Gold Panning, Potato Creek, Black Hills, South Dakota
$100 per person per day, $25 for each additional person, 12 and under are free. More information on costs at bottom of page, our prices have not changed in 10 years (up dated 3/25/25)
The summer of 2019 was the best ever as we found gold and gem stones in every pan. As we ended the summer we moved into a inside bend in the creek that was yielding appox. 150 flakes per pan. We found a large number of nice garnets. Most of these stones are faceted as if they had been cut to fit in a ring. Mike also made a number of improvements to his equipment that have made the tough job much easier. These improvements have still kept to the rule of no power equipment as in the 1800's. We are looking forward to another great summer in 2020. You can also watch us doing some gold panning on the TV show fishing Friendzy with Austin Vanderzee.
If you have ever dreamed for finding gold in the Black Hills we are the answer for you. You will learn how to gather ore from a mining claim and in the end pan out some gold. We will be using the same tools and techniques used by the early miners. You and your group keep all gold and gem stones (Garnets) you find in your pan, and we have never not found some.( the picture to the left if what was found by just one miner at the claim.)
(Note: Mike has added a orienteering trail that covers about 3/4 of a mile though the area at was mined in the 1880's. The tree are blazed with a white cross on them. The trail ends in a small chapel under the canopy of the trees. If part of your group wants to take a break from the mining this is it. It is hard to get lost as the creek guides you some what with it being easy to find your way back.)
Each expedition starts with some of Mike's story telling about the way gold was got in the old days. He also presents a gold brick award, each person can choose a piece of fools gold, and a 10,000,000 year old fossil for free. To the left is a good example is the gold and garnet gem stones found in 4 1/2 hours (8/5/11) of panning. A large number of nuggets, including the 7 ounce famous Potato Creek nugget, have come from this area in the past and with the price of gold around $3,000 per ounce you could get lucky and hit it rich. To date the largest nuggets we have found was summer of 2016 in that they measured 1/8th by 3/16th by 1/16th inches. This was a husband wife team and they both got nuggets almost the same size with in minutes of each other. The battery was dead on my electronic gram scale so we could not weigh them but from experience i would say over $200 each.
All mining equipment will be provided for your mining experience including lunch. Groups of 1 on up possible, we have plenty of equipment for large groups, we can set up same day trips in most situations. Just call and see what we have available, keep in mind that Mike only books two days per week with his guiding.
This last summer of 2018 was the best ever and mostly because as normal we just keep figuring out how to find more gold from the same area. I won't say how but we found more and you can come and see our secrets. We had one group that only went four hours and found enough gold to pay for the cost of the expedition. They found some gem stones to boot. You can do this too. The pictures of the pans of gold are not all the gold we found for the day like some places do but that was a single pan. We had pans last summer with well over TWO HUNDRED flakes. You can do this too but you need to come give it a try. We are nothing like those road side stops that salt in some gold for you to find. The gold you will find will have never seen light of day before.
We have some hard rains and heavy snow run off's up on the crik so we should see some interesting results as new gold is always washing in. Mike has hoisted a number of large rocks in the creek that we dug under last summer. Gold is always washing into the crik and should be a better chance of settling behind some of those big speed bumps. We were just getting into a hot spot when we had to quit for the summer last year. I also have a fine gram scale to weigh your findings if you like at the end of day. We are thinking that this summer will be the best yet. Come join in the fun. GOLD FEVER !!!!!!!
(Note: Mike has added a orienteering trail that covers about 3/4 of a mile though the area at was mined in the 1880's. The tree are blazed with a white cross on them. The trail ends in a small chapel under the canopy of the trees. If part of your group wants to take a break from the mining this is it. It is hard to get lost as the creek guides you some what with it being easy to find your way back.)
Each expedition starts with some of Mike's story telling about the way gold was got in the old days. He also presents a gold brick award, each person can choose a piece of fools gold, and a 10,000,000 year old fossil for free. To the left is a good example is the gold and garnet gem stones found in 4 1/2 hours (8/5/11) of panning. A large number of nuggets, including the 7 ounce famous Potato Creek nugget, have come from this area in the past and with the price of gold around $3,000 per ounce you could get lucky and hit it rich. To date the largest nuggets we have found was summer of 2016 in that they measured 1/8th by 3/16th by 1/16th inches. This was a husband wife team and they both got nuggets almost the same size with in minutes of each other. The battery was dead on my electronic gram scale so we could not weigh them but from experience i would say over $200 each.
All mining equipment will be provided for your mining experience including lunch. Groups of 1 on up possible, we have plenty of equipment for large groups, we can set up same day trips in most situations. Just call and see what we have available, keep in mind that Mike only books two days per week with his guiding.
This last summer of 2018 was the best ever and mostly because as normal we just keep figuring out how to find more gold from the same area. I won't say how but we found more and you can come and see our secrets. We had one group that only went four hours and found enough gold to pay for the cost of the expedition. They found some gem stones to boot. You can do this too. The pictures of the pans of gold are not all the gold we found for the day like some places do but that was a single pan. We had pans last summer with well over TWO HUNDRED flakes. You can do this too but you need to come give it a try. We are nothing like those road side stops that salt in some gold for you to find. The gold you will find will have never seen light of day before.
We have some hard rains and heavy snow run off's up on the crik so we should see some interesting results as new gold is always washing in. Mike has hoisted a number of large rocks in the creek that we dug under last summer. Gold is always washing into the crik and should be a better chance of settling behind some of those big speed bumps. We were just getting into a hot spot when we had to quit for the summer last year. I also have a fine gram scale to weigh your findings if you like at the end of day. We are thinking that this summer will be the best yet. Come join in the fun. GOLD FEVER !!!!!!!
Here's the CPI (Crow Peak Outfitters) gold bars, fools gold, and fossils that mike gives to every group during his informational talk prior to getting to work.
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Hi Mike,
I wanted to let you know what a wonderful time we had panning for gold with you recently on Potato Creek. It was a great experience. The equipment we used, the classifier, sluice, and the pan, and your patient explanations of the process and purpose of each step of finding gold, gave us a good understanding of how it was done in the days of the gold rush. We enjoyed learning the details of how the early miners did this. We also enjoyed the historical information and local stories you shared with us along the way. It was a good way to spend a day in the Black Hills. If someone wants to get rich quick, it probably won't happen panning for gold on Potato Creek. But if anyone wants to really learn and experience the way gold panning was done in the past and how gold mining shaped the history of the Black Hills area, I would definitely recommend they join you for this gold panning adventure. Thanks for a very memorable day. Bill Vanevenhoven De Pere, WI |
Good friends and family find gold in the hills
You can choose to wear rubber boots but the water is not that terrible cold and a pair of old tennis shoes works fine. This is hard work grubbing the gold from the creek but can really be fun when you pan out a good pan with a couple of dozen flakes in it. Nothing shines like gold in the bright sun shine or as they say, some color in your pan. We provide you with a vile to save your gold and a vile to put jem stones in as part of your cost. Rochelle and Mike have been hunting with a gold pan looking for color for 20 plus years. One gold brick award goes to each group.
A little explanation of what we will do when you are out gold panning with us.
We start by mucking the rock and ore out of creek or where ever else you would like to try for gold. We run the material through a high efficiency classifier (designed and built by Mike) that separates the fine gold ore from the larger rock. This goes into a large tub that we then run through a arm powered rocker sluice (a copy of the ones the old times used built by Mike) to further separate the gold from the tailings. The sluice is washed out back wards into another tub. We then scoop out the fines and put into a gold pan and work it down to the mother lode for your pocket. Mike gives very clear instructions on how not lose that hard earned color in your pan. Remember Mike taught school and loved it for 25 years and taught from kindergarten on up. We can start our day any time but for the most part about 10 am is best to be on site as it is fairly well warmed up by then.
A little explanation of what we will do when you are out gold panning with us.
We start by mucking the rock and ore out of creek or where ever else you would like to try for gold. We run the material through a high efficiency classifier (designed and built by Mike) that separates the fine gold ore from the larger rock. This goes into a large tub that we then run through a arm powered rocker sluice (a copy of the ones the old times used built by Mike) to further separate the gold from the tailings. The sluice is washed out back wards into another tub. We then scoop out the fines and put into a gold pan and work it down to the mother lode for your pocket. Mike gives very clear instructions on how not lose that hard earned color in your pan. Remember Mike taught school and loved it for 25 years and taught from kindergarten on up. We can start our day any time but for the most part about 10 am is best to be on site as it is fairly well warmed up by then.
Here are some examples of gold and gem stones (garnets) we have found, yours is waiting for you to find
The Filmore Mine is one of the first sites we can visit on your Gold Fever Adventure.
What a trouper, with water in his boots and gloves this young man found the gold even in 6 inches of snow. That's how the tough old miners did it back in the day.
This the pulley system on the old filmore mine. Imagine hauling this equipment into the hills on the old 1920's trucks. Those are 12" steam cylinders
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Here's what a mining claim looks like as we will be working the potato creek area under the mining claim of the Filmore Family
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This the boiler for the old filmore mine to run the steam operated equipment.
I did a poor job of taking group pictures last summer as you just get into the work and finding gold and when it is good you really forget. There are plenty of pictures following this to see what I am talking about. Feel free to give me a call if you have questions.
Too your left are photo's when I remembered to take them from summer of 2016. Problem is after my short talk about gold panning every one is ready to go to work and I forget to get some shots.
1. the rock we dug up in creek last summer i call dinosaur rock. I feel it has foot prints in it and you can decide for your self when you see it. 2. This is Daisy #3 mine on the Filmore mining claim. 3. Working with the classifier 4. Panning the fines down 5. Digging material in the creek 6. working the tub of fines down to the gold 7. Digging for materail 8. Panning in the creek 9. Panning in the creek |
Mike took the St. Joseph Newman Club on a gold panning trip October and the water was cold but the fun we had was not.
The Minnesotan's doing some digging, they have gold areas back home and planned to take this information home to see what they could find.
This was a June snow ball fight for the fun of it. It gets warm up there late and cold early.
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Father son from Minnesota learning about finding the gold in the Black Hills.
Father son crew putting the rock on the rocker sluice.
Another father son panning out the good stuff, when you are finding gold and gem stones your back does not get so tired.
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This family really worked as a team mucking out the ore to be run through the classifier that you can see.
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After mucking, classifying, rocker sluicing it is time to take the fine to the pans.
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Cold gold
When we got up to Potato Creek there was snow on the ground, water was super cold, but it never deterred these guys from finding the most gold of the summer.
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Banking it
We found the most gold in the creek bank, the guys ignored the cold and found the gold.
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Running the old rocker sluice
Did not take these guys long to figure out all the tools for gold fever.
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Pannin' party
Here the crew learning how to work out the fines looking for that shinny metal in the pan. Never had a single pan with out some color in it.
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Super pan
Mike did a follow up from the bottom of the tub, which normally is a worst of the fines. Turns out to be the best pan of the summer.
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Here's the proof
Check out how much gold we found in about 4 hours
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Rock box or sluice?
Here we are working the box back and forth to get some separation of gold and fines before we start to pan.
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Shining in the sun
The flakes for this group were the biggest of the summer and some garnets to boot.
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A mucking we will go !
Three of us were digging under the big rock I lifted while I was out prospecting earlier.
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Pannin' out the color
The material that we worked with was super heavy today but with some work we turned the trick.
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Nice pan o' color
Here was best pan of the day with 40 plus flakes .
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Gold and Garnet Gem Stones
Here was the end result of a day of work. A good batch of gold and some excellent gem stones.
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Mom and daughter
This is family fun with out the computer.
Checkin' the pretty rocks out
Never know if there will be a gold streak in one of the quartz rocks.
Family fun in the outdoors
Every one is looking for the gold, that big nugget could be in the next pan.
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Gettin' ready to find their fortune
This is a good look at Potato Creek.. It was very dry last summer so water flow was very low also. The kids do not have to be mining the whole time as there is plenty of space to explore this historical area.
Mom and son findin' the flakes
They not only found good gold in a short time but a good batch of gem stones.
Mom and dad pulling out the good stuff
The kids are out exploring while back at the claim it business as usual.
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Here's the proof for the work
This was about 4 hours of work. Some of those stone are ring quality.
Here's the sluice in operation
Taking the fines from the classifier and running them through the sluice is the step before panning starts.
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Learnin' the tricks of findin' the yellow stuff
This young man came down from North Dakota to learn the tricks of panning and see what my equipment looked like to make some of his own.
Panning out the flakes of yellow fever
It can be tiring but when you are averaging about 15 flakes per pan you kind of forget that.
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Daniel hits a pan with 25 flakes of gold
Took a while but once Dan figured out how the panning works he was kicking butt.
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Here's the lay out on Potato Creek
Good view of the classifier and sluice in the creek
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Digging for gold
Mike and Lacey digging in Potato Creek filling buckets with materials to take to classifier
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Working in a gold mine
Trisha is helping Lacey pry some of that placer gold out of the creek bed
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Classifier work
The girls are dumping the creek materials into the classifier to remove large stones to prepare material for the sluice
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Sluicing it down to fines
Taking the material from the classifier and running it down the rocker sluice gathers the fines so that it is ready to pan out and gather some placer gold
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The abandoned Fillmore Mine
This is the fillmore Mine that was operated by Charlie Fillmore's dad back before World War II. It produced gold and sliver and was very profitable at the time. It is located on the hill above Potato Creek where we will be panning. The mine closed when the war started as most of the work force entered the military service. It is now totally abandoned and not in operation.
Here’s my testimonial:
We had a great time panning for gold just like the 49’ers did during the California gold rush. With picks, shovels and a lot of elbow grease, Mike show us how to extract golden treasure from Mother Nature the old fashion way. This is no “side of the road” tourist attraction. This is the “real deal” with the discovery of gold in every one of our pans. You won’t get rich monetarily but you’ll gain a treasure trove of information from Mike.
Keith
We had a great time panning for gold just like the 49’ers did during the California gold rush. With picks, shovels and a lot of elbow grease, Mike show us how to extract golden treasure from Mother Nature the old fashion way. This is no “side of the road” tourist attraction. This is the “real deal” with the discovery of gold in every one of our pans. You won’t get rich monetarily but you’ll gain a treasure trove of information from Mike.
Keith
My Story
Visiting Mike and Rochelle is always a good time. They are great hosts and half the fun is seeing what new project Mike is up to.
With my youngest son Daniel (age 20) Mike suggested we try something different and go gold panning.
That sounded great to me and son Daniel was up for it as well. Being a history teacher I like having real experiences like this to better
understand what our ancestors went through to survive and to be able to share that knowledge with my kids.
Heading up into the hills outside of Spearfish on a dirt road is really the way to get part of the true feel of the hills. No false
tourism/reptile gardens/waterslides or knick knacks here. Real nature and real outdoors. It wasn't too long before we stopped at a cabin
tucked into the woods for permission and to pay a small fee paid to work a claim along a creek. After several minutes of interesting
conversation with a colorful hills character we headed off the the "rich digs." Don't kid yourself there is some work involved but with
a healthy young man working the tools the time and dirt moved well. With Mike helping and directing as we worked and using Mikes home made
placer mining equiptment we attacked to creek bottom. Soon we had sorted out the rock and larger waste and had ourselves some promising
dirt to pan out. Mikes instruction along the way gave us encouragement and insight to what the gold rush miners had gone
through. Next we got a lesson in panning. Daniel got it down well and I struggled.
Our hard work paid off as the pan revealed tiny flecks of color as well as a few little garnets. A couple times I had a little heart
jump when I thought I saw a small nugget. That was fools gold. Appropriate that I would get that!
Daniel was a natural and was nailing the gold with quite a number of flakes in his pans while my pans from the same dirt yielded
considerably less. I estimate we spent the better part of the afternoon counting travel time and a little lunch break and picked up
what Mike estimated as about $30-40 in gold.We placed the gold and garnets in a little vial. Daniel go to keep the
vial as he earned it as well as bragging rights. If they hadn't had me messing things up it would likely have been more!
The experience was great! Even better to have my son share that with me. We've seen Rushmore, Crazy Horse and most of the rest of the
usual attractions in the Black Hills and they are all great. But a day of panning left us with a real understanding of the true history
of the hills, a little gold, some sore muscles and a real feeling of accomplishment! It was the highlight of my trip and something I'd
definitely want to try again. I've got some redeeming to do! Tracy Upton, Milbank, South Dalota
Panning fun
The idea to go gold panning was somewhat of a spur of the moment outing. I was visiting my brother in Spearfish when we decided to try some gold panning in the hills to the west of town. The drive was not long and the scenery along the way made the trip seem even shorter. When we arrived at the claim, we carried our tools and pans to a spot along the creek that looked promising. After being shown what we needed to do to setup our panning operation, I started panning for gold. The weather was fantastic and water cold. The panning looked a lot easier when Mike was doing it. After a few pans and some additional instruction, I got the hang of it. It wasn’t long before I found my first small flecks of gold and deposited them into my glass bottle. During breaks from panning, I imagined what it was like during the gold rush and thought about the prospectors that probably were panning like this in this very stream. When we had enough panning for the day, we packed up our tools and pans and headed back to town. I did not get rich with amount of gold I found but I had an experience that I will never forget.
Jeff Berg, Sioux Falls, South Dakota
What's it going to cost to haul the gold away
One person $100 per day
Two people $125 per day
$25 for each additional person
All children 12 and under are free
All adults 13 years and older will have to pay a $50 trespass/gold mining fee directly to the Filmore Corporation. We will pay this on site before we start to work. (keep in mind that there are few gold panning area's that don't have claims on them and the claim owners take trespassing on their claim very serious)
Two people $125 per day
$25 for each additional person
All children 12 and under are free
All adults 13 years and older will have to pay a $50 trespass/gold mining fee directly to the Filmore Corporation. We will pay this on site before we start to work. (keep in mind that there are few gold panning area's that don't have claims on them and the claim owners take trespassing on their claim very serious)