Tomah Wisconsin GPAA Chapter – February 2020

Welcome

Welcome to the 2020 GOLD FEVER Newsletter.  Another year, another gold prospecting opportunity.  If you have not tried to find gold, you need to give it a try.  Let us know if you need help to get started, there are many people with experience that the help you.

 Do not forget the Newsletter and pictures can always be found at:

President’s Message

  I don't know how the storm went for the southern half of the state, here in Marshfield we got about 4''s and it ended early Saturday. I might have been able to make the meeting, not sure about our speaker from Merrill thou. Most members I talked to were in favor of cancelling the meeting it is better to be save than to have something bad happen to someone! The two speakers we had lined up for the reading a river meeting can't both make it to the February 15 th meeting. So we will have to do something else.

  For the February meeting I will be talking about rocker boxes.

  I need to finalize my vacation plans soon to get the days I want. I plan to go to South Dakota in june. and have to use some days for the gold show in Milwaukee, Nugget Lake where I have reserved site #51 this year. Also a few other outings for other club outings. I get five weeks and it never seems like enough!

 I sent in our paperwork to the GPAA so we will be one of the sponsoring clubs at the gold show . We will need a few volunteers to help either man the doors, the panning tables (hopefully) or sell tickets for the raffles.

 The week of our last meeting the Saturday storm wasn't the worst to hit Marshfield in snowed Tuesday and Wednesday for 33 hours strait. It also snowed Thursday and Friday a little bit, I’m sick of it already!   Hope it doesn't snow again on meeting week ends Mike Fait

See you at the meetings Mike Fait    

Upcoming Events

Planned Outings:

-       February 1, 2020 – Wausau Meeting – Alaska Gold Mining & reclamation by Dean Race.

-       February 15, 2020 – Tomah Club Meeting - Rocker Boxes

-       March 21, 2020 – Tomah Club Meeting

-       April 18, 2020 – Tomah Club Meeting

-       May 1-2, 2020 - Central Wisconsin Rock and gem show Marshfield

-       May 16-17, 2020 - GPAA gold show Milwaukee Wisconsin at the state park fairgrounds

-       June 5, 2020 -  Lacrosse rock and gem show

-       June 5,6,7, 2020 -  Black Hill south Dakota outing (Wausau Chapter)

-       June 26,27,28, 2020 - Tomah chapter outing to Nugget Lake

-       July 17,18,19, 2020 - Wausau outing to Snyder  county Park

-       July 24,25,26,2020 - Midstate metal detectors club 24th annual open hunt Nekoosa

-       Aug 25-30, 2020 - GPAA diggers party in Athens Michigan Wausau/ Tomah

-       Sept 18,19,20, 2020 - Wausau outing to Nugget Lake - this is Tomah’s  weekend so we will join them       (individual dig  for  yourself)

-       somewhere this summer we will try and squeeze in a metal detecting outing

Tomah Club Meeting - Town of LaGrange Town Hall. 22731 Flint Ave. Tomah WI. 54660 - 1.8 miles west of the 12/21 Hwy intersection in Tomah. – At 1:00 pm on the following dates, speakers will be announced as they are scheduled:

Tomah Wisconsin GPAA Chapter Minutes January, 2020

Club Business:                                                                                                                                                              

Meeting was cancelled because of weather.

Tomah Gold Club now has a facebook page Tomah prospectors gold club ----  https://www.facebook.com/groups/835244036943448/

There are a log of pictures on this facebook site, just JOIN to get information about the club.

Gold Price on 01/29/20 was $1,569.80              Silver Price on 01/29/20 was $17.42

Respectfully submitted by Diane North – Newsletter Editor

At the very dawn of the Gold rush to California, the rocker box was perhaps the most used piece of gold prospecting equipment. For a time it was perhaps even more important that the gold pan. Mostly this was because the miner could make a rocker for himself in the field from rough sawn lumber cut in the forest. They are also easily portable. Rocker boxes were also popular during the Klondike gold rush for working the hillside placers that were far above the creeks.

The 'rocker' is a box with a hopper about 3 to 4 ft. long and 1 to 2 ft. wide, sloped like a cradle, and is mounted on semicircular pieces of wood and worked by a, handle to give it a side motion; and it is also inclined so as to carry the material down to the lower end, which is open. At the upper end is a small hopper that may be removed and which has a sheet-iron bottom perforated with 1/2 -in. holes. Under the hopper is a canvas apron or tray inclined toward the head of the box but touching neither end of the hopper-box. Several wooden riffles are placed across the box. The material is fed into the hopper and screened through by water poured on top; the lighter material is carried over the end, while the riffles catch the gold nuggets and magnetic sand. This concentrate is cleaned out and panned at the end of the operation. The rocker is used for the same type of work as the gold pan in that it is mainly a prospecting tool.  A man is able to wash 3 to 5 times more yardage than with the gold pan, and the use of the rocker eliminates much of the backbreaking strain of continuous panning. On the other hand, the easy mobility of the pan as a prospecting device is lost.

So why might a modern prospector be interested in building his own rocker box? After all these things had their highest level of popularity in the early 1850s, and lots of other types of equipment to mine gold are out there and available. The principal use of a gold rocker is for mining small deposits where water is scarce - that's the place where it really shines. The rocker is a lot faster at processing material than a gold pan. It does get better gold recovery than a dry washer and can handle moist gravels that a dry washer just cannot deal with. Still, it is not really a desert device and it does use some significant water, but not nearly as much as a sluice. In a rocker, gravel requires about three times its own weight of water to wash it. The water used in a rocker can easily be captured and recycled. So perhaps the best use is in streams and waterways with very little water – where some water is present, but not enough to run a sluice box. If enough flowing water to run a sluice is present, a sluice is faster and easier to run than a rocker. If there is no water at all and things are dry, then you probably are better off with a dry washer. The rocker is only a primitive machine, having a capacity but one-fifth as great as that of the sluice box, but because it is portable as well as cheap, requires only a little water, and saves a high percentage of coarse gold nuggets, the rocker will continue to be used in many districts.

The operation of a rocker consists of shoveling gravel onto a screen or grizzly, pouring water over it from a dipper, and at the same time giving the device a back-and-forth rocking motion. The grizzly retains all the oversized stones, which are removed by hand when they have been washed clean. The operator briefly examines the oversize rock to be sure no large nuggets or gold specimens are being tossed out. The cradle must be placed on an inclination while being worked, and under the influence of the continued side-to-side rocking the dirt is quickly disintegrated, passes down through the hopper grizzly and the water and the undersize fall down onto the canvas apron which saves most of the gold and places the remainder at the head end of the trough. From the apron it is conveyed to the inner end of the cradle floor (the sluice box like section of the rocker), from which it flows over the riffles, or bars, and out at the mouth.  Riffles, canvas, blankets, corduroy, burlap, or cocoa matting with expanded metal have been used to cover the bottom of the trough and all have met with varying degrees of success in saving the gold. The combination of cocoa matting covered with expanded metal lath has proven to be quite effective for most gravels. The frequency of cleaning up depends on the richness and character of the gravel, but clean-ups are usually necessary two or three times a day. The hopper is taken off first, then the apron is slid out, and washed in a bucket or tub containing clean water, and finally the gold is collected with a spoon from behind the riffle bars, and panned out.

The rocking motion used should be sufficient to keep the gravel disturbed, allowing the gold to settle out, but a too vigorous movement will cause a gold loss. The gravel bed should be shifted slightly with each motion and should be evenly distributed across the trough. Generally speaking, the rocker is not known for its ability to save fine gold, but with careful and expert manipulation, decent fine gold recoveries can be achieved. Tailings from both rockers and sluice boxes should be occasionally panned to check for gold losses. When gold is found near the lower end of the rocker or sluice box, the potential for losses should be investigated.

Because there is no one “right” design for a rocker box, I am not actually presenting specific plans, but I am giving you the information you need to plan, design and build your own rocker box if that’s what you decide to do.  My recommended design for a rocker is to start buy building a sluice box 40 inches long, 16 inches wide on the bottom, sloped like a cradle, and with rockers at each end. The hopper would be 16 inches square and 6 inches deep, with a sheet metal bottom made of perforated steel with 1/2-inch holes. This hopper box needs to be designed so it can be removed for clean up. A light canvas-covered frame is stretched under the hopper, forming a riffle. Square riffles of wood or steel are placed across the bottom of the sluice portion of the rocker. Curved feet are placed underneath the sluice portion of the box to allow it to be rocked back and forth. Historically, rockers are built of wood, as the early prospectors built them. However, there is no reason that a rocker could not be built from sturdy heavy gauge sheet aluminum. It would be lighter that the wood version. Remember that wood also absorbs water, and water logged wood is much heavier than dry wood.

One design I idea that I did have, which you might consider, is that if it is properly built with a removable hopper, the rocker base could also be used as a simple sluice box in locations where enough water flow is present to run a sluice so long as the hopper and frame as well as the feet are removed first. This type of dual purpose sluice or rocker would work well with a design made from a sheet aluminum body - the turn of a few wing nuts and with a few bolts one could easily go from a sluice to a rocker or vise versa in just a few minutes - there is a lot of similarity between the two types of equipment.

Officers – elected for 2020.

President – Michael Fait (mgfait@charter.net) 715-384-9265   (Cell phone to be used only on meeting days = 715-305-8319)

Vice-President – Gary Morrison 715-316-2555

Secretary – Jeanne Morrison 715-316-2555

Newsletter Editor - Diane North (dbnorth@centurytel.net) 608-635-7031

Treasure – Gayle Fait (mgfait@charter.net) 715-384-9265

Outing Chairman – Jeff Hastings (monkeyhast@frontier.net)  (608) 637-3097

Claims Director – Richard Niemyjski (richnski@frontiernet.net) 608-637-3295

State Director – Mick Whalen mj-whalen@hotmail.com  715-612-2800

APPROVED DEALERS:

Deer field Detectors.  Dealer for Whites, Fisher, Garrett, Minelab, Bounty Hunter, Detector Pro Detector & Pinpointers, Sunray Detector Accessories, & many misc. detecting accessories.  Deerfield Detectors, N3091 CTY Rd. B, Hancock, WI 54943 (715) 572-1845 or e-mail stmill@uniontel.net or http://www.deerfielddetectors.com/

Wisconsin Area Clubs

The Kettle Moraine Prospectors of Wisconsin – We still meet in the Community Center in Plymouth, Wi.  on the second Saturday of the month, providing the church doesn't have something else on their schedule .- 1:00 PM Meetings  Contact: Chuck Riel – 414-328-3194 or visit wisgold.org/index.html

Midstate Metal Detecting Club – meets every 3^rd Wednesday at 7:00 pm at Shooters Bar and Restaurant at the intersection of Hwy 39 and 54, next to the Shell Station.  Contact: Steve Miller 715-572-1845

Wausau Prospectors – meets the 1^st Saturday of the month at 11:00 am at the Village Town Hall in Brokaw Wisconsin. Address is: 218 2^nd St., Brokaw, WI. Take US 51 north of Wausau and take exit 197. Then go east on county road WW. At the 4 way stop in Brokaw take a right. You are there (just past the Credit Union).  Contact:  Kurt Bublitz 715-340-2831 or e-mail lizzy101@charter.net

Wisconsin Michigan Prospectors.GPAA Chapter – holds their meetings on the 3^rd Saturday of every month at 11:00 am, at meeting location for the next few months at Newinghams Supper Club at 722 Main St. Wausaukee, WI 54177. Contact Ron Smith.  

MAY THERE BE GOLD IN EVERY PAN !!!!