Local gold experts say gold has been prospected in the area for decades, but no such discovery had been made before. "I have been a prospector and dealer for two decades, and cannot remember the last time a nugget over 100 ounces (2.8kg) has been found locally," said Cordell Kent, owner of the Ballarat Mining Exchange Gold Shop. "It's extremely significant as a mineral specimen. We are 162 years into a gold rush and Ballarat is still producing nuggets - it's unheard of." [...] He told Australian media the prospector had been using a state-of-the-art metal detector, which meant he was able to find the gold relatively deep underground in an area which had been searched many times in the past.Yet British archaeologists continue to underestimate the significance of these state-of-the-art detectors now available and those still being developed for policies on artefact hunting and collecting.
'Australian amateur prospector finds massive gold nugget', BBC News 17 January 2013
Vignette: Aussie tekkie
2 comments:
For a discussion of why depth is important see here.
But of course depth is important only insofar as it relates to plough soil depth.
While the latter hasn't increased since that paper was written (and may in fact have decreased), the depth to which detectors can reach increased dramatically just after that publication.
For me, the juxtaposition of detectors capable of reaching to 24 inches with this table of ploughing depths http://farmingforum.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=6860 illustrates a problem that is yet to be acknowledged, still less to be addressed.
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