Archived tutorials

[OferAZ]

Just wondering if there are some video tutorials on this Site that show how to go about making sure some property isn’t Claimed up, private property, State trust land, etc.  etc.

[Bedrock Bob]

Clay has written volumes on the subject. Several of his posts have been pinned as resources for this. Im not sure if they still are.

It would be worth your time to search for his holy scripts that are buried in this forum like so many diamonds dropped into a cow patty...

He has a website and a database that may be of interest to you. I forget what he calls it. 

He's as close to an expert on it as anyone. If you rub his belly just right he might bestow some knowledge upon us by posting here. 

I can usually get him to post if I aggravate him a little. So if he does not respond here I'll start in on him and get his attention for you.

Otherwise find his website and start there. 

[Au Seeker]

4 hours ago, OferAZ said:

Just wondering if there are some video tutorials on this Site that show how to go about making sure some property isn’t Claimed up, private property, State trust land, etc.  etc.

 

3 hours ago, Bedrock Bob said:

Clay has written volumes on the subject. Several of his posts have been pinned as resources for this. Im not sure if they still are.

It would be worth your time to search for his holy scripts that are buried in this forum like so many diamonds dropped into a cow patty...

He has a website and a database that may be of interest to you. I forget what he calls it. 

He's as close to an expert on it as anyone. If you rub his belly just right he might bestow some knowledge upon us by posting here. 

I can usually get him to post if I aggravate him a little. So if he does not respond here I'll start in on him and get his attention for you.

Otherwise find his website and start there. 

The name of the website you seek is called Land Matters and hopefully @clay  will drop in on this topic with some guidance on how best to use his website, most if not everything you asked about can be found on his website once you get the hang of how to use the site/maps, etc., here's link to Land Matters.

http://mylandmatters.org/

[OferAZ]

Thanks guys !! I’ve tinkered around on that site, but usually end up getting frustrated or lost in the maps.  I’ll keep after it .

[Bedrock Bob]

All you really need is a land ownership map to know if you are on private, State or BLM land. 

Once you know you are on BLM land you can go pretty much wherever you want to go. When you find the spot you want to prospect then you need to determine the specific location (township and range) and find out if the area is claimed. 

That is where it gets a bit tricky. Good maps and databases like Land Matters are the best place to start. 

If you are on BLM land that isn't obviously marked you are probably OK. You aren't supposed to be actively prospecting on someone's claim but it is not something that is a big deal unless it is being actively worked and clearly marked.

It is easy to get the contact information for claim owners. It's up to you whether to ask permission or forgiveness depending on how you intend to prospect and who has the claim.

[chrisski]

As a  claim owner, I’d rather you ask for permission than forgiveness.  Bob may have not riled Clay into answering, but he riled me.

If you have questions, I’d be happy to answer them.

Claim owner contact info is very easy to find off the notice of location for the claim.  Might involve mailing which is not a quick answer like email.

All claims are marked, but the moment I go away, I can’t guarantee those markers are still there.  Anything from someone being malicious to a cow knocking it over.  Also, only the four corners need marked.  Since the smallest claim is 20 acres, finding those corners may not be easy.  If its 160 acres, its even harder.  Also, all 4 corners do not need a copy of the paperwork.  That is left at the monument.  The 4 corners on my claims I’ve had are never easy to place.  Always involve a bit of walking and some have no trails or roads on the claim itself.  Top of the tall hill, Hidden in a grove of bushes.  Never at a road intersection.

It’s pretty heartbreaking when someone spends $165 per 20 acres in filing fees annually or going through the small miners waiver and finding a bunch of holes across the claim when someone has went through with a metal detector.  I’d rather the two or three grams of gold that came out of the ground go to the claim fees.

Using things like land matters.org, you can easily find areas that are 1 Mile that have no claims.  If there are claims, the maps just need to be downloaded from the county.  Except for places like Rich hill, there wil be areas with unclaimed land.

 

Edited October 8, 2021 by chrisski

[OferAZ]

Good info. Thank you.  If I go through an area, relic hunting or “Prospecting “, I leave no trace.  Not much of a prospector though.

[chrisski]

If you give me an area you want to start in, I’d be happy to go through the process.  I know you’re in Northern Arizona, so the there’s the Bahde Claims in that area the GPAA has, but I’m sure there’s still open land out by Dolan Springs.

If I prospect the right way to make sure the land is open, and gold bearing, takes me about 40 hours of research before I put boots on the ground with a metal detector.  A lot of that is starts and stops at dead ends and restarting.

BLM will records will tell you what’s claimed, and that’s the database MyLand matters accesses.  What I like about that is the maps layers.  Any mines or prospects, I like to look them up in mined at.org.  One particular area I looked at had a lot of mines and workings and I was excited about until I saw these were copper and manganese from pre-WWII diggings and no gold was indicated.  Since that stuff is for open pit mining, which is beyond me, I decided not to spend a couple days out there and went somewhere else.  

I find what mineral maps I can, but I’m no geologist and I use those to steer away from valley fill areas or recently deposited sands.

THere’s also searching through records to make sure there’s no special land which you can find on the plats.  This can be withdrawn from minerals, wilderness areas where you can’t use motorized vehicles, or better ones like land given to state trusts that the federal govt held on to mineral rights.  In Arizona its much easier to file with the federal govt than the state for a claim.  I’d bet there’s at least 100 times the claims on federal land than State Land.

The BLM data base and mylandmatters.org can be a couple of weeks to 100 days behind, so I search the county records before going out to make sure nothing has been taken.  Takes a couple of weeks to mail and process a claim at a county office, and the person can sit on sending the paperwork in for 90 days after staking the claim and prior to filing.

[OferAZ]

Thanks Chrisski, mighty generous !  Just updated my profile, I’m now in Searchlight, NV.  Going on 3 weeks now since the last U-Haul load.  Might have to edit my handle too, but then, I did remain zero finds in Arizona while in AZ.

[chrisski]

I said I'd post something on the research portion I do for prospecting.  The 40 hours of research prior to boots on the ground.  What I found after 90 minutes of research tells me I would go here if I was local, but the particular section I mention, but since I'm 5 hours away, not worth the trip for me.  I'd do a whole lot more looking, but to me, there's enough here to make me do a bit more research if I was going towards searchlight.

So to start I go to MyLandmatter.org and look at the number of claims around searchlight.

Looking at the maps and claims, I see that to the North west of the Searchlight are some public lands with claims.  

Section 28 and 29 are fairly close to the highway, and even section 33 south of the highway has some mines.  You can zoom in and get a coordinate on any of them and put it in a GPS.  I like the hills though, so section 28 has a couple of hills, consists of roughly 640 acres, of which only 42 are claimed for lode claims.  Looking closely at the Northeast you can see perhaps 100 acres is not BLM land.  That is a no go area, whether private property or patented claim,  you can research and find out further, but no prospecting.

Clicking on the "i" button brings up this tab on section 28:

If you go to "Click for current BLM report, you can see whether the fees have been paid.

You can click on the "Click for County Documents," and then in that click the "Search Documents."  If in the LAST NAME FIELD, you put the mines name, you'll get the CERTIFICATION OF LOCATION, which will have the map.  I'd download that, but Clark County would charge me a dollar for each download.  Yavapai and Maricopa COunties I work with, are free unofficial downloads.

 

This is a Google pic of one of the tunnels:

And its location next to the highway:

This mine is a couple of miles away from section 28, but this tells me its a gold and silver area.

So, there's a but more research to do, like locating the two lode claims.  Also finding if the gold in the area is lode (which I think it is) or placer.  If lode gold, tailings piles could be a good way to detect, but it could have been bleached out by chemicals. I'd also do quite a bit more research in Minedat on mines in the area.  Someone in the area can tell you more about the gold.  I ran some material from a lode mine through a sluice and had some color, with a recommendation from a local.  Finally, I joined the BLM's MLRS and that gives me access to the plats. Plats will tell you a lot of details of the section.  You'll probably find info of the patented claim in the North East of the section.  

 

This is located in: 

Nevada

Mount Diablo Meridian

28 South; 63 East; Section 21

Either way, its really close to Searchlight.  There appears to be a trail going in to the area that will get you off road, and would be no more than a mile hike.  There's probably better places and took me about 90 minutes to get the info.  Looking at a bunch of different areas is part of the 40 hours of work that goes into me putting boots on the ground.

 

 

Edited October 13, 2021 by chrisski

[OferAZ]

Very interesting. I’m going to try this step by step, just to familiarize myself with the process.  Thank You, this is above and beyond !

[chrisski]

If you have questions, you can private message me.

One big thing I didn’t look up is Arizona Bureau of mines put out a document that talks about gold finds throughout the state, and that lets you know whether the district tends to be placer or lode and how some of it was developed.  I’m Ute Nevada does the same thing.

If you look at Chris Ralph’s”Fist Full of GOld,” that’s a decent book.