Prospectors, an Endangered Species? Page 2 of 6

This understandable need for secrecy has had many of our past data-base customers request a listing be taken down — right away. This is why we do not have as many “sold” signs as other online advertisers.

All of this has lead to annoying phone calls from a “gold bug” looking for an exclusive placer property, tucked into a pristine “wilderness” setting they could drive to, where he and his buddies could pan enough gold while on vacation to make payments, plus get a hobby tax write-off of their beer on a tax Schedule C. Oh yes, they also want this prospect to have a cabin.

We usually direct these guys to a friend in the Brooks Range of Alaska who has ground that would be a nightmare to try and wash through conventional sluices. Mick Manns of Paradise Valley— and we have not taken any compensation from him other than supplying a cabin while filming for our AlaskaTravelMagazine.com, to tell you this— allows gold bugs to help him do assessment work on his claims by using their own —what do you call those things?— gold detectors. These “helpers” who follow Mick bulldozing an exploration cut are allowed to keep “samples” they find for their hard work.

Know that anything to do with placer gold is hard work. And, as much as we would like to sell you on the idea of letting your fingers do the walking it takes to prospect for placer gold, we can’t. At this moment our WesternMiner.com only has one small scale placer project, complete with cabin, listed. The only reason it has lasted is that the owner is in Switzerland, and somewhat difficult to reach.

Since prospectors need a marketplace to sell claims, and we can’t list enough small placers that majors are not interested in developing to meet demand, what is the problem? If you complain to this old-timer that the days of the small prospector/miner are long gone, I am going to start calling you names. Especially in Alaska where less than 2 percent of the landscape has been altered by man. It’s a tough job finding the gold needed to make cell phones work for holier than God Sierra Club members, but someone has to do it. Now that bully environmentalists are being exposed for being the major offenders of carbon mapping, what is your excuse for being a whoosie?