The Lure of Nuggets
…Placer gold is the rarest of gold formations. Formed in quartz deposits, pieces of gold were broken out of exposed quartz-gold veins when erosion took place. After being washed into streams and rivers of America’s rugged back country, they were tumbled, pounded and polished by the action of the water, until they stopped and logged into a depression or crevice, waiting throughout the years for man to find them.
…Less than one tenth of 1% of gold recovered is in placer nugget form. All other gold is in hard rock or refined. Placer nuggets have been recovered by various methods, from the simple gold pan, rocker sluice box and bucket dredges to the modern gas powered suction dredges. On the average, it takes the moving of about 80 cubic yards of materials (150 tons) to recover one troy ounce of gold.
…Every year nugget discoveries become rarer. Placer gold, in any quantity, is found in only seven locations through out the world: Alaska, the Western United States, Canada, South America, Central America, Australia, and Russia. Every natural nugget is amazingly close to total purity and runs from .820 fine to as high as .950 fine (21-23 kt.) gold. Like snowflakes, no two nuggets are exactly alike. Each is a unique, one of a kind collector’s original, which will increase in value over the years.
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