Go Back To The Land With A Gold Pan

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DON'T GET FOOLED

All that glitters is definitely not gold ... and, occasionally, even gold doesn't shine. The metal's color can vary from lemon yellow to a dull golden hue. At times, nuggets will be covered with some other metal (like mercury), so check out any soft and very heavy pebbles . . . being malleable, gold won't break but will smash or bend instead. The real treasure clue, however, is that the color of gold will remain the same . . . regardless of whether it's in the sun or shade.

Fool's gold (iron pyrite), on the other hand, changes color from shade to sunlight and will flake when broken. Mica, too, glitters under water . . . but the small, light particles of this substance will usually float away during panning.

If, despite these tests, you're still not sure of your find, put some nitric or hydrochloric acid on the sample. If the chemical bubbles, you've been fooled . . . because the "real thing" will create no reaction at all.

PICKIN' UP THE PIECES

Use your tweezers . . . a wet, narrow camel's-hair brush . . . or a wet Q-tip to remove each golden flake from your pan. A special enclosed magnet (or a "lodestone" wrapped in paper or plastic . . . to keep it from sticking to the pan) can be used to remove any dry black sand. (Take it slow, however: Smaller pieces of gold often get trapped between the darker grains and can be lost! )

Put your flakes and nuggets in a small vial filled with water, and store any sand that contains tiny specks of "flour gold" in a wide-mouthed container to be separatod later.

Since gold is usually formed in quartz veins, always check for the metal in any pieces of quartz you run across. Such gold-bearing rocks are particularly valuable to collectors and-like large nuggets-often bring in several times the price of pure gold.

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