What is This?
It's brown and heavy.
Could be drugs (does it smell like dirt? ? Or, someone was sampling for
gold, but did not know to use five gallon buckets to sample :-)
--Casey
Bill the brown stuff looks like the brown powder left after gold
has been dissolved in acid.
Thanks Chris H.
It looks like gold chloride. To find out if it its, put a small sample in a crucible,
cover it with an equal weight of anhydrous borax (20 Mule Team Borax will do
in a pinch) and fire it at about 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit for about 10 minutes.
The heat will drive off the chloride, and in the absence of oxygen,
will produce a bead of gold.
Richard S.
Thanks for the inputs!
The owner says the last two are pretty much right on.
Gold dissolved from rock with acid.