Time to Celebrate!!

     Come October 24th in Butte, Montana there will be a centennial like none other. (it was fun! Must post someday soon.) The Montana Bureau of Mines and Geology will be celebrating its 100th anniversary of serving the Montana public. 

     They do a wonderful job keeping records of a wide variety of documents, artifacts, and objects that help serve the needs of the people and organizations of our state. They provide and invaluable service plus maintain a great museum of gems and minerals.  

      The staff say they have lots planned for that day, and we intend to see just what it is. This site intends to add to the festivities for sure. 

DEQ Makes an Attempt

      With the public comment opportunity at Great Falls High School recently, Rainy, the water dismissal chief from DEQ had statistics, paperwork, and pep talk, but she didn't quite know what to make of comments and questions asked of her: Are you really going to look at the daily, weekly and monthly data from this mine (at the refinery DEQ lets them self-monitor the flame for every 10 minutes it is going and for days there is no reporting?) How is the PH maintained? How does repositories work if you are not changing the chemical structure  of materials removed? Plastic for a pond...is that secure enough? Are they going to use up all the ground water? Even though you tell them what to do, when you don't monitor what they do to return the water to a safe level, is that sufficient? Would you present to the Montana Bureau of Mines and Geology in October because conditions of the water in mining is a crucial element for public safety. What kind of pollution is Great Falls going to have to deal with when this mine pollutes our upstream water? Did you know there are already 5 Super Fund sites along the Missouri River Corridor that were promised to be remediated long ago and nothing has happened? Did you know Belt's water was polluted by mining that closed in the 1930's and they had to float millions of dollars in a water filtration plant recently to clean the water sufficiently for health? Did you know that Great Falls water is already close to unacceptable levels now without pollution from this mine? 

      Rainy's response to my questioning: my, Alma, you are all over the place! Ummm...yeah, when there are accountability issues, there are many topics to cover. Many of the speakers said that DEQ had not done a sufficient job analyzing all the factors in regards to this mine, and it needs to go back and work some more on their drafts. The Great Falls Tribune had a very good article about this event that is worthy of perusal. 

Hear or See Where People are Finding Gold; Want to Know More So You Can Stake a Claim Nearby....

      Here's how you do it. Call up Peggy Delaney at the Montana Bureau of Mines and Geology. She looks up on her computer all the details of the area that you think might have gold on the land. She gives you the exact location with the township, range and section so you can find it physically. 

     Then you can go to the Montana Cadastral and look up two views of the land so you know what you are looking at in several different directions. You can get the entire details on any site or claim if you want to. She ID's whether the nearby land is USFS or BLM so you know who to go to for more information. Peggy is such a great resource of all information about claims and mining site and more. The best!! She is the Program Leader in the Mining Archives and her email is MDelaney@mtech.edu or find her on www.mbmg.mtech.edu Public information is handy!!

Trippy Rocks

      At the gathering of rock and mineral hounds, there was an Idaho rock trader who had gone to the Tuscon Gem and Mineral Show 46 times in his life. With such jaunts, one begins to know the vendors and their benefits.

      One of those vendors offered to take a group of 8 people to Morocco, take a list of rocks sought after and make sure there would be trips to dig for those stones in the 10 days for $1000 out of Arizona. Sounds like a deal; more to come.

Making Haste

     With Memorial Day quickly sneaking up on us, preparation plans for the take-off are brewing on the back burner of many a mind. Thinking menus, what to bring, hoping for a better dig this year with yellow in the troughs of the high bankers, and the fun around the fire in the woods at night.

     With new equipment on board, a winter of thoughts of good weather ahead, we are soon to pack up the shovels and head out for the biggest prospecting event offered in Montana for group participation with the Billings chapter in Zortman, Montana. It gets your prospecting itch scratched and you have a bang-up time meeting hard working, and lovable people who have the desire to dig. Sign up for the Big Dig, choose the friends you want to work with and head out soon. You will be glad you did. Check it out at this site: http://yellowstoneprospectors.homestead.com/Zortman-Dig-Info.html

Gold on That Thar' Globe!!

     When you have a chance to create a snow globe, you scour the house for objects to use as you ditch the Dollar Store or Michaels in options, you gather some random piece to see what might behoove you in class. 

      Sure enough with the encouragement of others in class, antique Lady Liberty without her scale got an earth ball that quickly got golden nuggets to represent the weight of the world with golden opportunities to have and behold those beautiful shiny things. 

      It's gold at her feet and the propulsion of a golden flower to her backside that means the shiny golden flakes of sparkly gold will shower down whenever shook throughout the winter to remind us just what can we be doing with the weather warms up and our winter doldrums dissipate. Our gold pans in hand will bring the richness of the earth to us without a bit of trouble.

      News has come that the Lewis and Clark National Forest has set up meetings for the public's input both in Lincoln and in Great Falls for revisions of the forest plan revision process with updates. This is a strategic arrangement since the initial meetings planned did not include the mining interests. Making plans without including the prospectors and those who hold claims in the areas affected is serious malignment of the people affected. Luckily we will be able to be a part of planning and input now that we know about the meetings ahead of time.

      This gives prospectors advanced notice to go, speak your mind and say what you want to say. This is our government and our voices need to be heard.

       The meeting in Lincoln is on July 30th from 5-7 in the Community Center and the one in Great Falls is on August 2, from 5-7 as well in the Civic Center.

       Make plans on being at one or all of these meetings to state your opinion about how our forests are managed; certainly they haven't been managed properly to date and eliminate input, and transparent practices as the rules and regulations can be anything they want without accountability or resultatant effects of their decisions. A more balanced driving force needs to be an influencing factor in their decisions.

We Want Clean Water!!

Mining Shouldn't Destroy It; Being Responsible is a Must!! Please join me in voting YES on I-186 to protect Montana's waterways.

Yes for Responsible Mining/I-186 is a ballot initiative before Montana voters in November that protects water quality and prevents pollution of our rivers. I-186 would require the Montana Department of Environmental Quality to deny a hard rock mining permit for a new mine that would cause permanent water pollution that would necessitate water treatment forever. I-186 does not impact existing mining operations, revisions to those mining operations or amendments to those mining operations. Only new hard rock mines permitted after November 6, 2018 will fall under the new law. Miners currently employed in mining operations across the state will not be impacted by I-186 because I-186 does not apply to current mines. There are approximately 1,900 hard rock mining jobs in the state and none of those jobs would be impacted by I-186. Voting for I-186 is a vote for responsible mining. We know new mines can meet this common-sense regulation.  Mines such as the Troy copper mine near Troy, Montana, and the Stillwater mine on the Stillwater River near Fishtail, Montana, are examples of such mines already in operation that are not predicted to cause permanent water pollution. Proposed mines such as the Butte Highlands mine south of Butte, Montana, on a tributary of the Big Hole River also would not produce polluted water requiring treatment forever and, if developed, would not be impacted by the proposed new law.
       Two states, Michigan and New Mexico, have passed similar laws. Mines have been permitted in those states since those laws were enacted. New Mexico is poised to permit a new, large copper mine and has continued to be the number two copper producing state in the U.S., behind Arizona under a law like this. Following their lead, the state of Maine recently passed a law of their own that will encourage responsible mining there too.
       Montana’s wild trout fisheries are treasures, some of the very best in the lower 48.  Some of these, such as the Smith, are directly threatened. I-186 will help us prevent irresponsible mines from destroying Montana’s trout treasures. Please join me in voting YES on I-186. Thank you! With your help we will win!

Dinosaurs to Helena

       Want to take kids to see the dinosaurs? Try this upcoming event in Helena, Montana that families can flock to for entertainment for the entire family. It should prove to be very interesting to stimulate the imagination and to formulate the vision of what life was like long ago. Get tickets and information for this event at the fairgrounds there by clicking on this link: https://jurassicquest.com/helena