Hole Etiquette

[JeffP]

Whats the go if you find in a creek bed where someone has been digging ? Should you go for it or leave it ?
I ask this after seeing one of Wals youtube vids Ancient Wash where they found quite a lot of good gold and they left it to come back later .
I would have finished digging it for them .

 

[Twapster]

All depends on how desperate you are for a gold fix. As long as someone hasn't left a bucket or item at the hole I guess its free for further exploration.

Im def guilty of making one guys digging a little bigger because there was good gold coming from it. I left it for one day and no one came back so I had a crack.

Unfortunately at some point you have to leave the dig and go home. Wasn't a hole as such, hard to explain but was the sort of dig that was just moving rocks and dirt from one area to another and gold at about the 1 foot mark.

Next time I got back to the spot....it was the area of a swimming pool......I guess a few other people did the same as I did. Gotta leave some for everyone else!! :lol: :lol:

 

[DrDuck]

Traditionally, if you were continuously working the spot, say coming back the next day, you would leave your pan, a shovel, or even your highbanker near the hole, and no prospector would jump your claim. Good manners dictates that you would not work an area you knew someone was already working, or even get too close. However, the traditional professional courtesy is now not as reliable, and there are plenty of spots where you would not want to leave equipment, even overnight. If you have to leave the hole, say to come back the next weekend, the best policy is to fill in your hole and make it look as inconspicuous as possible. That spot that Wal and Liz were working was a walk of a couple of kilometers, and leaving such a location is much less risky than an easily accessible location.

 

[casper]

I tend to push the rubble back into my holes but I fear it doesn't work to disguise my work cos i reckon it's obvious someone was at work there cos i just can't get the rock placement to look like MN (mother nature) would've and of course an experienced fossiker would recognise my hapless deception straight up and rob my hole but then again I could leave the hole open in the hope that interlopers would think that the hole was abandoned cos it was a "duffer".

In the end it ain't your hole or my hole, ay! - I just go and dig and enjoy the bush ............................................. and of course fill in afterward

casper

 

[The Green Wanderer]

I try and backfill any holes dug whether they produce or not, after all the ground isnt mine and if I leave an area I may not be able to make it back for a while so it doesnt phase me if someone else discovers my hole and decides to dig it. Its a slim chance anyway that theyl dig exactly the same spots I did.

 

[Tassie Daz]

But then, hyperthetically, if you came upon a digging in a creek and there was the suggestion that it was producing, you would be within your right to continue up or down the creek and have bash in that position, wouldn't you? I mean the whole landscape isn't someone's right if they happen to find gold, surely? [And I am suggesting out of a person's vision and earshot] If that wasnt the case then there would never have been what has been recognized as a "rush". Rushes happened because someone heard of someone's good fortune and "rushed" to that location to get in on the act.

As far as refilling holes is concerned, I am amazed at the cowboys out there who don't leave the bush as they find it. We will ALL certainly be held to account if holes aren't filled in in the future. Maybe it would be good if we come across a hole in an area to fill the thing up so that we leave it as it should be left. I read a post somewhere where a farmer has closed a good spot because idiots weren't filling in their holes. That's the start of it.

 

[jamie]

i welcome people to dig my holes, it means i am not the only one not finding gold
all jokes aside when i was at tuena last there were a lot of unfilled holes which i didnt want to go near as i wasnt sure what was 'someones dig' or not untill i got talking to two blokes that said what was being dug at that time and one bloke was nice enough to say jump in his dig, mind you he was still working it
i think the old shovel with bucket on top should tell people to stay out and if you are done with the spot back-fill it and hope no one else digs that spot if you are coming back after an extended period of time

 

[Twapster]

There were two holes at Nundle that looked more like a crater. I heard one guy had been working them for a few weeks. One flood and the holes were gone!

 

[Guest]

In Vic the 1 sqM in 48 hrs, rehabilitated would make that illegal. Last time I went to Wedderburn I filled in a dozen holes within 10m of the car, before I even got the detector out. Thankfully they had filled in their toilet holes, but the dunny paper with skidmarks was everywhere, along with fresh ringpulls and cigarette packets/foil. On the way out the back-track I saw the bag of garbage on the side of the road, probably belonged to the same mob. I would've picked it up, but I'm not keen on needle-stick injuries.
We need to be a united group to stop the removal of our freedoms and edumacate bozo-derros like this. Although I'm a croweater I gladly join PMAV and proudly own a Vic prospectors licence. The Eureka spirit is, and will always be, more important than all the criminalising BS the elitist, non representative guvment try to shove down our throats.
I commend the Vics for their progressive approach. It seems they are the only state who even remotely listen to their people.

Keep up the good fight.