Emerald Creek photos

Emerald Creek Garnet Area
You may freely copy and use these photos.

by Monica Ray, Cactus Computer Co.

Big Changes for the 2006 season

In order to address water quality, aquatic habitat, and safety concerns, the Forest Service is converting to a new method for gemstone collecting. Visitors will take garnet-bearing gravels from a stockpile to one of the two sluices where they will wash and screen for garnets. While visitors will no longer be digging for garnets, the new method will still allow people to enjoy the thrill of discovery.

The gravel stockpile was selected from areas surveyed by a geologist for garnet quality, quantity, size and weight. In this first year of the change, the gravel is from the best areas of the survey. Come and see!

All of the equipment will now be provided so you will not have to bring your own and pack it up the gulch. Permits are $10 for an adult, $5.00 for children.

HOURS: 9 AM -to- 5PM, Friday thru Tuesday. CLOSED Wednesdays & Thursdays

Be sure to phone if you intend to come on Memorial Day. They might not be ready for visitors - there's a lot to do this year.

ST. JOE RANGER DISTRICT
222 S. 7^th Str, Suite 1
St. Maries, Idaho ~ 83861
(208) 245~2531 or Clarkia (208) 245~1134

1997 Article:

The Emerald Creek garnet area in northern Idaho is open from Memorial Day until Labor Day. Digging is with hand tools only, and each person is limited to six days per year or 30 pounds of garnets, whichever comes first. Thirty pounds of garnets? Don't laugh too hard - it's unusual but it's been done.

During the season, the site is open from Friday through Tuesday, 9:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. At the ranger's cabin, adults pay ten dollars per day to dig, and children under 14 pay five dollars. And dig you do! We've decided to go into training for next season - maybe we'll dig trenches in the back yard for two months before Memorial Day. Without a training period, don't figure on doing anything physical (like bending over to tie your shoes) for several days after you return.

Once you pay your fees, you get to pick from an array of shovels, buckets and screens at the ranger station. We brought our own as well, just in case there were more diggers than there were free shovels. In three trips, that's never been the case, but we'll continue to bring tools anyway. It would be a shame to have to either make a three hour drive for tools or, more likely, just go home again.

Then there's a hike through the woods to the garnet digging area. After about a quarter mile of ups and downs, we reached the designated area. The hole at left is near a small stream which has been mostly piped around the dig by the Forest Service. This is both to maintain the quality of the water and to keep the holes drier. Even so, water seeps through the gravel into the holes fairly quickly. By morning a dry hole will need plenty of bailing again.

The garnets are found in the reddish gravel at the bottom of the holes. The ranger explained that every ten thousand years or so, a huge flood scours the dirt and sand from the valley, and washes garnets from their birthplace high in the mountains. Then the valley gradually fills with sediment and vegetation, hiding the stones from view and easy gathering.

To gather the garnets, we started with a small hole which someone else had dug. We widened it and bailed the water out, one bucketful at a time. When we got down to the gravel layer, we shoveled buckets of the rich, mucky stones into 3/8" mesh screen boxes, and washed the mud away in a pool. The way I heard the process described is, "Wash the mud out, throw out any rocks that aren't garnets, and you're through." While this is an accurate description of the method, it implies that a lot more of the "rocks" are garnets than is actually the case.

Some screenfulls will have no garnets at all in them. A really rich haul will include several rough garnets bigger than a marble. Occasionally a really large stone will turn up. The stones at right were dug by a college student visiting from Seattle. The coin is a nickel, and the rough gems are sitting on a upturned bucket.

A perfectly formed garnet is a dodecahedron, and some of the smaller stones come very close to this perfection. The larger ones and most of the smaller ones have pieces missing, cracks and intrusions which are filled with a rusty material. We have yet to try our hand at polishing, tumbling, or faceting these stones. But a glass case at the Ranger Station shows several garnets after being polished, including a large six-ray star garnet. This area, along with one in India, are the only places in the world where star garnets are found.

At left is "our" garnet hole. From an area about five square feet we took a total of about four pounds (that's almost 10,000 carats) of rough stones in one day. In color, they're a very dark purple, liberally covered with rusty muddy patches. Even after we washed them at home, the rusty patches persist.

It's apparent that the Forest Service has taken every precaution to preserve the water quality below the dig. There is a settling area at the bottom of the dig, because of the mud stirred up in the digging and washing process. At the bottom of the hill there's another settling pond. And as the dig gradually moves downstream, the rangers fill in the holes and the forest reclaims its territory.

At right is the St. Maries River near the mouth of Emerald Creek. It's crystal clear and cold, showing no trace of the "mining" which goes on upstream. Click on the photo to download a 640 x 480 .jpg suitable for wallpaper. (Warning: It's about 100K.) To get to this spot from Moscow, Idaho, we took Highway 8 to Bovill. Then we turned left onto Highway 3. The turnoff to Emerald Creek is just past Clarkia.

In all, it's about an hour and a half by car from Moscow to the turnoff, then six miles up a well-maintained country road. The last half mile is an uphill hike to the ranger station.

In all, our family of three dug about seven pounds of garnets in three visits to Emerald Creek. Most of the stones are cracked and broken, but some of them will have the spectacular stars which make garnets from this area so prized.