Old Timer Shafts

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Hi Guys,
These old timer shafts are in the Cue,Mt Magnet area it amazes me how the old timers found the gold in these area's and the shafts were built with precision. Looking along the stone retaining walls they're gunbarrel straight no short cuts here. The old timers did it tough but still maintained high disciplin.


Cheers Kev

Hey Kev where are the pics of the GOLD ??????

Hi Kev, given the amount of stonework appearing in new up-market houses, and with the quality of the dry stone work in your pics, I reckon they would do well in Perth today!

I know a creek in the Pilbara that had been dug out and the old timers have stacked rocks along the length of the creek - on each bank. The creek had not seen pushed which is very unusual nowdays so it was just like they left it.

I felt bad digging signals on the banks and disturbing the stonework - felt like I was in a historical site - in fact it probably should be given the rarety.  I dug carefully and ended up putting the rocks back as i found them.

Stingray

Only dug 9 little bits Chris, better than nothing but I've got to find new ground.
Yeah Stingray I agree they deserve our respect.

Cheers Kev

Nice pics Kev.
The old diggers pulled off some mean dry walls. Here in NSW there are plenty of chinese workings where they stacked round river wash in vertical walls. They built tracks along creeks that are holding up well since they were built in 1857. There are water races that run for kilometers where they cut through solid rock and bridged gullies with stone via ducts.
Still,the diggers here had water but you have to take your hat off to the hard core reef workers in WA.

Depending on the age of the workings, a lot were made by men from overseas who had experience of doing that kind of work anyway.
Ya only gotta look at the stone walls in England and Ireland and you see where the skill comes from.
But likes ya's say, you have to hand it to them. Those men did things we wouldn't dream of doing today, unless we had a 4x4 and a bulldozer.
Aaah, the good old days. Where men were men and the kangaroos were nervous  

cheers
Cliff

PS. Kev, gold is gold not matter how small and it's always nice to find some.

Well you better start taking lots of photos because there's a good chance they're all gonna be bulldozed by the DMP.

You may be aware that next year, it's proposed by the DMP to bring in a "Mining Rehabilitation Fund" levy. All prospectors and companies will pay this levy if legacy mining works exist on thier tenements and the potential clean up liability is greater than $50,000.00 to clear up the mess that others left behind. This includes old working etc. It doesn't take much to rack up $50 grand using machinery such as Cat D8. I can charge out my "little" Cat 943 at $1500.00 a day (wet hire).

The money raised by this levy will go towards rehabbing old mine sites - this means all old mine sites. So get yer cameras out.

Oh yes,,,,,,,,,,,and say thank you to those nice Greenies for getting this done for the benefit of mankind.    

Cat

I do see a positive to dozing the old shafts, it will bring up new ground to detect over.

yeah but the trouble is these old shafts are already on pegged ground thus creating more dramas in the bush..

but as people say it would be a miscarry of justice to destroy some of our culture and history..

regards
oneday

I agree Oneday, the DMP have no right to authorise the destruction of Australian history. Where do they get there brainless idea's from where is the logic?

Kev

Phone 'em up and ask 'em. God knows we in APLA have tried and gotten no sense.

Cat

There are a few shaftstat have been bulldozed in the name of public safety on crown land over here.
I was lucky enough to show up a week after the dozer went through,and got some little speci's from where the mine heaps were pushed flat.
Didnt they dump the overburden from the super pit in Kal ontop of prime alluvial workings?

Cat, can I assume it means some of the old open cut pits will also be backfilled ?
if they do, I wouldn't mind walking over the ground. I'm not sure if they screened the top soil before getting at the hard rock so there surely would have been gold in the overburden piles.

Yes, some of the old pits will, in time, be backfilled. This Mining Rehab Levy is a very complex structure designed to release the current Environmental Bond system that miners lodge with the DMP. This will release funds to the mining industry that can then be used for exploration, mining or just lining the pockets of directors,,,,,,,,,,,, 

This bond was originally designed to ensure that miners actually do rehabiliate the ground - which as you often see, never gets done.

So now, we all have to pay a levy on our tenement fees that will slowly build up into a fund, the proceeds ofwhich will "indemnify" the State from the liability of cleaning up any environmental mess.

It's unlikely that small miners will have a sufficiently high cost liability to trigger the levy. The lower limit is thought to be "$50,000.00". Anything above that cost of cleaning up will attract the levy for that tenement.

Just another money grab.

Cat

Those old shafts and sites are part of the history of our great country and should be left as memorials to the prospectors who helped make it this way as a show for those to come ahead of us in the years ahead just what hardships  our forebears went through,        filling  old open cuts, hell the cost would be prohibitive, just think what that money spent on our health system could do for the country, from what I have seen those old open pits have become a reliable source of water for both cattle and wildlife.
Ask a young mine worker at Cue last year what it was that she doing, told me that the previous day that she and a few others had spent the day chasing wild goats away from the old open cuts and out THROUGH the fences away from there lease so they wouldn't fall in the open cuts,  said that at the monthly meeting in Perth they had to show what they were doing as part of there environmental work on the lease and this was part of it.  I pointed to the mound at the far end of the nearby open cut and said there is a couple of them up there, She took of to escort them out.

salt-d wrote:Those old shafts and sites are part of the history of our great country and should be left as memorials to the prospectors who helped make it this way as a show for those to come ahead of us in the years ahead just what hardships  our forebears went through,        filling  old open cuts, hell the cost would be prohibitive, just think what that money spent on our health system could do for the country, from what I have seen those old open pits have become a reliable source of water for both cattle and wildlife.
Ask a young mine worker at Cue last year what it was that she doing, told me that the previous day that she and a few others had spent the day chasing wild goats away from the old open cuts and out THROUGH the fences away from there lease so they wouldn't fall in the open cuts,  said that at the monthly meeting in Perth they had to show what they were doing as part of there environmental work on the lease and this was part of it.  I pointed to the mound at the far end of the nearby open cut and said there is a couple of them up there, She took of to escort them out.

I look at it this way.  Mining Companies dug the bloody pits, if they aren't going back to them then the least they can do is fill em in.  As for being a water source, I've tasted some of the water in them.  Ya can't drink it, it's foul water.  Animals might be able too but not humans.
I have said in a post ages ago, that the mining companies know the water is crap.  Some actually took the time to find breeds of fish and shellfish that could tolerate the water.
Station stock know where their water supply is, wild life is another story.
As for goats, they will eat anything so I guess they will drink the water out of the pits.
Years ago I was on a station east of Leonora.  The station owner rocked up while we were there.  He told us why they had drill holes everywhere in an area about the size of a football ground trying to find the source of fresh water for stock but all they got was salty water.  There was 1 old shaft in the vicinity that did have water in it, it was tested.  It was sweet water and fresh. We dumped our Leo water and refilled our containers.
As an adjunct to this story, the station owner was kranky with detectorists.  A few weeks before I got there, a bunch of low lifes had used the water troughs to do their laundry and left the soapy water in them.    
 

Cheers
Cliff

If you want to know where to catch fish in an open cut right next to a massive pending lease with some good ground, pm me. it half an hour from leo and close to the highway. great place for a swim, but don't eat the fish as the water is highly mineralized an they taste crap, but its good fun fishing. the mine and pits are inactive and the place is about to be taken over as its on C&M atm. just rock up to the mine office and tell my bro that you will be detecting on the lease I can tell you about, then go for ya life. the chinese will have the place within weeks so now is your chance.
rw

p.s,
Found a goanna down an old shaft oneday, that had no way out, so my mate and I lowered a large stick on a rope down there, and that goanna jumped straight onto that stick with its front legs then my mate hauled it all the way out while it hung on to freedom. when it came out it looked all wrinkly/dehydrated and buggered. we put some water out for it then let it be while we went for a walk ,came back later and it was gone.
Twas a good feeling and I think we created ourselves some luck as we were rewarded with a nugget each later that day.
true story
rw

Like it roger good yarn