Going for gold (or another treasure)
Prospectors say room for more of their kind in the province
Clink, clink, clink — three strikes and off popped a corner of the small boulder.
Peter Dimmell, a mentor with the Prospectors Association of Newfoundland and Labrador, picked up the piece of rock and took a closer look. A magnifying lens to his eye, he inspected the innards.
“I looked at a lot of quartz before I ever found any gold,” he said, going on to describe some of his work in the mining industry on the early exploration side, but also what he considers a good hobby for anyone with a love of the outdoors.
He was standing with Norm Mercer, the president of the provincial prospectors association, after taking his old pickup off the Trans-Canada Highway and bouncing out an access road for pastureland near the Foxtrap Access.
“This is the best rock I’ve seen down here,” Dimmell said, a few steps off the laneway where he was parked, with an underlying sense of excitement betraying the treasure-hunting element of prospecting.
From the fluorspar mine of St. Lawrence to the gold mines of Baie Verte to the nickel of Voisey’s Bay, billions invested in local mining began at some point with a single spark of discovery. It’s why the prospectors association (nlprospectors.org) wants more people to try their hand — taking notice of the land, colour changes in the exposed rocks, investigating. They hope to get people active outdoors, but also increase their own ranks, gain a further understanding of provincial geology and mark the next targets for exploration and development dollars.
Both Dimmell and Mercer said a new hobby prospector should not be concerned with re-treading ground where even career professionals have been before and declared no luck.
“The statistics show that deposits in this country that have been found, it’s generally been the seventh or eighth pass, either by prospectors or exploration companies,” Mercer said.
Fresh eyes or fresh thinking around what lies beneath can make all the difference.
You can get a good starting point with a call to the prospectors association, or a geologist at the Matty Mitchell Prospectors Resource Room, an informational base where select tools are also available, cost-shared 50-50 between the provincial government and Mining Industry NL (found on the first floor of the Natural Resources Building, 50 Elizabeth Ave., St. John’s, 709-729-2120).
There are areas of the province where prospecting is not allowed (about 30 per cent of the island and 50 per cent of Labrador has been removed from prospecting) and where claims are already staked, so it’s a good idea to connect with someone for quick reference points before you head out.
For a little more prep, the province offers an annual training course, with the next coming up in September.
The gear for prospecting is pretty straightforward. Dimmell says all you really need to start is a hammer, maybe a magnifying lens and some curiosity.
He carries a more specialized GeoTool — one end a stub, used to smack at rocks, and the other a flat extension, for digging away soil to better expose outcroppings.
“The statistics show that deposits in this country that have been found, it’s generally been the seventh or eighth pass, either by prospectors or exploration companies.” Norm Mercer, president, Prospectors Association of Newfoundland and Labrador
He wears glasses, a cap and a reflective vest. The vest carries a compact lens, a magnet, plastic bags, a digital GPS and a compass (in case his digital unit conks out).
Heading out any distance and the usual considerations come into play: water, communications and basic first aid.
He and Mercer were not tackling a 15-kilometre trek on this day or even a five or twokilometre one, but focused on explanations for TC Media of prospector activities.
They used a tool like an auger to demonstrate soil sampling. Lab tests for mineral levels can help improve understanding of an area, highlighting where valuable concentrations of minerals are more likely to be found.
Dimmell then traded in the auger and GeoTool for metal pans (purchased online). Hopping into a nearby stream, he showed how a prospector can use the pans for seeking out similar indications on where to take their hammer. If you find visible gold along the stream, he explained, continue sampling periodically as you trace the stream until the visible gold disappears. Then backtrack to where it was last seen and start investigating inland, as the source rock is your prize.
Hobby prospectors unfamiliar with geology can learn more as they continue on. Anyone prospecting for a living will often describe rock using scientific names and geological terms.
When Dimmell and Mercer decided it was time to abandon the hunt for a mid-day coffee, Mercer pointed to the parking lot on approach.
“That Tims sits right on top of the Cambrian non-conformity,” he said, going on to explain some of what lies beneath the communities of Conception Bay South.
There was early mineral exploration work undertaken just off the Conception Bay Highway, he said, in what is now a subdivision — the turnoff found between Shopper’s Drug Mart and Berg’s Famous Ice Cream parlour.
“That subdivision is built on gold mineralization,” Dimmell said, adding there was even a pocket of bonanza-grade gold found in what is now a backyard. The mineral-rich vein was not enough to justify cancelling the planned housing development.
“They all know. The developers, they named the streets after the minerals and such,” Mercer said, as the pickup wound around Dawson Run, Goldrock Run, Goldust Place, Zircon Place and Karat Close.
Prospectors generally avoid hunting around town sites, the men said.
But it’s also true there can be a lot to find in your own back yard.