MINING FOR SAPPHIRES IN NORTH CAROLINA

welcome to another episode of the watering buffalos and we are in North Carolina at the Mason Ruby and Sapphire that's right so we're going to get some buckets or shovels go to the dig pile it's all native material and we're gonna start hunting for the sapphires I may say unsalted yep so once we get our buckets you know we'll bring them over to these spoons start sifting washing down the material and see what we find [Music] so right up there on the ridge that's where they actually take the big excavators and this has been a mining pay to dig place since the 1940s I believe 1942 and as you can see they've been taking material off this whole hillside in the mountains and they've also found three mining tunnels from when they were actually digging tunnels to mine for sapphires here even companies such as Tiffany's have mined this exact area before for sapphires but what they do is they use the excavators load up load trucks up and then they have two areas one over here to the right when you come across the bridge and that's where they'll start dumping material for everyone to start digging through and processing and we're working the left side this trip and they usually bring material down at least two to three times a year but as you can see these piles are pretty huge after the season where we're at the tail end of the season but you're still able to find some sapphires you just really have to work for it but it's a lot of fun it's neat to find native gems so let's take a quick look here at Kathleen digging some more so she's been having pretty good luck she's been finding smaller sizes but right here so you just get your shovel and start filling up your buckets and take it over to the to the flume but what's cool is we have this whole place to ourselves today because there's a chance of storms its rained a little no but it is very beautiful we would really like to climb up there and get our own dirt but they will not allow it [Music] the whole thing we stick it in the water and kinda works like a classifier so right now I'm just breaking all the clubs up [Music] it's like a classifier it's really like clay material when I just got nice and broken down what they've done here is like built these plumes they're recirculating the water yeah I like the forks on - yep down the flume they're good when I get everything to one side and then I have to go through it all right look at some in there all right now I just got to go through a little at a time not one they're not going to look all Jenny they're gonna look well I'll show you what they look like we found a couple little ones before but I'll show you what they look like and it could be hiding in the mud club so you want to make sure you you break all of them down have more to break down here big rocks they have us put in their wheelbarrow lots of pretty quartz up here I think I even found like amethyst purple it definitely did find the garnet right here got the schist all over it but you can see the all the sides to it really relaxing actually just listening to the water playing in the mud kind of like mining for gold but quieter nothing I'll show you what they do look like him and this one I'm going to put the ones you do find in them there's a couple of them right now you can see all the terminated side you have this thing that's just on the outside but they're just tubes and this one right here and I don't think these two are gem-quality but they're pretty cool okay Danny put those in here but [Music] all right Kathleen's like way up on me she's finding him so I already rinsed my material like Kathleen showed so now I'm just gonna start going through my bed and sometimes you think you find them but they just disintegrate and this stuff will actually stay pretty strong that's mine see I saw one I was working my way oh yeah so you can tell it has like this weird schist all around it now these more unlikely aren't gem quality but they're still genuine North Carolina sapphires so we'll put them into my little jug still got more to go through I know I think this is one too it's just broke yeah they look like it shipped off here but it has that schist in this sides you can see the sides yeah see how it's like angled perfectly and it just got broken off there so we'll definitely keep that one it's it's a cool piece it's special but I still got to go through the rest of my stuff so we'll see what I can find maybe I'll find that 10 carat the bell ringer the bell ringing [Applause] do you mind showing that backlight for the yeah so that you shine a black line that cou that is the other chromium atom like some glow cherry red and that's how you can tell if you have a snuff sapphire yep that's how you can tell so these ones were not those are karnatic they are not set baby that's a cool way to put it kind of not that's pretty cool had never heard he put that way before I'll have to use that one place to herself because the rain kept people away but special shout-out to Judy who was working here and you know let us in and we worked in the rain for a little bit but it's starting to be sunny now we didn't go away empty-handed we didn't get a bell ringer you have to have a 10 carats or more to get a bell ringer but we did get a total of five point nine and have a really good time in I'll show you my favorite one that one right there is really really red but I enjoyed myself yeah so it's you know if you're looking for a place to dig and native dirt and find actual native sapphires to Franklin this is one of the best places to come to many of the other minds you maybe find bigger gems sapphires but they're not from Franklin and you can camp here too exactly so it's really cool in there they're continuing to expand and have more facilities for changing rooms and bathroom and so it's pretty cool now we did get a lot of cool quartz rocks like Kathleen like so we're going to bring those home and we did pick up a bag of gym hater for our premium patron giveaway so if you're interested in becoming a patron check out the link below we appreciate the support and being able to do this and travel to more places and bring you along for the adventures and then give it all right back to you guys so we hope you enjoyed this episode there's going to be a lot more coming your way thanks for watching the video you like what you see don't forget to subscribe and ring the belts we notified of new videos announcements and giveaways also be sure to follow us on Facebook Instagram and Twitter [Music] you

Channel: Wandering Buffalos

Views: 29,478

Rating: 4.8114142 out of 5

Keywords: mining, sapphire, sapphires, gem mining, sapphire mining, looking for sapphires, finding sapphire, where to look for sapphires, blue sapphire, gemstone mining, natural sapphires, how to find sapphires, gemstones, digging for gems, collecting sapphire, how to find gemstones, last of the mohicans, franklin north carolina, sapphire and ruby, sapphire mine north carolina, ruby and sapphire mine, masons ruby and sapphire mine, mining for sapphires in north carolina, minecraft

Id: 90dSx20xIFs

Length: 14min 49sec (889 seconds)

Published: Tue May 28 2019