PLACERS OF THE RAMPART REGION. 77 
at $18 per ounce. Some small nuggets of copper and a small amount 
of silver have been found with the gold. 
Mining. — Most of the claims are worked by drifting in the winter, 
though the three loAver ones are worked during the summer by open 
cuts. On the latter the muck and gravel are first ground-sluiced off 
within 1 or 2 feet of bed rock by means of a dam provided with an 
automatic gate, and the remaining gravels are afterwards shoveled 
into the sluice boxes. The drifted pay gravels have often been " coy- 
oted " or " gophered ; " that is, holes have been sunk here and there 
without system until, although there is probably much pay still left, 
the ground is frequently almost unworkable on account of the ice 
in the old holes which floods the neAV workings when thawed by a 
steam point. When workings are filled with water, the mass is said 
to freeze on the top, sides, and bottom, while the central part remains 
unfrozen through several years. Much of the ground is worked on 
" laj^s " or leases, the lessees paying from 25 to 55 per cent of the 
gross output, an amount that is apt to leave the worker little for his 
labor if things do not run very smoothly. Freight rates are 2 cents 
per pound in winter and 4 cents per pound in summer. 
The remaining gold in Little Minook Creek would seem to be best 
recovered by working the claims in cooperation as one company, for 
it is certain that some of the richer claims can no longer be profitably 
worked by drifting. The quickest, but an initially expensive, mode 
of working would be to hydraulic the gravels by bringing water from 
Minook Creek. A ditch 10 miles in length above the mouth of Little 
Minook Creek would probably give a head of over 100 feet and plenty 
of water at the upper limit of the pay gravels. A way requiring 
less capita], but much slower, and the one that will likely be car- 
ried out in the end, is the ground-sluicing of the claims, successively, 
from the mouth of the creek upward, by means of dams and auto- 
matic gates, but as the claims belong to different parties, some of 
whom are unwilling to sell, there will probably be only a small 
amount of work carried on along the creek for a number of years to 
come. 
LITTLE MINOOK JUNIOR (KEEK. 
General description . — Little Minook Junior Creek, between Little 
Minook and Hoosier creeks, is about 2.1 miles long. Its valley lies 
wholly within the high bench of Minook Creek. It is a weak si renin, 
generally dry during the summer, and rarely carries a sluice head of 
water. With a valley of hard rocks it has not been able to cut its 
bed down to the depth reached by the larger tributaries of Minook 
Creek. In the lower half the grade of the creek is torrential and the 
valley is narrow with steep sides. In the upper half the grade is 
