Blood in the Water

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cuzzinjack
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Joined: Mon Jun 13, 2011 7:33 pm

Blood in the Water

Post by cuzzinjack »

I rented a mercury vapor tester, a Jerome J405, and went out last Saturday to see what’s up at the First Water Ranch. Only samples of the surface air were performed, and a lot of them were from .5 to 2 micrograms per cubic meter in strength. Note: this is 500 to 2000 nanograms. The soil was still damp from the rain and it was felt that the conditions were not ideal for the vaporization of mercury, but was still very stunned by the results. (The J405 only registers readings above .5 micrograms).

Monday, the manufacturer and the distributor were called and asked, “Can this really be true?” They seemed to be convinced that it was. A paper was found on Sunday about the mighty Potosi district in Bolivia, and a mercury survey that was performed there. The use of mercury stopped there similarly around 1850. Their descriptions of soil testing had me intrigued:

http://mollymarieprospect.com/Peralta2p ... potosi.pdf

On Tuesday, 3 days ago, I went there again, and the surface mercury readings were really popping. I did some soil testing, like the photo below, and like the paper, I would get a peak if the hole was tested right away. The phenomena was observed just like they said happened for them. The meter would read 0 or just above 500 nanograms, and then spike to 2000 to 3000 nanograms (2 to 3 micrograms) in several holes, and drop down again.
Note: the USGS paper posted in the Cart Ruts thread recorded 66 nanograms per cubic meter.

The geology of the Superstitions does not support a natural mercury deposit as the USGS paper implied, and it is suggested it is a man-made one. This is a photo of the soil testing method that was used:

http://mollymarieprospect.com/Peralta2p ... method.JPG

I’ve got to run, and hope this website doesn’t shut down before more of this story can be posted.

Cuzzinjack
cuzzinjack
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Posts: 163
Joined: Mon Jun 13, 2011 7:33 pm

Re: Blood in the Water

Post by cuzzinjack »

Here is a link to the place where the entire paper about the Potosi, Bolivia mercury testing can be downloaded. As soon as the website opens there is a “download full text” button at mid-height on the right.

http://www.researchgate.net/publication ... Bolivia%29

cuzzinjack
cuzzinjack
Part Timer
Posts: 163
Joined: Mon Jun 13, 2011 7:33 pm

Re: Blood in the Water

Post by cuzzinjack »

Here is a portion of the massive text file from the mercury vapor detector from testing one of the shallow holes that were dug:

Jerome Model: J405-0007
Serial Number: 405-00347
Date: 27-Oct-15 21:28:58
Gas: Hg

dd-MMM-yyyy hh:mm:ss Reading Units Temp-C
27-Oct-15 14:05:22 0.87 ug/m3 33.43
27-Oct-15 14:05:24 1.13 ug/m3 33.43
27-Oct-15 14:05:26 0.97 ug/m3 33.43
27-Oct-15 14:05:28 2.75 ug/m3 33.43
27-Oct-15 14:05:30 2.66 ug/m3 33.43
27-Oct-15 14:05:32 1.09 ug/m3 33.43
27-Oct-15 14:05:34 0.54 ug/m3 33.43
27-Oct-15 14:05:35 0 ug/m3 33.43

Notice that in this mode it takes a sample every 2 seconds. What is ironic, to me anyway, is the way this machine works is there is a strip of gold foil inside and it absorbs the mercury by amalgamation! As the gold absorbs the mercury, the resistance of the strip increases proportionally.

My next step is to get soil samples, after I get done with a tile project. But, that does not stop me from theorizing about how this operation functioned.

The Minas de Oro map appears to be generally correct, and the “S” is even shown in the road (Camino) to show how the road had to zig-zag to negotiate the too-steep portion of the hill down to First Water Ranch. With the Minas Del Oro map, logic, cart ruts, and the mercury vapor survey, the following theories were derived (some I have said before):

• Those are not arrastras on the Minas del Oro map. The “Camino” downhill of the cart ruts would have taken a LOT of fill to cross the side of the hill. It is not felt that 4 arrastras, each grinding 1 ton per day was worth the effort of the road development.

• They had to have stamp mills, animal powered stamp mills. The animal-powered mills were prevalent in Mexico since the 1500’s. As posted before, there were hundreds and hundreds of them in Mexico in the 1500’s.

• It is felt that the round circles indicate amalgamation patios. Several links to these patios are below. The Spanish and Mexicans used these patios for silver recovery since the 1500’s and they mixed finely crushed ore, salt, water, mercury, and copper sulphate to create silver amalgam. The chemical process could take weeks in the sun. With the gold amalgamation proposed here, only finely crushed ore and mercury were added, and the process would take a day or two. These patios would have provided good recovery, and just as importantly, security.

• They had to have a dam. There is no other way that they could process on a less-intermittent basis without one. It was read that the climate in the Southwest was much wetter between 1700 and 1850, but nonetheless, they had to have a dam. There is no better place found for one than the spot marked on the map shown below.

• They had to get rid of the sand they produced. They couldn’t let it run back into the lake created by the dam, so how did they do it? The sand slurry would need a run that is fairly steep to keep flowing downhill, and the slurry would have to be a thick as possible to minimize water use.

• They had to have a good place to install a long, fairly steep sluice safe from flash floods.

• They did not absolutely have to have one, but a good producing well would be great, so at least some ore could be processed in the patios with minimum water. First Water Ranch had a windmill and another well that had a windmill or an electric pump, and willows abound.
Below is a link to a map created that shows the items discussed above.

http://mollymarieprospect.com/Peralta2p ... litems.jpg

The small drainage where the apparent sluice is indicated is perfectly sloped for a sluice, of any length they needed. The technology of the day to recover fine gold would have been copper plates, riffles, and posts that were soaked with mercury. The vapor detector was popping pretty good near where the bottom of the sluice would have been located; not like the area marked in yellow, but it was very anomalous. If the sluice was here, the sand problem would be taken care of and would be disposed of away from the lake and washed away. Sand was not seen in the small drainage, but far downstream from the apparent end of the sluice there was an inordinate amount of drusy quartz crystals in the sand bars far away from the canyon bottom.

Inside the yellow dashed area was the only place holes were dug to take vapor samples. Just ran out of time taking wide-flung surface surveys. It is believed they had 2 systems: one for low grade, and one for high grade. The picture-rock they would have crushed and put in the patios to amalgamate, and the clean-out would have been under heavily-armed guard, in one little place. The sand would have been skimmed off and run through the sluice, and the amalgam would have been scooped out for the retort. If there wasn’t enough water for the sluice at the time, the sand could be stored on a large bench below the patios. The lower grade would have been crushed and taken straight to the sluice.

Here are some excellent photos and sketches of what the patios looked like. Horses and mules were used to keep them agitated, there were no stones pulled around.

http://mollymarieprospect.com/Peralta2p ... patio1.jpg

http://mollymarieprospect.com/Peralta2p ... patio2.jpg

http://mollymarieprospect.com/Peralta2p ... patio3.jpg

This is my guesstimate of how things operated at that place and time…………

cuzzinjack
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