Holloway Bar Placer Mine - Picture of the Week

This "x-wing rock" looks like something ejected out of a Star Wars movie right onto Holloway Bar on a close fly-by - but it's really just another of the interesting rocks and other objects that are often found while placer mining. I found this interesting piece while walking through one of the tailings ponds not being used this year. A geologist would have a field day sorting through the smartie-box of rocks ejected from the gold plant. After all, gold mining machines are just big rock sorters - they take gravel and dirt in one end and toss, tumble, spin and wash the material to sort the big rocks from the small and the heavy rocks (hopefully including some of the area's gold) from the light while creating a slurry that is caught in the ponds. Larger rocks like this one, about a half-meter across, are usually ejected by the grizzly before reaching the gold plant. Sometimes the gravel contains things left by the old-timers - Scott dug through an old garbage dump on the last hole. In other placer mining areas, pre-historic remains are sometimes found - such as the mammoth skull and tusks recently found in Dawson City. But there are no mammoths here - the glaciers removed any signs of them years ago...

As you have probably noticed from watching the webcams, Scott and Del have the shaker plant fired up and are feeding in the raw materials with the excavator and clearing away the tailings with the cat this season. The shaker plant is a lot more portable than the Wizard, the Holloway Bar gold machine built by Scott in 1997, so is more convenient for this year's mining plan as it can be fairly easily moved every couple of weeks to start digging new ground in search of the McDame Creek's elusive gold channels. Although the Wizard can be moved when necessary, it's significantly larger than the shaker plant and consists of several pieces - the mudbox, trommel, and sluicebox - so it's a lot bigger job. In contrast, Del's shaker plant (be sure to check out last year's video) consists primarily of the main shaker deck and feed bin with a small sluicebox out the end - so is quite easy to pull around with the cat. Once set up in a new location, Del makes sure the plant is leveled correctly before mining as the angle of the shaker deck and sluicebox have a big impact on the gold recovery. After making sure the waste water is gathered up and controlled, they're ready to go mining again after each move.

Access is probably the key ingredient to any kind of resource property. Some natural resources are located in locations so remote and harsh that access is almost impossible. We're lucky on Holloway Bar as the highway runs right to the property. However, there is one small catch that you notice as you get close - although you can drive right here, the property and highway are located on opposite sides of McDame Creek. In the early days, access was only possible by driving through the rushing water - but this meant that conditions had to be favourable - in times of high water during spring runoff, the water was just too high to safely cross. To provide passage during times like this, Scott built a tramline near the river crossing. The manually operated tramline - you cross by sitting on a little platform and pulling yourself across - could transport a person and a bit of gear safely across a few feet above the raging torrent. Eventually, the bridge was built to provide easier and safer access for all those with business here. The tramline is still operational and is available for emergency use, but it is mostly just a reminder of the earlier days on Holloway Bar and the struggles to safely access the property.

It's extremely important to make sure that all of the waste water from the placer mining process is gathered and directed to a safe location. Water is probably the most important piece to the mining puzzle. A large pump carries water from McDame Creek into the gold plant where it is used to both break up the raw materials and carry it over the various "gold catching" elements of the gold plant. On its journey over the shaker deck and through the sluicebox, it turns to a brown muddy colour as it picks up the fine particulate matter (ie dirt and clay) and carries it away. Once it leaves the plant, it's directed into the first tailings pond where the water starts to drain through the gravel on the floor of the pond. Every active mining location on Holloway Bar has a network of several connected tailings ponds. Once the pond nearest the plant starts to fill up, as it will with several days of mining, the overflow starts to run through the pipes that connect the ponds together. These pipes are buried under the road network that provides access through the pond areas and can be driven over. Once the water has drained away, all that is left is a thick layer of mud rich in nourishment where the local plants will thrive in future times!