons.  I remember in the early days of The New 49’ers that we had some aggressive members who tied off a pulley on one vehicle. Then they ran a rope down to a small trailer in the canyon up through the pulley and used a second vehicle to pull the gear right up the hill.  It’s not as hard as it would first seem, as long as you know there is a golden prize on the far side of the river!  Rich said, “Heck, I have a portable, plastic kayak I can put on my back while I lower myself down the hillside, and I can be digging on the far side of the river within 30 minutes!”  I’m guessing it would be more like an hour.  But if I made a bet with Rich, he would surely win!

So I suggested we pull a prospecting team together and use one of the Club’s large rubber rafts to run the entire Independence Canyon on a day-trip and see what kind of gold we could find down there.  That was a heck of an idea!  We started organizing right away.  Rich and John lined up a bunch of our more experienced prospectors, adventure lovers and some of our most loyal Club supporters.

We did our first canyon float just a few days ago with Rich and John, Diane Helgesen, Robbie Collum, Connie Krimm, Steve Jones, Josh Collum and Derek Eimer. I went along to steer the boat.  Though I will admit that even though I tried my best, when you put 9 people in a big rubber raft, it pretty much goes where the Klamath River wants to take you!

• Rafting, top view

I believe this was just the first of many more trips to come.  One of my own objectives was to see how difficult this canyon is to travel by rubber raft. It’s not so bad, but life preservers are a must! I wanted to see how long it takes to float the 3+ miles. It’s maybe just two hours if you don’t stop to prospect or enjoy the surroundings. All of us wanted to see how good the prospecting is down there.  I can tell you that the prospecting is really good in some of the areas where we stopped.  The opportunities are so extensive that we could devote the rest of our lives down there and not prospect it all!

Since this is getting kind of long winded, I’ll allow the following video sequences and the story images to tell the rest of this story.  Let me just say that the ride through the canyon provides as much adventure as the gold prospecting.  One set of rapids after another keeps the adventure alive most of the way.  We had intended to video our drop through Dragon’s Tooth. But the ride was so dramatic, we completely forgot the camera! But we did capture some rapid-adventure further down into the canyon:

• Cruising down the river
• Deeper into the canyon
• You guys are animals
• Going down the rapids
• Straight down the middle!
• Reckless driving!

There are long stretches of exposed bedrock on both sides of the river, most which have never been touched by modern gold prospectors.  Some of these places are producing nice, larger flakes of shiny gold, and even some nuggets. I’ll bet we would find large nuggets if we devoted more time, especially to underwater prospecting.  Some places are producing hundreds of colors of fine gold in each pan.  All you have to do is dig out the cracks! Even the place where we stopped for lunch was producing gold right out of a crack alongside the wall where we were sitting.

• Let's sample at Ukonom Creek
• Rich Krimm's gold discovery
• Check out these samples!

All the adventure and gold aside, the part of the experience that impacted me the most on this trip was being surrounded by the wild remoteness of the outdoors once we got deep down into this canyon.  Steep walls tower up out of sight as the river takes you through a place where few people have gone before. The best I can describe my own experience is similar to the majestic and humbling feeling I have when I stand under a mature redwood tree, so large and old, having been alive for more than a thousand years.  This quiet, massive, hidden canyon has been keeping her secrets safe much longer then the oldest redwoods on this planet!  There is not only gold to be found down there.  You can rediscover parts of yourself and internal, almost-magical feelings in places like this that you forgot you even had.  It would be almost spiritual to spend a night or two down in that canyon; something to think about.  As we were floating through this wondrous place, just before we reached the final rapids that would speed us back to civilization; I was feeling so lucky that we have these gold-rich canyons available to us.  Interesting, after all these years, we have just gotten around to them!

• Deep down in the canyon

Legal Fund Drawing Winners

We performed the prize drawing from the most recent New 49’ers Legal Fund drawing at our July 5^th Saturday evening potluck in Happy Camp. The event was fully attended by a very lively bunch.

Myrna and Montine from our office had produced a ticket for every $10 contribution during the previous (approximate) 3 months, until 12 noon on the 5th. These were placed in an open container and mixed well. John Rose drew 25 tickets, one at a time. We started with the silver prizes, and then went to the gold. Here are the winners in the order they were drawn:

1-ounce Silver Eagles:  Timothy Ray McGarry; Francisco Rodriguez Jr.; Ernest Gajdusek; Timothy Ray McGarry; John Berrier Jr.; Tom Chambers; John Barrier Jr.; Ronald White; William Pettigrew & Gerald L. Sciscent

1/10th-ounce Gold Eagles:  Robert H. Franklin; Gary Wright; Tom Chambers; Dennis Henry; Edward Murphy; Craig Hall; Steve Kiesel; Douglas Hurt;  Roy Davis & Randol Thrasher

1/4-ounce American Gold Eagles:  Richard Grady; Gary Zenter; Edward R. Rosemark Jr. & Howard Hutto

1-ounce American Gold Eagle:  Randy Richards

Here is some video of the drawing event:

• Starting the drawing
• Finishing the drawing

Winners can make contact with Montine in our office at 530 493-2012.

I want to give a sincere thank you to everyone who has contributed to the New 49’ers Legal Fund during these past several months, and especially to the army of you who responded to our calls during this past week. You guys have never let us down! If it were not for you, we would not have the resources to fight for small-scale gold miners.

Next 25 drawing prizes will be made up from these 3 ounces of Dave Mack’s gold nuggets!

Even though we can write it off as a successful legal fundraiser, this one only produced 2/3 of the revenue that The Legal Fund normally brings in on similar legal fund-raisers.  I take this as a sign that maybe you guys are getting bored with gold and silver coins.  We all know that legal fund-raising is less about the prizes, than it is about generating resources to pay the very best specialists to defend small-scale miners against extremists who want us off the public lands. Having said that, we also know that valuable prizes create a fun and interesting incentive for you guys to participate. Therefore, the newest fund-raiser (already in progress) will be for 3 ounces of beautiful gold nuggets that I personally dredged off the bottom of the Klamath River.

Our office will automatically generate a ticket in your name for every $10 legal contribution we receive ($100 would generate 10 tickets, etc.).  Any contributions received after noon on July 5th will automatically generate tickets for the new drawing.

This drawing will take place at the close of business on 31 October 2014 (Halloween). You do not need to be a member of our organization to participate. You do not need to be present to win. There is no limit to the size or frequency of your contributions, or to the number of prizes you can win.

Legal contributions can be arranged by calling (530) 493-2012, by mailing to The New 49′ers Legal Fund, P.O. Box 47, Happy Camp, CA 96039, or online by clicking Here. 

California Legal Update 

Several other members and I accompanied our attorney on June 24^th & 25^th for 2 days of Mandatory Settlement Discussions in San Bernardino for the several ongoing cases in front of Superior Court Judge Ochoa. Before I get into this, I need to point out that the discussions were confidential, so I can only discuss this in general terms.

As an important part of this, in case you didn’t know, because of scheduling conflicts, oral arguments in Brandon Rinehart’s appeal to the Third Appellate District have been pushed back to September. In that case, we are petitioning the Court to decide that federal law prevents the State of California from prohibiting suction dredging on the public lands. We are arguing that the law is already well-decided on this issue. One of the State’s primary arguments is that they are only prohibiting suction dredging, and we are still allowed to use our gold pans. Our position is that our mining claims are only valid in the first place because we have made viable gold discoveries at the bottom of waterways which can only be reached through suction dredging. Preventing us from extracting the gold deposits we have discovered is basically a prohibition on the use of any effective method of mining that is available to us. As long as we get a fair hearing, and it appears as though we will, we are pretty confident that we will win the federal preemption case in the Third Appellate Court. The case law we are relying upon says that while the State has the authority to impose “reasonable regulations” upon us, they cannot prohibit mining altogether.

This brings up the subject of what constitutes “reasonable regulation” of suction dredging in California. While maybe everyone does not agree, many of us believe that the regulations we worked so hard for in 1994 were reasonable, except that the Department of Fish & Wildlife (DFW) decided afterward that the Special Permit process was no longer available to us.

Please allow me to put this in perspective: A statewide suction dredge permit scheme is good for our industry. Otherwise, each of us would need to submit separate dredge applications for each different place we want to work. The process of obtaining those permits could be quite lengthy, burdensome and expensive. For example, the previous judge that was presiding over most of this litigation was strongly suggesting that every single suction dredger should be required to do a full Environmental Impact Report (EIR), a requirement which would certainly have been the end of our industry.

Section 5653 of the DFW Code allows the Department to issue dredging permits if there is not going to be “harm” to fish. “Harm” in this respect means a deleterious impact upon an entire species of fish. Rather than require each individual dredger to complete an EIR, the State has developed a statewide EIR with regulations which allow limited suction dredging along numerous waterways at certain times of the year. Since the statewide approach requires DFW to make general assumptions concerning “harm,” the Department believes it must err on the side of caution. This in itself is not unreasonable. But in the exercise of caution, the regulations are sure to restrict or prohibit suction dredging in areas where, if looked at more closely, reasonable people could agree that some suction dredging could take place without endangering a species. This is where the Special Permit process came in during 1994 and before. Said another way, without a Special Permit process in place, suction dredging would be completely prohibited in all areas that are not allowed by the statewide regulations. We believe this would rise to a prohibition in some portions of the state which would likely be preempted by federal law. The recently-adopted 2012 statewide regulations do not allow for a Special Permit Process. This is just one thing (of many) that must be resolved.

You guys probably recall that Brandon Rinehart was cited several years ago for suction dredging without a permit. Our attorney, James Buchal, took Brandon’s case. More or less, our defense is that the state has over-reached its authority by first adopting Section 5653 of the DFW Code which prohibits people from operating suction dredges within California’s waterways without obtaining a permit, and then passing another law which prohibits the state from issuing any suction dredge permits. If Brandon wins this argument in the Third Appellate, it basically means that we can all resume suction dredging without much worry over being prosecuted for not having a permit. I suspect this would prompt the legislature to cancel its moratorium and order DFW to immediately begin issuing dredging permits in conformance with the recently-adopted 2012 suction dredge regulations.

While permits under the 2012 regulations would be an improvement over our existing situation, I believe everyone within the industry would agree that they are not even close to being “reasonable.” At the same time, anti-mining activists are arguing quite strenuously that the 2012 regulations are not restrictive enough. Therefore a big part of the active litigation in Judge Ochoa’s court is over the disagreement on what constitutes “reasonable regulation” of suction dredging in California.

I have read some recent comments made by others which are pushing the notion that Judge Ochoa’s Order for all the parties in the active litigation to participate in mandatory settlement discussions is a bad thing, especially since they will not be continued until September 4^th & 5th. That means we will not be dredging this season. The reason for the delay, as I understand it, is the very same scheduling conflicts that delayed Brandon’s case in the Third Appellate. It is basically the same group of attorneys in both cases. People take vacations during the summer months. Yes; I know that does not include suction dredgers. But, since we are not going to resolve this without the attorneys, it is a waste of time to make a big deal over things we cannot change. We are so late in the season already, under the new regulations, there was not going to be much time for anyone to get in the water this summer, anyway. Perhaps it is better that we dwell on the good side of this.

The good side? This is where others might disagree with my perspective. Civilized disagreement and debate amongst us is a good thing. We do this all the time within the industry. It increases all of our awareness on the issues we face and improves our ability to deal with the obstacles we must overcome. When I look back at how much better we are today at managing legal challenges than we were in the 1990’s, I am amazed we actually overcame the very strong push to eliminate suction dredging and came up with a set of regulations that supported our industry for 15 years. We were very divided in our views back in 1994. But we did manage to pull together a united front on the important matters that we had to deal with. I am confident we will do that again this time.

Now to my perspective: Since we expect that the Third Appellate is going to overturn the legislature’s moratorium on suction dredging perhaps sometime around the end of this year, the next big matter to resolve is what constitutes “reasonable regulation” of suction dredging in California. That matter is in front of Judge Ochoa. I believe this is one of the main reasons he has ordered Mandatory Settlement discussions. The beginning of the process this past month involved all the parties and attorneys communicating our views and concerns to the judge on a personal basis. I believe the judge was trying to discover how far apart we are and assess the likelihood that he can bring us together in a negotiated settlement that everyone can live with. I believe he now has a good understanding of the issues we must resolve. Before we closed on the second day, he asked for a list of issues that each party would like to see changed in the 2012 regulations. After reviewing these with all the attorneys, he still had enough confidence to schedule two more days of settlement discussions in early September.

I know some people don’t like this settlement idea. But we should consider the alternative, which is to litigate each and every one of the issues that we do or don’t like, and that anti-mining activists don’t like – all in front of the very same judge. This would involve tens of thousands of pages of reports and comments, expert witness testimony from all sides, all which could take years of hearings, not to mention the costs. This is because many of the issues are scientific and complex. All of this, only to have Judge Ochoa make the final determination in the end, anyway.

Therefore, I see his offer to try and resolve the issues through settlement discussions as an opportunity to shortcut a very timely and expensive process.

The 1994 regulations were not the result of litigation. They were the result of all the parties coming together in discussions, with a very capable negotiator finding the balance that we could all live with. That was not an easy thing to do! My initial impression of Judge Ochoa is that we are very lucky to have him there. I’m sure he is going to give everyone’s view a fair hearing. That is a lot more than we have received since we were shut down in 2009. It is a lot more that we might expect in today’s world.

Therefore, I am suggesting that we should not be too quick to decide mandatory settlement discussions are a bad thing. Without them, even if Brandon wins, we are likely to be stuck with the 2012 regulations until they are fully litigated, which could end us up in the very same place as a settlement degree before the start of next season.

• Make a Legal Contribution

2014 Annual Dues will be Billed in August

We bill $50 for annual dues to all Full Members in August. This is because most of the costs, especially property taxes, that are associated with maintaining our extensive mining properties come due before September.  The Bureau of Land Management in recent years has substantially increased annual filing fees to hold mining properties. We thank you in advance for your support on this! 

Part Time Help Needed in our Office 

We are in need of a part time person in our administrative office (in Happy Camp, California). We need a person that has some background in accounting, particularly on maintaining an electronic balance sheet.  We are using Microsoft Excel.  Part time positions in our office normally evolve into full time positions if the person is interested.  We would prefer to fill the position before the end of this summer if possible.  Anyone interested can please initially contact Montine at 530 493-2012. 

Caretaker Needed

We are in need of a caretaker (night security presence on our office property) who would like to plug in on the back corner of our building in Happy Camp in exchange for free electric, water & sewer connections. The person must have an RV (not much more than 30 feet). There are some minor duties involved. While we can be flexible, we prefer no pets.  We are looking for someone who is not into the after-hours party life. We would prefer to find someone for this position before the end of the summer, who will commit for the upcoming winter months.  Anyone interested can please initially contact Montine at 530 493-2012.

Join Us for our Remaining Weekend Group Mining Projects!

There is a learning curve to successful gold prospecting.  One of the most effective methods of progressing through the learning curve is to go on prospecting adventures with others who more experienced than you are.

Our 2-day Group Mining Projects are one of the primary benefits of New 49’er membership which set us apart from other mining associations.

The remaining weekend events for the coming 2014 season are scheduled for August 2 & 3 and August 23 & 24. These events are free to all members.  We appreciate it if you contact our office in advance to let you know that you will attend: 530 493-2012.

• Schedule of Events

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We strongly encourage you to sign up for the free on line version of this newsletter.  The Internet version is better. This is because you can immediately click directly to many of the subjects which we discuss; because the on line version is in full color; because we link you directly to locations through GPS and Google Earth technology; and because you can watch the free video segments which we incorporate into our stories.  Actually, the video segments show the adventures better than I can write them!

Signing up also places you on our Political Action Team.  Things happen so fast these days; it takes too long to organize political action through the U.S. mail.  As an example, just a few years ago, in concert with other mining organizations, our Internet Action Team killed anti-mining legislation in Oregon in less than a week.  All of these future battles will be organized over the Internet since it is so much faster.  Please join us in the battle to maintain our remaining freedoms!

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The New 49’ers Prospecting Association, 27 Davis Road, Happy Camp, California 96039 (530) 493-2012  www.goldgold.com

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SECOND  QUARTER, JUNE 2014                               VOLUME 28, NUMBER 6

Newsletter By Dave McCracken General Manager

We have been on the lookout for a new place to do our Weekend Group Mining Projects for quite some time.  This is because we have done every Weekend Project on the upper bar of our Mega Hole property at K-15A for the past five years.  That amounts to 35 separate projects in just one area, even though we have 80+ miles of good mining property to choose from (It used to be 60 miles, but we have grown).  We kept returning there because the Mega Hole property always produces gold for our projects.

We used boats a lot during our earlier years when there were not so many people on the projects.  The truth is, with an occasional exception, the better gold deposits are always richer in the places that are more difficult to get to; especially those places that are just out of reach.  This is the nature of gold, and is one of the reasons it is so valuable.

The upper gravel bar at the Mega Hole is still producing gold.  All you have to do is dig in the remaining undisturbed areas and the gold will immediately start adding up.  Our Weekend Project team leaders and I are just tired of going back to the same place over and over, again.

So a few weeks ago, Rich Krimm and John Rose, two of our Project team leaders, and I found ourselves looking at the extensive gravel bar on our new Elliot Bar property at K-25AB.  We already know that the bar on the Highway-96 side of the river pays very well in the surface deposits alongside the river.  The problem is that the existing trail down to the gold deposit is perhaps a little too difficult for some members that might arrive for a Weekend Group Project.  We were expecting more than 70 participants on the first project of our season.

As a second alternative, we made plans to organize a small group of experienced members to meet up and make use of my jet boat to do some sampling on the far side of the river on our new A & D # 3 property at K-23AA.  This is the property where a bunch of members did quite well last season, both in and out of the river.  These numbers, by the way, identify each of our many properties on a published Claims Guide along with maps.

Several days later, the day before Memorial Day, I found myself launching the jet boat with longtime supportive members, Rich Krimm, John Rose, Derek Eimer, Steve Jones, Sean Hart and Steve Kleszyk.  Our initial target was the sizable gravel bar on the far side of the river at the top end of A & D #3.  We chose this place because quite a lot of members have been doing well on the far side of the river about a half-mile downstream. John said a small family were prospecting on this upper bar last season. They told John they were pleased with the gold they were recovering. There is a pretty good trail going down to the river from the Highway 96 side of the river directly across from the gravel bar.  There is also a huge pull-off for plenty of parking and camping.  This place is nine miles downriver from Happy Camp.

Once our prospecting team arrived across the river with the jet boat, we scattered across the gravel bar and started sampling.  Initial results were rather poor. Rich and I found a place where some rocks were tightly wedged together just above where we could see some exposed bedrock. We were wishing we brought a pry bar along.  Our progress was moving along slowly. The results in our gold pans were not getting better as we dug deeper, which is also often the case when we are beginning from scratch in a new location.

We had been out there for perhaps thirty or forty minutes when John came over with a pan with maybe 15 or 20 gold colors in it.  It was a good pan. It was a heck of a lot better than what the rest of us were finding. I felt this huge sigh of relief as soon as I saw the gold.  The first moment of an important gold discovery always takes my wind away just for a moment. This is the moment of magical alchemy, when something of little value is suddenly turned into raw wealth.  There are not very many other experiences in life that are so exhilarating. Derek followed just a few minutes later with about twice as much gold from a single pan.  Eureka!

The rest of us immediately gathered up our prospecting gear and followed Derek and John to where they dug their samples.

It does not take very much gold in a sample pan to signal an important discovery.  This is because the volume of material processed in the sample is very small. We then follow up with more tests to establish exactly where the gold is coming from. Further testing is done along the trail that leads to the richest material.  Then the amount of gold in a single pan, or perhaps even a 5-gallon bucket, needs to be related to how much volume of material we can process once we get into production.

• Initial strike with Derek

There are a few important lessons here that are worth pointing out:  The first is that your chances of making a good gold discovery in a new place are vastly improved when you go out with a group.  If Rich and I went out there alone, we may never have made the strike.  Perhaps the most important lesson is to keep your ears and eyes open all the time when you belong to an active mining association like The New 49’ers.  The reason Derek and John were sampling in that place was because they had watched where the family was mining last season.  Once the rest of us got over there, we could see where the earlier prospectors had been scraping bedrock. John and Derek had just picked up where they left off, and that’s all it took.

More than 100 colors from a single pan out of Rich’s vack machine

The location of the strike is in a transition between the lower gravel bar alongside the river and an elevated older gravel bar from some earlier time.  The transition is mostly exposed bedrock with a thin layer of sand on top.  The sand is loaded with fine gold, sometimes 100 colors or more to the pan.  The bedrock is made up of decomposing shale which is very easy to break apart with a hand-pick (garden tool). Gold is also packed down into the shale about as far as you care to dig.  The bunch of us spread out across several hundred feet of the bedrock transition, and our sample results were about the same wherever we dug the material.  Talking about easy; all we had to do was dig a thin layer of sand and clean up the bedrock underneath. Every pan was producing a handsome showing of gold.  We had arrived on the bar about an hour and a half earlier, and we had discovered a new place to do our Weekend Group Projects!  Here is some video that captured the moment:

• We got ourselves a brand new strike!

It is challenging to separate fine gold from volume-amounts of sand, difficult to accomplish with a normal high-banker.  Ultimately, we pulled together three Le Trap fine gold recovery sluices and connected them to a single water pump down alongside the river.  We normally use these Le Traps to concentrate the material from our high-banking and suction dredge recovery systems at the end of the day.  They are very effective, but a bit slow to keep up with volume amounts of material. Derek also offered up his new Gold Well recovery system, which, I believe, is the most exciting gold processing system on the market at this time.

Then we pulled one of The New 49’er Colorado River rafts out of storage and pumped it up.  We did not expect it to hold air. This was because we have not used the big rafts for about 6 years.   But the quite sizable boat blew up like it was brand new!  Then we added in the floor boards and pulled out the outboard engine.  The outboard had been worked over just a few years ago. Once we got it started and ran it awhile, it sang like a well-oiled machine.  Later that day, our whole prospecting team and some more members loaded everything up and hauled it down to A & D #3.  That Colorado River Raft is so tough; we just slid it down the hillside and into the water.

Gold recovered from a single bucket of pay-dirt

A few hours later, we had all the recovery gear set up on the far side of the river.  John Rose wanted to do a small production run just to be sure everything was going to work when we arrived with an army of 70+ people.  It is always better to be safe than sorry!  We dug up a bucket of the sandy pay-dirt, directed it through an 8-mesh screen, and ran it across one of the Le Traps.  The amount of gold we recovered gave us solid confirmation that we had made a fantastic gold discovery. Here is some video:

• Not bad for a bucket

There were 78 members signed up for the project on Saturday morning. This was an enthusiastic, friendly bunch.  We met over at the Happy Camp Grange Hall where I introduced our team leaders who would help manage the project. We are so lucky to have a bunch of experienced members that enjoy helping with these Group Projects!

I then provided the group with my talk on how to pursue a sampling program.

Once we all arrived out on A & D #3 on Saturday afternoon, it took less than 30 minutes for us to get everyone across the river in the raft.  Our team leaders and I had preplanned how we would get everyone into and out of life jackets with no lost time, and also how we would launch and recover the raft on both sides of the river.  All that went off without a hitch. Here is some video that captured the action:

• Getting across in the boat
• A good boat crew is the key
• Motorized raft is the way to go!

Since we had already made the gold strike, the only real objective for my team on Saturday afternoon was to teach beginners how to pan for gold.  We consider that as one of our most important responsibilities.  This is because the whole sampling process comes back to effective panning skills.  If you cannot pan, you cannot sample.  If you cannot sample, the only way you are going to find high-grade gold is if someone else gives it to you!

At least 2 nice nuggets were panned on Saturday afternoon!

We do a New 49’er potluck every Saturday evening during the summer months.  This meant we needed to get all these people back across the river so they would have time to freshen up for the evening event.  Once the beginners were all lined out, me and my team mates were eager to start transferring people back across the river.  But they didn’t want to go!  There was so much fine gold in their pan samples, just about all of them kept saying, “just one more pan.” We literally had to peel the last of them off the gravel bar late Saturday afternoon.  Truthfully, I was worried some of them were going to hide over there so they could continue mining. There was no other way back across the river unless they wanted to swim.  Gold does have that effect on people!

It was a full house at potluck on Saturday evening.  The enthusiasm and excitement was so noisy, it was challenging for me to get the meal started!  After a bunch of great food, we had a short meeting, did our weekly prize drawing, and let everyone go home earlier than normal. This is because we were planning to meet out on A & D #3 at 6:30 the following morning.  We have found over the years that it is better to start early on Sunday so we can get most of the physical work done before the heat of the day sets in.  The whole objective on Sunday is to come together in a well-organized team to process as much pay-dirt as we can.

By the time I finished ferrying everyone across in the boat, our team leaders had already positioned everybody into a well-organized production crew.  Did you ever see the war footage of the American D-Day invasion?  That’s what this reminded me of! This bunch was charging ahead to fill buckets with pay-dirt as fast as they could. There were people picking, digging, screening, vacking, carrying buckets, and feeding the recovery systems.  The noise out there was almost deafening!  The following video sequences captured the different parts of our production program:

• The parking lot looked like Woodstock!
• Here we are mining with 70+ members…
• The bedrock & sand is laced full of fine gold!
• Processing the fines through Le Trap sluices
• The Gold Well recovers all the gold

I had left word up in the parking lot that I would return with the boat after a while for any stragglers.  Thirty minutes or so later, I was stunned by a very directed shout from across the river. Sure enough, there were enough people over there for another boat load.  It was lucky someone over there had a strong voice.  By then, I was so involved with all the productive activity that I might never have remembered about stragglers!

• Emily & I are loving this!

It is a good thing we brought Derek’s Gold Well recovery system to support this project.  The easy digging in the sand and shale, along with the very substantial energy of this group, was producing screened pay-dirt several times faster than the three Le Traps could process the gold out of it.  If you try to process sand too fast, you will overload the recovery system, and the gold will just wash out with the tailings.   This crew was doing it just right.  Excess pay-dirt was being directed to Derek’s crew on the Gold Well.  And even the Gold Well could not keep up.  That’s what happens when you have 70 people filling up buckets as fast as they can!

Derek’s team operating the Gold Well

• Halftime clean-up!
• Look at the fines!
• Look at all that gold!

Mid-day clean-up!

We cleaned up the Gold Well and one of the Le Traps at about mid-day, just to see how we were doing – and the amount of gold was even shocking to me!  This bunch was so jacked up; at least half of them did not even stop digging to take a look at the gold!  The buckets just kept coming and coming.  Pretty soon, we were filling extra wash tubs because we were running out of buckets!

We stopped the digging at around 11 AM.  This was because we had already dug more pay-dirt than we would have time to process.  The crew went around and filled the few holes we had dug.  There were not many.  This gold discovery is mostly resting on exposed, decomposed bedrock. In most places, after you scrape it off, you are left with clean bedrock and no hole to fill in!  Eventually, we were all down watching the recovery systems struggle with more material than we could feed even if we stayed out there for another hour or two.

Get this: In nearly 30 years of doing these Weekend Group Mining Projects, this is the first time the digging crew ever supplied more pay-dirt than we had time to process!  So I called a meeting to order out there on the gravel bar and made a motion that we split up the remaining pay-dirt into buckets and allow everyone who wanted a share to take it across the river to process at home.   The motion was passed unanimously, and at least 30 buckets of pay-dirt were carried off towards the raft without any delay.  The material disappeared so fast, it was as if it were never there!

We met back at the Grange Hall at about 1:30 on Sunday afternoon, and all worked together to complete the final gold separation. Then we split the gold.  It was the most fine gold I have ever seen on one of these projects.   There were 10 small gold nuggets.  In the end, we split off a half-ounce of gold between 70 participants.  There were lots of smiling faces.  That’s the part I like the most.

Legal Update: Federal Preemption Decision Coming Soon! 

As many of you are aware, our legal specialists have brought a federal preemption challenge in front of the Superior Court of San Bernardino. We also have a similar challenge in front of the Third Appellate District of California.  We are arguing that the Supreme Court has already decided that the State does not possess the jurisdictional authority to prohibit suction dredge mining on the public lands, which is exactly what they have done with the existing Moratorium in California.

All of the briefs have been filed with the Third Appellate District, and they have just scheduled this 28 July for oral arguments concerning the Eighth Circuit’s Decision on federal preemption. This development is a hopeful sign that we are going to get the hearing we have been asking for on this very important matter. Here is how the Eighth Circuit weighed in. And here is a short update memo from our attorney.

If we win this important challenge, we suspect the Appellate District will instruct the State of California that they cannot cite prospectors for using suction dredges unless the activity violates reasonable and lawfully-issued permit regulations.

Meanwhile, in a completely separate case, we are making similar arguments challenging the existing Moratorium in front of the Superior Court of San Bernardino.  If we win that motion, we anticipate that the judge may order the State of California to immediately resume issuing suction dredge permits.  During a motion hearing last month, the judge Ordered that we attempt to settle all of the mining-related issues in front of him on June 24^th before he issues a Decision concerning federal preemption.   Here is a short memo from our attorney which provides further explanation.
I will personally attend the mandatory settlement discussions alongside our attorney in San Bernardino in just a few weeks. Cross your fingers that this will lead to the judge deciding for us on the federal preemption motion.

Please take note that we only have 3 more weeks remaining in The New 49’er Legal Fund active fund-raiser.  We will be giving away 25 gold and silver coins  during our weekly potluck in Happy Camp on July 5^th.  To date, the Legal Fund has only brought in $2,124 in contributions to support this fundraiser. That’s only somewhere around half the value of the gold and silver prizes that will be given away. Ouch! This will be the last newsletter we send out before the drawing. So I am I encouraging you to send in some contributions. This is how we generate the necessary funds to pay for legal support.

Thanks for all your support, you guys. I know you will all do your best. The fight would have been lost a long time ago if it were not for you!

• Make a Legal Contribution

Join Us This Season on Our Weekend Group Mining Projects!

There is a learning curve to successful gold prospecting.  One of the most effective methods of progressing through the learning curve is to go on prospecting adventures with others who more experienced than you are.

Our 2-day Group Mining Projects are one of the primary benefits of New 49’er membership which set us apart from other mining associations.

The remaining weekend events for the coming 2014 season are scheduled for June 21 & 22; July 12 & 13; August 2 & 3; August 23 & 24. These events are free to all members.  We appreciate it if you contact our office in advance to let you know that you will attend: 530 493-2012.

• Schedule of Events

We have free long term (dry) campgrounds available to participants who prefer to enjoy the complete outdoor experience.  There are also private RV and other lodging options in and around Happy Camp for those of you who prefer more accommodations.  The staff in our office will go out of their way to help you with your individual needs. Montine specializes in helping you guys get the most enjoyment from your visits to Happy Camp. Here are our contact details. 

What We Can Do on Our Properties in California 

Members have been calling in wanting to know what we can and cannot do these days for prospecting activity on our extensive property holdings in Siskiyou County.  While I do not have a license to provide legal advice, I will follow with my own understanding of the current state of affairs.

1) We all know that suction dredging in the active waterways is closed until we overcome the existing moratorium in California.  As explained above, this is presently being challenged in two separate legal proceedings. It is possible that either of these two challenges could be decided in our favor during the 2014 season.

2) Surface mining (high-banking) is still alright.You can do that on your own, or you can join in on our Weekend Group Mining Projects.

3)      The State of California has adopted modified regulations which now define “suction dredging” as using any type of motorized vacuum or suction to excavate material off the bottom of a waterway.  Therefore, the underwater suction gravel transfer systems we used last season will no longer be allowed until we overcome the suction dredge moratorium.

4) There is no problem with booming (motorized suction mining) 100 yards or more from the active waterway.  There is also a way to boom using blowing methods (see below) which should not be affected by the 100 yard rule.

Please note that all surface mining activities on New 49’er properties are governed by our internal set of Surface Mining Guidelines.

5)  Underwater crevicing is what most active members were doing within the waterways at the end of last season. Some were using the hookah and pump from their 5 and 6 HP motors on floating platforms to provide air for breathing and a jet of water to help blow material out of the way. Our attorney agrees this cannot be classed as “suction dredging” under California’s expanded definition.

Sign up for the Free Internet Version of this Newsletter

We strongly encourage you to sign up for the free on line version of this newsletter.  The Internet version is better. This is because you can immediately click directly to many of the subjects which we discuss; because the on line version is in full color; because we link you directly to locations through GPS and Google Earth technology; and because you can watch the free video segments which we incorporate into our stories.  Actually, the video segments show the adventures better than I can write them!

Signing up also places you on our Political Action Team.  Things happen so fast these days; it takes too long to organize political action through the U.S. mail.  As an example, just a few years ago, in concert with other mining organizations, our Internet Action Team killed anti-mining legislation in Oregon in less than a week.  All of these future battles will be organized over the Internet since it is so much faster.  Please join us in the battle to maintain our remaining freedoms!

• Sign up for our Free Internet Newsletter!

The New 49’ers Prospecting Association, 27 Davis Road, Happy Camp, California 96039 (530) 493-2012  www.goldgold.com

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SECOND  QUARTER, APRIL 2014                               VOLUME 28, NUMBER 4

Newsletter By Dave McCracken General Manager

Story by Lori Meyer & Debra Thewes

Before we came to Happy Camp, we looked all over the Internet hoping to find an affordable gold claim where we could prospect.  This is when we stumbled across the New 49er website, which we found to be such a wealth of valuable information and colorful adventure. After watching the videos and reading about the Club, we decided to join and we are so glad that we did.  We have made friends that we now consider our family, and we have had so much fun hunting for gold out on the Klamath River.  We now spend several months a year in Happy Camp.  The 2013 season was our best ever. We even found a gold nugget weighing just over 1/5th of an ounce! Boy was that exciting!  We actually discovered the nugget on bedrock under only 8 inches of sand. This was just a mile from town!  In fact, all the nuggets we have found were just a short distance from Happy Camp.

When we joined, all we wanted to do was find gold. We had absolutely no prior experience. But with over 60 miles of mining property available to us, it was like a smorgasbord of opportunity! On our first day, Montine (she is Customer Relations in the New 49’er office) took the time to tell us everything we needed to know to get started. She was so helpful!  We met our friend, Rip Ripple, on our first day, too.  Rip took us to his personal dig and showed us exactly how he was finding gold. Boy was he finding some nice stuff! We have watched Rip and other experienced members do the very same thing for many other beginners.  But that’s what you can expect with the New 49ers, “miners helping miners.”  So we bought a vack mining machine, some gold pans, a highbanker, and some digging tools; and we headed out onto the claims to dig for gold – and yes, we found gold.

The first weekend we were there, we attended one of the weekend outings at the Mega Hole and learned so much. We also got to meet some awesome people.  Dave Mack is such an amazing guy.  You can tell right off that he really cares about his New 49’er members. 

Being members of the New 49’ers has been life-changing for us.  Gold mining has become a passion. This is not only because of gold. It is also becoming friends with so many interesting people. The Klamath River is one of the crown jewels of the Pacific Northwest. The place is breathtaking!  The New 49ers program has provided us the opportunity to not only find gold, but also to make great friends and experience the outdoors like never before.  With so many mining properties, we get to choose where we want to prospect and there are simply unlimited opportunities to find gold.

So many of our friends have asked us “Did you find gold?” and we always tell them that we do!  Then they ask, “Did you get rich?” and we always answer that we have gotten rich in so many wonderful ways.  Then they want to know if we have gotten wealthy with gold, and we answer that we have found more gold than we expected, so far – but we are not finished, yet!  The New 49’er program has been, without a doubt, the most exciting outdoor adventure we have ever experienced in our lives.  We are living the dream!

When we joined, we had no idea that our lives would change in so many wonderful and profound ways. Now we can’t wait to get back to the Klamath and our friends, and the great outdoor adventure that waits for us.  Watch for us out there.  We are the Jersey Girls!

This is Going to be a Low Water Year! 

By Rich Krimm, Director of Internal Affairs

The Klamath River and its tributaries are presently experiencing historic lows for both current flow, and gauge height.  Today (April 6) at the Seiad Valley station along the Klamath River, the current is flowing at 2,350 cubic feet per second, which is more than  3,000 cubic feet per second lower than the average for this time of the year.  The gauge height is 3.54 feet and that is about three feet lower than where it should be.

We are expecting a few days of extremely warm spring weather (80 degrees plus) that will cause the insignificant amount of snow in the area to melt and possibly cause the river to rise slightly only for a short period of time.

I made the trip from the Scott River down to our lower claims at Elliot Bar, a distance of almost fifty miles, and conditions looked similar to the low water we were experiencing last year in early July.  If these conditions persist, then more locations along the river and creeks will be exposing bedrock areas that are traditionally underwater year round.  Access to submerged areas along the side of the rivers and creeks will also improve.

Several of my neighbors, who I will describe their age as being life-long residents and senior citizens, have told me they have not seen conditions like this in all the years they have lived on the river.

We already have more members arriving in Happy Camp than normal for this time of year. Looking into this coming season, I can already see and hear the Vack machines running as the newly exposed material in bedrock cracks and crevices are drying out. So they can hopefully take advantage of the low water conditions, I know that at least several members are putting together blow-mining gear to help facilitate the underwater crevicing activity which Dave Mack described in our March newsletter. This is lining up to be a very productive season along the Klamath and its tributaries! 

Join Us This Season on Our Weekend Group Mining Projects! 

Our 2-day Group Mining Projects are one of the primary benefits of New 49’er membership which set us apart from other mining associations.  We started them during our second season in 1987 with the purpose of helping members to learn how to successfully prospect for gold on their own.  Long since then, the weekend projects have evolved into fun events that many members attend just for the adventure and shared camaraderie with other members.

There is a learning curve to successful gold prospecting.  One of the most effective methods of progressing through the learning curve is to go on prospecting trips with others who are further along on the curve than you are.   We are fortunate in The New 49’ers that we have a bunch of experienced members who take pleasure in going out and helping on the weekend projects.

The weekend events for the coming 2014 season are scheduled for May 31 & June 1; June 21 & 22; July 12 & 13; August 2 & 3; August 23 & 24. These events are free to all members.  We appreciate it if you contact our office in advance to let you know that you will attend: 530 493-2012.

Schedule of Events

The events begin with a few hours of theory, normally presented by me, on Saturday morning at the local Grange Hall in Happy Camp.  After lunch, we all go out on one of our more productive properties and put the theory to practice.  Our mission on Saturday afternoon is to make sure everyone knows how to sample for gold deposits with the use of a gold pan.  We also need to find one or two gold deposits to work on the following day.  All the gold that you recover on Saturday is yours to keep.

If you are not too tired, we encourage everyone to attend our Saturday evening potluck at the Grange Hall.  This is a relaxed, somewhat-informal social affair where we all share some great food and camaraderie.  We take the opportunity to pass on any important information, and we end the evening with a prize drawing.

We normally start early on Sunday morning so that we can get off the gravel bar before the heat of the day sets in.  Sunday is where we pull everyone together into a cooperative production program, devoting three or four hours to processing as much pay-dirt as possible through a few portable gold recovery machines.  Rich Krimm normally heads this part up with the help of several other experienced members.  Everyone is organized into activity which fits their physical capabilities.  Even most disabled participants can contribute in some meaningful way.  Sunday is an exercise in teamwork where we try to recover as much gold as we can.  Having said that, we also caution everyone to not push beyond your personal limit.  We are also trying to keep the project as fun as possible for everyone.

Once we feel we have processed enough pay-dirt, we fill in the excavations that we made out on the gravel bar, put our gear away, and do some initial gravity concentration of the material that has accumulated in our gold recovery machines.  Then we allow everybody a break to get refreshed, and meet back at the Grange Hall for final separation of the gold.  Everyone is invited to watch and participate in the final steps. Usually, sometime before 4 or 5 PM on Sunday afternoon, we have split up the gold evenly amongst everyone who actively participated on Sunday. Even children receive a share if they worked.  Sometimes the kids out-work the adults!

These weekend events cover the fundamentals of successful gold prospecting from A-to-Z. If you are paying attention and stay involved, even a raw beginner will have a substantial grasp of the important fundamentals by the time a project is over on Sunday afternoon.  As far as I know, we are the only outfit in the world that is providing this service.  Most prospectors have to go out and learn through the school of hard knocks.  Our weekend projects shorten the process by a large margin.

Most of these images were captured during our August 3 & 4 event last season. To get a better idea of what we do on these projects, and how much fun we have, I encourage you to read the video-enhanced story we published in our October newsletter about our final weekend event of 2013. Even though it was raining that day, which almost never happens in August, everybody participated with enthusiasm and we recovered a bunch of gold. Better yet, here are some more video sequences that we did not publish in the story:

• Three or four pieces of gold to the pan
• Rainy day
• Operating the high-banker
• Getting a lot of gold!
• Say hi to the world

We have free long term (dry) campgrounds available to participants who prefer to enjoy the complete outdoor experience.  There are also private RV and other lodging options in and around Happy Camp for those who prefer more accommodations.  The staff in our office will go out of their way to help you with your individual needs, for example, if you are flying in from some longer distance away or even from another country.  Montine specializes in helping people get the most enjoyment from their visits to Happy Camp. Here are our contact details. On that note, if you prefer private accommodations, I suggest you don’t wait until the last minute.  Sometimes they fill up! 

What We Can Do on Our Properties in California 

Members have been calling in wanting to know what we can and cannot do these days for prospecting activity on our extensive property holdings in Siskiyou County.  While I do not have a license to provide legal advice, I will follow with my own understanding of the current state of affairs.

1)      We all know that suction dredging in the active waterways is closed until we overcome the existing moratorium in California.  This is presently being challenged in two separate legal proceedings.  Let’s just keep our fingers crossed on this turning out in our favor. On that note, The New 49’er Legal Fund is giving away 25 gold and silver coins in our ongoing legal fund raiser.

2)       Surface mining (high-banking) is still alright. You can do that on your own, or you can join in on our Weekend Group Mining Projects.

3)      The State of California has adopted modified regulations which now define “suction dredging” as using any type of motorized vacuum or suction to excavate material off the bottom of a waterway.  Therefore, the underwater suction gravel transfer systems we used last season will no longer be allowed until we overcome the suction dredge moratorium.

4) There is no problem with booming (motorized suction mining) 100 yards from the active waterway.  There is also a way to boom using blowing methods (see below) that should not be affected by the 100 yard rule.

Please note that all surface mining activities on New 49’er properties are governed by our internal set of Surface Mining Guidelines which are available from the office.

5)  Underwater crevicing is what most active members were doing within the waterways at the end of last season, using the hookah and pump from their 5 and 6 HP motors on floating platforms to provide air for breathing and a jet of water to help move material out of the way. Most of our March newsletter focused upon this new method of moving material around by blowing, rather than sucking. Our attorney agrees this cannot be classed as “suction dredging” under the expanded definition.

Sign up for the Free Internet Version of this Newsletter

We strongly encourage you to sign up for the free on line version of this newsletter.  The Internet version is better. This is because you can immediately click directly to many of the subjects which we discuss; because the on line version is in full color; because we link you directly to locations through GPS and Google Earth technology; and because you can watch the free video segments which we incorporate into our stories.

Signing up also places you on our Political Action Team.  Things happen so fast these days; it takes too long to organize political action through the U.S. mail.  As an example, just two years ago, in concert with other mining organizations, our Internet Action Team killed anti-mining legislation in Oregon in less than a week.  All of these future battles will be organized over the Internet since it is so much faster.  Please join us in the battle to maintain our remaining freedoms!

Sign up for our Free Internet Newsletter! 

The New 49’ers Prospecting Association, 27 Davis Road, Happy Camp, California 96039 (530) 493-2012  www.goldgold.com

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FIRST  QUARTER, MARCH 2014                               VOLUME 28, NUMBER 3

Newsletter By Dave McCracken General Manager

Story, video and images by Alan Mash & John Rose

Early March is a heck of a time to do underwater mining.  The water is cold, and on this particular day, the creek was running higher and faster than normal because of a rain storm just a few days before.

I wanted to experiment with this new method of underwater blow mining in California before the warmer weather gets started. So I decided to visit Happy Camp to try it out on the New 49er South Fork of Indian Creek property. This is a place which is well known for producing nice gold nuggets.  I once recovered quite a large gold nugget using a metal detector along the bank of the stream on this property.  Bedrock is very close to the surface in most places.  So you don’t have to work that hard to get down to the cracks where gold can be found.  I was doing quite well there using a suction dredge several years ago.

Before going down, I lined up Steve Jones and John Rose to come on out and join me for an adventure.  Those guys are always ready to go!  Several other New 49’er members also came along.  Since I have the most experience doing underwater video, Steve jumped right in there with the nozzle and did a lot of the mining work.  This is Steve’s second winter supporting himself from the gold that he mines along the Klamath River.  He’s a hardy guy!

Using the blow mining method is the same thing as using a blaster nozzle on a suction dredge to cut through and break up hard-packed layers and bedrock that a dredge nozzle won’t take apart.  But in this case, we were mainly using the blow nozzle to help move material out of the way and help us get down to the bedrock cracks faster.  Really, this is just a step further than raking and fanning material out of the way with your hands.

Steve and John suggested we could take the process one step further and blow the material into a second blowing device with a hopper that can be used to direct material through a hose to a sluice box (see next section below). But since South Fork mostly has bigger gold, we decided to just use the primary blower nozzle to see what we might find by uncovering some cracks on the edge of the creek.

We were using a 6.5 HP motor, mostly running on idle, with a standard mining pump and hookah compressor to supply underwater breathing air.  You could also use a normal trash pump for underwater blow mining in shallow water. It’s pretty easy to adapt some ABS or PVC fittings to a pressure hose coming off the pump. Any motor that otherwise might be used to power a dredge or high-banker can be easily adapted to this kind of mining. My own dredge uses a Keene 1-inch high pressure hose going to a blaster nozzle tip. That provides plenty of power to push material around underwater!

John captured this video afterwards, while we explained what we were doing:

• Mining in March!

The gravel and overburden on the edge of the creek was only about a foot thick when we started. Sometimes it takes more effort to strap on divers weights when working in shallow water. We decided to tough it out without them. John explained what we were doing in the following video sequences:

• Explaining Blow Mining
• Not wearing any weights

A larger 1 ½-inch blaster hose and nozzle was connected to the pump which certainly would have moved the overburden off faster.  But since that would have made the underwater filming more difficult to capture, and there was only about a foot of material to move out of the way, we decided to just use a garden hose without the blaster nozzle tip at first to help move most of the top material off. Once we got down to bedrock, we attached the narrower-tipped blaster nozzle to help take apart decomposed bedrock. We were hoping to find some gold underneath.  Here is some of the underwater action:

• Moving Gravels and Getting Down to Bedrock

We were all pleasantly surprised to discover that it is quite easy using this method of underwater blowing to gain access to shallow gold deposits.  By this, I mean shallow material.  You can use this method in deeper water with the use of hookah gear.  I’m looking forward to using this method along the banks of the extensive new mining properties The New 49’ers have acquired downstream of Happy Camp during the past few months.  I’m sure those areas have not been mined during the modern age!

Shortly after reaching bedrock, we found a beautiful Indian Creek nugget stuck in a crack in the bedrock. I’m pretty sure I saw the nugget first because I was upstream with the camera from the slight cloud Steve was stirring up with the nozzle.  For just a moment, I thought Steve was going to blow the nugget away!  But, of course, gold is too heavy for that.  Fortunately, I had the video camera on at the moment of discovery:

• Finding a Nugget on Bedrock
• Got one!

We wanted to do more prospecting; but after getting out of the water to congratulate ourselves, we found ourselves shivering up on the bank. We had such a great time exploring this new method of mining, we finally decided to call it a day and start making plans for the next time.

There seem to be more New 49’er members around Happy Camp this year than during prior winters that I have spent down there.  It’s always a great time visiting with other members! Maybe next time I will use a wet-suit heater so I can devote more time recovering those easy nuggets.  Or better yet, spring is only about a month away!

Taking Blow Mining to the Next Level!

Last season, when the State of California decided to redefine “suction dredging” as “…the use of a suction system to vacuum material from a river, stream or lake for the extraction of minerals,” we immediately went to work on creating a new system which relies completely on water blowing to move streambed material to a hopper either above or below the water, and then through a hose to either a container or recovery system.

While the new system relies upon the same types of engines, pumps and underwater breathing systems we have historically used in most of our small scale mining activities, there is no suction or vacuum employed to excavate material off the bottom of the waterway.  We only use blowing, thus the new term “blow mining.”

To my knowledge, you cannot buy these blow mining hoppers as ready-made devices.  But they are not hard to fabricate at home.  We glued our prototypes together with ABS plastic materials.  We reduced the jetting down to ¾-inch tubing from the traditional 1 ½-inch pressure hose that extends from a 6.5 HP motor and pump.  As you can see from the images, we added in a garden hose and valve so we can blow material into the hopper.  You can also feed material into the hopper by hand.  Through testing, we found that a 6.5 HP Honda will supply enough power to deliver material to either a 3-inch or 4-inch recovery system (sluice box) that can float on pontoons out on the waterway.

Several of our members began using these blow mining techniques late last season when the wardens started coming around to inform miners that the definition of suction dredging had been expanded to include any type of suction or vacuum mining on the bottom of the waterway.  When the wardens were informed that these prospectors were only using blowing techniques to move stream-bottom materials, the wardens went away and that was the end of it.

We will leave one of the prototypes at the office so everyone can get a look at it.  When constructing your own, I caution you to be mindful that no suction or vacuum can be used to excavate material off the bottom of the waterway.  This is largely a matter of placing the pressure jet so that it blows material through a delivery hose. It is also a matter of creating a feed hopper which is large enough that it will catch materials directed its way without creating even a fraction of suction strong enough to perform excavation on its own.  Some of our members are calling this an “underwater high-banker,” though I point out that the very same system is also effective above the water.

Here are some very helpful video sequences to demonstrate the system:

• Blower nozzle explained
• Underwater high-banker!
• Can blow material right into a recovery system!

Legal Prize Winners!

This drawing was for three ounces in American Gold Eagle coins and ten ounces of Silver Eagles.  The drawing took place just before closing time in our offices in Happy Camp on 28 February.  Because she had no personal interest in the outcome, we asked Connie Rasmussen from the gift store next door to draw the tickets. In addition to our staff, there were a number of others present for the drawing.

• Legal drawing, part 1
• Legal drawing, part 2

1-ounce American Gold Eagle: Paul L Velotta

Quarter-ounce American Gold Eagles: Ray Crum, Larry Buzzell, Brian Cutler & Timothy J Gilbreth

One-tenth ounce American Gold Eagles: Lynn L Bourne, Les Martin, Philip F. Myska, Edward Murphy, Gary Standefer, Stephen Drinovsky, Chester Morris, Joe Sawyers, James A Karl & Fred Fifield.

One ounce American Silver Eagles: Jasper Bishop, Larry L Reiter, Alton Smithart, David Albrecht, Clark Morrison, Janis A Keene, Richard Stroda, Mike Keller, Phillip Sharpe & Joseph Schaberger.

I want to give a heart-felt thank you to everyone who participated in this fund-raiser. We can count this fund-raiser as another big winner for small-scale miners.

Congratulations to all the winners!

Any contributions received after the time of the drawing will automatically generate tickets for the next prize drawing which will be sponsored by The New 49’er Legal Fund. It will be for 15 more American Gold Eagles (3 ounces of gold) and 10 more American Silver Eagles (10 ounces of silver).  The next drawing will take place at the New 49’er Saturday evening potluck in Happy Camp on 5 July 2014. You do not need to be present to win.  You do not need to be a member of The New 49’ers to participate.  Our office will automatically generate a ticket in your name for every $10 legal contribution we receive ($100 would generate 10 tickets). There is no limit to the size or frequency of your contributions, or to the number of prizes you can win.

Legal contributions can be arranged by calling (530) 493-2012, by mailing to The New 49′ers Legal Fund, P.O. Box 47, Happy Camp, CA 96039, or you can do it online by clicking here: 

What We Can Do on Our Properties in California 

Members have been calling in wanting to know what we can and cannot do these days for prospecting activity on our extensive property holdings in Siskiyou County.  While I do not have a license to provide legal advice, I will follow with my own understanding of the current state of affairs.

1)      We all know that suction dredging in the active waterways is closed until we overcome the existing moratorium in California.  This is presently being challenged in two separate legal proceedings.  Let’s just keep our fingers crossed on this turning out in our favor.

2)       Surface mining (high-banking) is still alright. You can do that on your own, or you can join in on our Weekend Group Mining Projects. They are scheduled in 2014 as follows: May 31 & June 1; June 21 & 22; July 12 & 13; August 2 & 3; August 23 & 24. These events are free to all active Members, and everyone is encouraged to attend.  Please contact our office in advance to let us know you will be there: (530) 493-2012.

• 2014 Schedule of Events

• High-banking
• Getting a lot of gold!

3)      Since our last newsletter, the State of California has submitted an application to the Office of Administrative Law to adopt its Emergency Regulations as permanent.  This will do away with using any type of vacuum or suction to excavate material off the bottom of a waterway.  Therefore, the underwater suction gravel transfer systems we used last season will no longer be allowed until we overcome the suction dredge moratorium.

4) There is no problem with booming (motorized suction mining) 100 yards from the active waterway.  There is also a way to boom using blowing methods (see below) that should not be affected by the 100 yard rule.

Please note that all surface mining activities on New 49’er properties are governed by our internal set of Surface Mining Guidelines which are available from the office.

5)  Underwater crevicing is what most active members were doing within the waterways at the end of last season, using the hookah and pump from their 5 and 6 HP motors on floating platforms to provide air for breathing and a jet of water to help move material out of the way. Most of this newsletter has focused upon this new method of moving material around by blowing, rather than sucking. Our attorney agrees this cannot be classed as “suction dredging” under the expanded definition.

The main briefs have been filed with the Third Appellate District of California in the Brandon Rinehart case. Brandon was cited a while back for operating a suction dredge in California without a permit. Brandon hired our attorney, James Buchal, to defend against the criminal citation.  Brandon’s defense was largely based upon our federal preemption argument in San Bernardino Superior Court that the State does not have the authority to prohibit suction dredging, and that their refusal to issue a permit amounted to a prohibition.  The judge in that case rejected the preemption argument on the presumption that we would appeal to the Appellate Court.

Now that the Appellate Court will consider federal preemption, we are on a fast track to get this very important issue decided.  James Buchal did a fantastic job in presenting opening and closing arguments. We encourage you guys to read them, because they are very enlightening. The State’s argument is basically that congress never meant for the State to be prevented from stopping mining on the public lands.  Anti-mining activists have also weighed in with their own arguments. So that you can more easily follow along in the progress, we have created a special page on the web site that includes all of the important briefs.

In the event that we win the federal preemption argument, our guess is that suction dredge permits will again immediately be available in California.  This, because a judge will have ruled that prospectors can dredge even if California fails to issue permits. It is impossible to predict how long it will take the Court to issue a Decision. But it is possible it could happen before this next season.  The New 49er Legal Fund is providing financial assistance to pursue the preemption argument in the Appellate Court, since that outcome is likely to resolve many of the unsettled matters in San Bernardino Superior Court.

The State of Oregon has passed a similar statewide moratorium (SB 838) on suction dredging (as California’s), except that it does not take full effect until 2016. The new law does affect the 2014 and 2015 seasons in several very important ways:

1)      They are reducing the number of suction dredging permits to 850. This is approximately down to a third of the number of permits issued during the 2013 season.  So the big question is who will get the permits?

2)  The new law only allows the operation of a suction dredge between the hours of 9 am and 5 pm.

3)  Suction dredges cannot be operated within 500 feet of each other.

4)  No suction dredges may be left unattended on the waterway.  This is generally being interpreted as a requirement to remove all dredging equipment from the waterway every evening.

At the time this newsletter is being published, Oregon State Lands is not yet processing permit applications.

Fortunately, we have our federal preemption arguments to (hopefully) overcome this nonsense in Oregon.  To a large degree, the very same arguments we are using to try and overcome California’s moratorium will also apply to Oregon.   How can a State promote mining on the public lands (which is a mandate from congress) when they require a miner to remove his mining equipment from his work site every evening? Or when a miner is prohibited from operating a motor at times when anyone else is allowed to do so?

Since we are already making the federal preemption arguments in California, we will likely wait to see how the Appellate Court decides before challenging the new law in Oregon.

Lost Treasure Hunters was Scheduled to Air!

Just as we went to print with the February newsletter, I received notice from the producer that Animal Planet had scheduled the full version of Lost Treasure Hunters (5 episodes) to play, starting at 8 AM on March 6^th.  Episode 1 can be found here. Then, a week or so before the show was to air; I was informed that the network changed its mind once again. No explanation has been provided, so the mystery continues. Perhaps it has to do with the ancient curse of the Golconda diamonds!  Lost Treasure Hunters is a reality show that was filmed by Discovery Network about several friends and me who went on an extended expedition to India in search of one of the world’s richest diamond mines, a mine that has been lost for several hundred years.  I am not allowed to tell you if we found the mine.  But I can tell you that if you watch the show, you won’t be disappointed in what we found!

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The New 49’ers Prospecting Association, 27 Davis Road, Happy Camp, California 96039 (530) 493-2012  www.goldgold.com

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