Cadastral survey is the BLM’s stable of knights entrusted with the ultimate authority to designate the legal location of land rights – this is one of the oldest issues related to evolution of our civilization’s personal identification of the individual: the right to own land.

Our nation’s grid of township and range is the federal government’s infrastructure for tracking the people’s right to own land. By that, I mean these boundaries define the legal perimeter of our rights as property owners. Therefore, the federal government’s role is to protect the people’s rights by conducting surveys.

(from BLM)

“Surveys create, mark, define, retrace, or reestablish the boundaries and subdivisions of the public lands of the United States. They are not like scientific surveys of an informative character, which may be amended due to the availability of additional information or because of changes in conditions or standards of accuracy. Although Cadastral surveys employ scientific methods and precise measurements, they are based upon law and not upon science. Cadastral surveys are the foundation upon which rest title to all land that is now, or was once, part of the Public Domain of the United States.”

This is because the origin of law in the United States is traced back through our constitution to the courts of either England (or in the case of small areas of Louisiana – to France.) Cadastral was the King’s branch of legal authority for keeping track of who had so many cows and pigs and chickens and where did they live – for taxation purposes but also for defining such things as who to protect from invading Huns and Scots and Germanic tribes. Medieval Cadastral utilized one of the first GIS by providing a graphic map with tabular data to the King for tracking purposes of his realm’s assets. (Yes, you heard it here first: Medieval GIS, though I know the Egyptians and Chinese also used graphic maps with tabular data to make ancient GIS systems)

(from Cadastral…)

“The practice of finding boundaries is neither a purely legal process, nor a purely scientific process. It is something in between with a twist. The boundary surveyor in finding an old survey must be cognizant of the legal description of the land and any conflicts which may affect it. This involves not only knowledge but skills in research and investigation. Then the surveyor must be part archeologist to find physical evidence of previous surveys and occupation on the ground. Throughout the process the surveyor must understand the concepts of good measurements to find and describe what is found, and be able to interpret it’s relationship to the record. In the end those that do it well find it can be rewarding and fun, sort of as mathematical detective work, with archeology, dendrology, geology and paralegal aspects thrown in. So we sometimes use the old saying “Land Surveying” is both an art and a science. ”

All I know, is that corners can roam, county assessor’s titled plats do not stand up in a court of law, and malicious neighbors can hold a pith fork in your face and force you off your property and keep your land if they want to, but the guys at Cadastral are right on when it comes to explaining the state of our land status to us citizens (and they win in civil court). That said, you always start with BLM in matters of land status for mining claims or metes and bound parcels of both surface and mineral rights (severed mineral rights being in another blog one day).

This is a cyber-blurb that has probably been circulating the Internet for over a year, though I just got it yesterday sent from my Newly-Retired-X-Vietnam-War-Vet-Divorced-Ojibwe-CIA/DEA-Career-Navy-Seal-Uncle. It’s hard for him to be retired after all that but at least we can correspond regularly now. He sent these excerpts from Lee Iacocca’s book, “Where have all the Leaders Gone,” Simon & Schuster, April, 2007. Though the book is a year old, it hits on topics that run through my little noggin jez about every morning during my commute to work.

 The 82 year old (then) Iacocca writes:

 Am I the only guy in this country who’s fed up with what’s happening? Where the hell is our outrage? We should be screaming bloody murder. We’ve got a gang of clueless bozos steering our ship of state right over a cliff, we’ve got corporate gangsters stealing us blind, and we can’t even clean up after a hurricane much less build a hybrid car. But instead of getting mad, everyone sits around and nods their heads when the politicians say, “Stay the course.”

Iacocca says:

“Leaders are made, not born. Leadership is forged in times of crisis. It’s easy to sit there with your feet up on the desk and talk theory. Or send someone else’s kids off to war when you’ve never seen a battlefield yourself. It’s another thing to lead when your world comes tumbling down.

On September 11, 2001, we needed a strong leader more than any other time in our history. We needed a steady hand to guide us out of the ashes. Where was George Bush? He was reading a story about a pet goat to kids in Florida when he heard about the attacks. He kept sitting there for twenty minutes with a baffled look on his face. It’s all on tape. You can see it for yourself. Then, instead of taking the quickest route back to Washington and immediately going on the air to reassure the panicked people of this country, he decided it wasn’t safe to return to the White House. He basically went into hiding for the day—and he told Vice President Dick Cheney to stay put in his bunker. We were all frozen in front of our TVs, scared out of our wits, waiting for our leaders to tell us that we were going to be okay, and there was nobody home. It took Bush a couple of days to get his bearings and devise the right photo op at Ground Zero.

That was George Bush’s moment of truth, and he was paralyzed. And what did he do when he’d regained his composure? He led us down the road to Iraq—a road his own father had considered disastrous when he was President. But Bush didn’t listen to Daddy. He listened to a higher father. He prides himself on being faith based, not reality based. If that doesn’t scare the crap out of you, I don’t know what will.

A Hell of a Mess

So here’s where we stand. We’re immersed in a bloody war with no plan for winning and no plan for leaving. We’re running the biggest deficit in the history of the country. We’re losing the manufacturing edge to Asia, while our once-great companies are getting slaughtered by health care costs. Gas prices are skyrocketing, and nobody in power has a coherent energy policy. Our schools are in trouble. Our borders are like sieves. The middle class is being squeezed every which way. These are times that cry out for leadership.

But when you look around, you’ve got to ask: “Where have all the leaders gone?” Where are the curious, creative communicators? Where are the people of character, courage, conviction, competence, and common sense? I may be a sucker for alliteration, but I think you get the point.

Name me a leader who has a better idea for homeland security than making us take off our shoes in airports and throw away our shampoo? We’ve spent billions of dollars building a huge new bureaucracy, and all we know how to do is react to things that have already happened.

Name me one leader who emerged from the crisis of Hurricane Katrina. Congress has yet to spend a single day evaluating the response to the hurricane, or demanding accountability for the decisions that were made in the crucial hours after the storm. Everyone’s hunkering down, fingers crossed, hoping it doesn’t happen again. Now, that’s just crazy. Storms happen. Deal with it. Make a plan. Figure out what you’re going to do the next time.

Name me an industry leader who is thinking creatively about how we can restore our competitive edge in manufacturing. Who would have believed that there could ever be a time when “the Big Three” referred to Japanese car companies? How did this happen—and more important, what are we going to do about it?

Name me a government leader who can articulate a plan for paying down the debt, or solving the energy crisis, or managing the health care problem. The silence is deafening. But these are the crises that are eating away at our country and milking the middle class dry.

I have news for the gang in Congress. We didn’t elect you to sit on your asses and do nothing and remain silent while our democracy is being hijacked and our greatness is being replaced with mediocrity. What is everybody so afraid of? That some bobblehead on Fox News will call them a name? Give me a break. Why don’t you guys show some spine for a change?

Had Enough?

Hey, I’m not trying to be the voice of gloom and doom here. I’m trying to light a fire. I’m speaking out because I have hope. I believe in America. In my lifetime I’ve had the privilege of living through some of America’s greatest moments. I’ve also experienced some of our worst crises—the Great Depression, World War II, the Korean War, the Kennedy assassination, the Vietnam War, the 1970s oil crisis, and the struggles of recent years culminating with 9/11. If I’ve learned one thing, it’s this: You don’t get anywhere by standing on the sidelines waiting for somebody else to take action. Whether it’s building a better car or building a better future for our children, we all have a role to play. That’s the challenge I’m raising in this book. It’s a call to action for people who, like me, believe in America. It’s not too late, but it’s getting pretty close. So let’s shake off the horseshit and go to work. Let’s tell ‘em all we’ve had enough.”

OK, I got it. Nice. I am impressed by anyone who can capture their passion with eloquence and present it in a voice that is not whining and pedantic. Only issue with Iacocca is his bias based on his seat of power in the automotive industry. The mining industry has been fighting a battle way before 911 to maintain a leading role in global economics. We’ve been focused on trying to maintain our country’s competitive edge and the energy crisis long before gasoline hit $4.00 a gallon. In short, all I’m saying is we in the mining industry understand.

However, I have a rather dour personal opinion: I don’t trust or believe people who are political candidates for anything. It doesn’t seem that anyone with a level state of mind would run for a public office. By that, regardless of the patriotic motivation or perhaps personal responsibility to participate in an elected office, I know first hand that the people who hold public positions, even on a county level, become exposed to all kinds of ridiculous accusations, contrived allegations, and personal attacks. This circus-like presentation of our leaders focuses on an absurd element of fascination that people support in our news industry for entertainment. Anyone who even considers running in a presidential campaign nowadays has got to have something unbalanced with their personal values to start.

The Presidency is a job. It shouldn’t be a popularity contest. The job is advertised. It’s a term-position with benefits. Must be willing to relocate. Travel required. All applicants please submit a resume to our Personnel Director. (We need a Personnel Director.) I want the resumes weeded out based on qualifications. Then, I want to know what the credentials are. What jobs have they held? What were the reasons for leaving? Have they ever been fired? Why? What school did they go to? Who paid for it? What classes did they take? Did they ever take a class in economics? World history? Study law? What were their grades? What hobbies or interests do they have? What organizations do they belong to? Who are their references? Any awards? Any higher education? Volunteer work? Ever do civil work before? Social programs? Have any experience with the sick? Elderly? Poor? Study any foreign language? Any arts? Ever been in trouble before? Really bad situation before? Tell me about it. How did you handle it?

Yeah, those are a lot of incredible accomplishments to look for in a candidate but this is for the presidency. Those criteria will likely filter out the younger candidates, but not necessarily. We are looking for the most dynamic, best qualified individual in the whole country.

Start there. Then, I want public interviews. Interactive. We created an electoral college to vote for us when we were a nation of remote populations with no feasible means of organizing such a succinct communication as a direct national vote. So, we elect guys to vote in our best interest. Get rid of that. Let’s all vote directly for whom we want. Let’s extend the vote to 10 days rather than one day so everyone can get access to the Internet or mail a voucehr and believe me – I work remotely and in other countries all over the world and I have been able to arrange to vote remotely no matter where I am. Even Ma and Pa Kettle would be able to get in their old farm pickup and drive to the local library to use the internet and vote in that time frame. Unique user ID, password protected, all that jazz. The obstacles to this idea? Approach them as they come up. I don’t believe in letting hypothetical obstacles stop me from formulating an initial plan. That is what I call “a starting point”. We start there.

Everyone gets to vote for whomever they want to. Yeah that will diffuse the vote, but we have computers to sort that now. If someone has made such a national reputation (or campaigned) to the point that maybe most of the people in the nation voted for them, then hey – the system works. No, I don’t believe the nation is composed of menial idiots. Maybe a lot of us are not as educated as we should be on many topics but there are a lot of people in charge of making the decisions that are totally incompetent as well. No one should be in charge of my vote for president. Let’s all vote.

Here is a list of my terrible political opinions based on personal experience: 

• Kennedy probably slept with girls other than his wife while he was president.
• The three Roosevelts (Ted, Franklin, and Eleanor) seem to have been very impressive people. 
• George Washington is a suspicious character in my book. 
• LBJ inherited a hurricane in Vietnam and didn’t address that very well either. 
• Probably every president leading up to and including Nixon flexed a few diabolical muscles to get in office — Nixon got caught. 
• Ford was a vice president. Be very careful who we hire for that job, too. (Yeah, I know the Nixon-Agnew-Ford connection was out of our hands, but we still need to take our VPs seriously. Maybe that’s another job for our Personnel Director? Hmmm…..) 
• Reagan was a scary guy who actually bluffed the Russians into bankruptcy, which initiated thawing of the cold war. All of those threats are still there and new players have yet to rear their ugly heads. 
• Carter was once attacked by a rabbit in his canoe. Does anyone but me remember that???? 
• Old Man Bush had a war that I entirely missed while I was logging core in Mexico – I didn’t even know we were at war and when I got home everyone was ENTHRALLED with S.C.U.D. missiles. 
• Clinton was the only president who could even sustain a sex life since Kennedy and we crucified him over it. 
• Little Bush is so typical of guys with his syndrome, it’s a wonder he isn’t an exploration manager for Newmont.

I believe all of these persons were / are a nut in some aspect, based mostly on their desire to be a president in the first place. I also believe that each one of these nuts really and truly made an attempt to be a good president. They each thought they were doing a good job in the realm of making political decisions they thought were for the good of our country. That’s why we need to screen them before they get elected. 

SUMMARY: I’m not looking for Iacocca’s Great Leader. I’d be happy to hire the most competent, best qualified person for the job based on their credentials. That person may not be a hero. They might simply be  good at their job.

Michele,

I have some questions about the mining industry. For me, one of the most important factors in choosing a career involves location. I want to live somewhere with outdoor opportunities, not a smoggy city. I don’t want to live in a congested hub like Houston. I wouldn’t mind traveling to remote locations around the world, that sounds cool. Within the U.S., though, are there opportunities for work in small, rural towns? (I think you know what I mean: I love the mountains and don’t want to spend my whole life in a big city).

CARL:

HARDROCK MINES ARE IN REMOTE MOUNTAINOUS REGIONS BECAUSE THE MINERALIZATION COMES FROM MELTED MATERIAL AT DEPTH USUALLY ALONG SUBDUCTED MARGINS AND IS BROUGHT TO THE SURFACE DURING OROGENIC EVENTS. THAT MEANS HARD ROCK MINES ARE USUALLY IN THE MOUNTAINS. SOFT ROCK MINES (COAL, URANIUM) ARE IN BASINS OUT IN THE PLAINS AREAS. THERE AREN’T A LOT OF CITIES BUILT ON SOFT SEDIMENT BASINS OUT IN THE PLAINS SO COAL MINES ARE USUALLY ALSO REMOTE (RELATIVE TO A CITY LOCATION). CORPORATE OFFICES ARE IN BIG CITIES BECAUSE THEY NEED TO BE NEAR INTERNATIONAL AIRPORTS AND HOTELS. SO, IF YOU ARE A MINER YOU WILL LIKELY NOT BE IN A CITY UNTIL YOU BECOME THE MANAGER OR A BIGGER FOOL.

Also, how does it work for people that have spouses and families…?

CARL:

MANY GEOLOGISTS SUFFER BEING SINGLE WAY MUCH LATER INTO THEIR ADULT LIVES. MANY MEET THEIR SPOUSES ON THE JOB. I WAS 40 BEFORE I MET MY HUZBUN AT A MINE AND THAT IS MY FIRST (AND LAST) MARRIAGE.

Do they just get used to being home half the time/ gone half the time?

SOME FAMILIES NEVER GET USED TO IT AND DIVORCE FOR GEOLOGISTS IS COMMON. MOST GEOLOGISTS START TO FEEL STAGNANT IF THEY DON’T GET OUT OF TOWN FOR AT LEAST ONE SEASON EVERY YEAR.

Is this a fairly common thing (for a geologist to have trouble meeting their significant other?)

IT IS HARD FOR A GEO-GUY TO FIND A GIRLFRIEND BECAUSE HIS JOB IS REMOTE AND HE TRAVELS ALL THE TIME AND HE IS SMELLY AND FUZZY. ON THE OTHERHAND, GEO-GALS MEET GUYS ALL THE TIME AND HAVE 10,000 BOYFRIENDS (UNTIL THEY MEET THE RIGHT GUY LIKE I DID.)

Does the significant other ever come along and live where the geologist is working?

SOMETIMES, BUT NOT VERY OFTEN. DEPENDS ON THE DURATION OF JOB. IT’S A LITTLE LIKE BEING MILITARY – IF IT’S A LONG TERM JOB, THEN THE SPOUSE MAY COME ALONG. WIVES AND KIDS MEET OTHER WIVES AND KIDS ONSITE AND HAVE CLUBS AND ORGANIZATIONS AND DINNERS. WHEN YOU MOVE ON YOU MAY LIKELY MEET PEOPLE YOU KNEW PREVIOUSLY FROM OTHER MINES. REALLY REMOTE JOBS (LIKE IN AFRICA) WILL PAY YOU A LOT MORE MONEY WITH BIG FAT BONUSES TO START AND GIVE YOU A HOUSE AND A CAR AND PAY FOR YOUR MOVING EXPENSES. IF IT IS A LONG TERM JOB (1-2 YEARS) THE SPOUSE USUALLY COMES ALONG IN ORDER TO KEEP FROM HAVING TO PAY EXPENSES AT HOME. SPOUSES SOMETIMES TAKE SERVICE-RELATED JOBS IN REMOTE PLACES LIKE OFFICE JOBS OR TEACHING ENGLISH.

Does all of this vary greatly from job to job? Sorry, I’m just trying to get an idea of what to expect should I go this direction into the mining industry. Hope you don’t mind answering some of these questions!

ALL THE OTHER STUDENTS HAD THESE SAME QUESTIONS WHEN I WAS IN SCHOOL AND I HAVE NOTICED AS 20 YEARS SLIPPED BY WHAT SOME OF THE SOLUTIONS WERE. THAT’S WHAT I BASE MY ANSWERS ON.

MICHELE MURRAY

I just spent a weekend working under cover as a normal person. By that, I mean I wore a dress, braided my hair, and sat in a chair at a booth during a festival to sell my artwork and books. The venue was a kayaking race and festival on the Arkansas River in Salida. At such an event, it would be disastrous to let on that I work in mining. At least, that has been my experience when outside my personal circle of river-running, kayaking, fishing, rafting, mining friends. 

It’s easy to avoid the tender topic of mining in Colorado when you have books and art in your booth until the address of Victor, Colorado comes up.

“Where’s Victor?” nice people ask when reading my business card.

“Near Cripple Creek,” I answer, though I can tell that is a vague black hole in geography to some.

“What do you do there?” a more pointed question to avoid.

“I don’t live there anymore. That’s where I keep my business post office.” I answer.

“Why there?”

At this point, the truth is nearly inevitable and I feel the compulsive urge to blurt out, ‘I WORK IN THE MINING INDUSTRY – I MINE – I’M A MINER!!!!!’ like a mad woman possessed with the truth. By then, the customer has usually decided I am a kook and is ready to move on. That’s the way it is when you’re a booth babe.

I had a rather nice discovery while at the booth, though. I knew that the region had been an agricultural and railroading center with a rather dour economy prior to the latest surge in real-estate development and river-running enthusiasm. At FibArk, the ranchers were now mingling with the river rats walking that kind of slow, meander from left to right making their way down the aisle between booths. The river people walk fast, kind of stomping and wear, well, scant clothes. The ranchers wear, well, cowboy clothes. The latter were the people I targeted for conversation. Ranchers like to be asked things like,

“How long have you lived here? Are you retired? Do you have grandkids? Do you ride horses? What kind of cows do you raise? Is the rain good this year for hay?” Things like that. For some odd reason ranchers like to yell the answers at you, too.

“WE BEEN HERE 27 YEARS!!!!!!!!!! DON’T RAISE NO COWS NO MORE!!!!!!!!!!! DON’T RIDE NO HORSES NO MORE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! NOT ENUFF RAIN THIS YEAR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” etc.

My nicest discovery came early in the morning on the last day of the show. Most of the other booth people don’t stir quite so early in the morning (feeding elephants, I suppose) so I am usually alone. I had already set up my booth and was walking down to the river to sit a while and wait for the sun to climb high enough to warm my awning. On my way to the bank I saw a very elderly man holding on to the perimeter barricades down by the river. He was kind of tippy.

“Mornin’, ” I said.

“Mornin’, ” he answered. He was a dapper looking guy, nicely dressed, blue eyes, safari-style hat.

“That’s a nice hat,” I told him.

 ”Why thank you. My daughter bought that for me.” I think his eye twinkled. I melt when old guys’ eyes twinkle at me.

 ”Are you a rancher?” I asked him.

 ”No, I’m a retired miner.” He answered. “I worked at mines near here all my life until I retired thirty years ago.”

I put my arm through his and we made our way back to my booth while Lloyd told me all about drilling, blasting and mucking in his underground mining days near Salida at Chalk Creek and Monarch. Our mining heritage (and future) is intact.

That’s from my friend, Queen of Excel. What’s she’s talking about is inserting a formula into Excel so that the Cu-values are automatically changed corresponding to the daily market value she enters into the spreadsheet. Got me to thinking about GIS and the mining industry. We really don’t utilize our GIS software very much for the abilities that it offers — dynamic changes corresponding to non-static data for example, like a changing market value.

GIS software “looks at” other data and makes a visual map. That’s mostly what we use it for in mining. One of the most dynamic abilities of using GIS is to point or look at data that changes. Example is a spreadsheet of drill holes, including proposed holes. Proposed holes probably have (at the least) an easting, northing, a unique ID, and maybe that’s it. A GIS map will show the proposed holes locations as, say, little black crosses. Then, when the pad is built a technician enters some code into the spreadsheet that shows that task has been completed and the little black cross would change to a little blue cross. Then, when a rig gets on the pad and starts drilling, another person enters that code for that status and the symbol changes from whatever a blue cross to a green drill hole symbol. Then, as the hole is completed another code is entered into the same spreadsheet and so on including status of when the surveyor arrives, etc. etc. following the data as the samples get sent to lab and results come back – the color or symbol changes automatically. This is how GIS is usually used in mining.

Point being: no one actually edits or changes a GIS map – once the defaults have been created the GIS software makes the visual changes to correspond to changes in the status of the hole. So, a boss doesn’t need to track down a geo to ask him what the status is – he can look at the map on his computer as it changes instantaneously.

I wonder if the same thing could happen if the assay values in a spreadsheet were pointed to the daily market value? You could get a dynamic map (sections, ideally) that would change as the market went up or down. Would you want that? Every time you went to digitize a section – the values would change slightly. BUT – if the mining modeling software automatically made a wireframe to correspond to intercepts down hole (cut-off grades for example), then you could let a computer do the work. You would see your ore body swell (and shrink) as prices fluctuated.

Reply from a geostatistician I know (”geostatics” George calls them) about this idea of using a dynamic link to non-static data using GIS:

“I don’t think it’s a good idea at the database level when there is no volume or tonnage assigned anyway. Maybe it would be useful in ore control if you’re feeding a mill. Usually, we (geostatics) use long term averages so the daily changes in market value are useless. I think it would cause a lot of headaches to have a changing wireframe or ore body that fluctuates. “

Just a thought (I’m not gonna do it) but, what if? That’s what I like about my pal. She has these creative thoughts all the time like, what if you didn’t have to drill? What if you could just laser a beam to intercept programmed values, like petroleum tools do downhole for resistivity, porosity, density and you could at least pick tops or find water without any surface disturbance until you defined an area of interest. What if that was possible? And so on.

I’ve been attending demos of mine modeling software lately. I do this a lot, sometimes in a pace of increasing intensity as the client I am advising is about to make a decision. Having been a Director of Product Development for a mining software company before, I am very familiar with the show and tell story. I learned a few things about this aspect of the software business: I do not enjoy the sales demos.

That said, I can’t help but imagine a reality television show with a panel of mining engineers, (clean and smelling nice) geologists (fuzzy and with dog hear on their socks) , and database nerds (with gel in their hair) questioning a line-up of potential software candidates (wearing pressed shirts with their logos: “MineMiracle”, “MightyMine” and “Gold-B-MORE”). This last week, I was sitting across from spanky-clad sales people who were saying yadda yadda and turning block models off and on, the fancy spinning 3D model in the air showing all the glorious drill hole traces with fat intercepts of mineralization. I would like to have yanked a salesman from the previous day and kept him in an imaginary cyber window to interject his own comments to counter what the current sales pitch was saying. Or, to step out of the demo like in a Woody Allen movie, and turn to an invisible audience to share my candid observations:

‘That is a lot of button pushing just to change the view, don’t cha think?’

In my reality TV show, the sales people would have video clips prepared to demonstrate the prowess of their dynamic code and visual graphics, all the while some input on an electronic meter from the audience responds to the display with statistical credits flipping forward and backwards. The camera would pan to cover the facial expressions of the other candidates as first one then the other sales person made their bold statements.

“So, you see, no other software really does this better than MineMiracle,” while the other sales reps shake their heads in disgust or slap the table.

Each candidate would be allowed a platform to expound on the merits of their product and be open to comments from the competitors.

“So, how do you handle sub-cells?” is shot to the rep from his competitor and he gives his yadda yadda to answer the hot question, which basically means, ‘uh, we don’t.’

 ”What if the data doesn’t have a key field?” More yadda yadda blah blah blah.

The panel of judges submit questions to get the action rolling, including trick questions designed to bring a grin.

“What if a rat eats through the dsl line and we loose our connection to the server?” This is a terribly stupid, totally unrelated question designed to throw the candidate off. There are other conversational digressions as the panel of engineers and geos make fun of each other and tell totally unrelated stories about something stupic they did this one time in band camp… (The database guy has no visible sense of humor.)

The summary of the show, is an undisclosed, previously submitted hidden quote for the product that had been concealed up until the last moments, when for the first time, each representative has to turn their card over and display for public review – their cost estimate for an implementation, training, maintenance, and support. The show ends with the panel of judges awarding points and the winner goes to the next round of negotiations.

I have imagined this scenario enough to consider making a pitch to the Northwest Mining Convention or PDAC to host a session along these lines. I have also considered inviting the software candidates to a gladiator-type competition where their sales staff has to run an obstacle course in little gladiator suits to submit their quote and give a demo. That show is still in design reveiw.

(BTW: Chapter IV of “The Igneous Rocks of Tampeapa” is up on InfoMine, on their library page.)

There is a reason I haven’t written a funny blog in a while. I’ve become obsessed with writing, “The Igneous Rocks of Tameapa – an exploration adventure story”, which is being published by InfoMine as an ongoing series of PDF chapters. I have submitted 4 chapters in cliff hanger type of short stories, all of which will eventually lead full-circle to a resolution (and a sequel.)

I first became possessed by this story while logging core in Tameapa. The tuba player is real, the mad professor is real, the dog with a bow tie is real, in a creative literary-license sort of way. I’m not saying who or what or when inspired the characters or plot, but it practically came to me in a vision – the plot line, the characters, the events, the twists, even the ending. I can’t write it fast enough. The story is in my head and I know how it ends and can’t even explain it orally fast enough. Some of the elements of the story happen out of sequence and I capture them that way, trying to keep them organized by chapter number. The plot travels through time and all over the world. One underlying element in common is – MINING.

Since it is an exploration adventure, the story is chock full of technical jargon, which automatically limits it from ever flying in the public market but I think the InfoMine reader can handle it (possibly with a geologic dictionary at hand). The terminology is geologic. The characters are the wealth of the story and the situation is core logging in Sinaloa, Mexico. Each chapter is left open-ended with a ripe bit of colorful flavor. The language is colorful too (a few bad words here and there) and the events are slightly crazy (just like a real core logging job).

I have five main characters developed leading to the misadventures of Doc and Rene. Doc is an old professor who runs the Mobile Rock Identification Lab (M.R.I.L.), which is a converted ice cream truck. Rene is a bawdy 46-year old lady geo who works all over the world and makes trouble wherever she goes. Antonio is a handsome, crazy tuba player who was disfigured in an electrical accident a the mine in Cananea and who lives in a remote village where Rene logs core to hide from his past. Guillianna “Guilly” Arcalia de la Pera de Esperanza is a sexy female bandit with a vengeance against mines. Gerberto “Herbie” is a blind Mexican geologist. These characters meet up in Tameapa before the real action begins – a plot with bombs, kidnapping, a clever wonder dog, and even BATS.

This adventure story could be submitted as often as a weekly article of about 1000 words. I did this once before for a paper in Summit County, making an ongoing story with illustrations for Belinda Smegler — Trailer Trash Queen of Cripple Creek and her cooking show, none of which was true but the readers thought she was a real person. I used to get letters addressed to Belinda through the paper. The thing is, I keep having to actually work and therein lies the longevity to the story. I keep collecting more material as I go to new sites and continue my personal rock identification adventures.

And THAT is where I have been. Check it out!!!

Fly fishing and Mining, can it be? Can they exist in the same sentence?

Most “non-mining people”… (What should I call non-mining people for future reference sake? Hmmm, NMPs! That’ll do…) would shiver at the mention of these two industries in one thought. Most NMPs would never believe or be willing to accept the reality of the strong fly fishing-to-miners-ratio that exists. I would venture to say that per capita more miners fly fish than say, skiers. I focus on this phenomenon because both industries have the mountains in common, but are usually at odds in proposed house bills or endorsements or ad campaigns. The reason skiers are in the mountains are obvious, but the reason miners are in the mountains may not be so obvious to the NMPs. Miners work at, well — mines. And mines are, well, in remote places where most mineralization has likely been exposed to the surface by means of uplift and erosion, i.e., the mountains near streams and drainages. Of course, there is a hard rock bent to that observation. Coal mines in the flat lands might skew the numbers…. Point being: outdoors enthusiasts are often in the mountains but not neccesarilly fly fishing. And within the skiing population, if they fish at all, I speculate it is probably in summer, probably on a lake or reservoir, maybe with a motor boat. Yes, I know a lot of skiers who fly fish, but most skiers do not. However, most miners do some kind of fishing and year round and many fly fish and I do not know why but I bet it has something to do with combining methodical personality with the love for the outdoors. We need a study on this topic, I think — a demographic swath across the fly fishing industry of skiers versus miners.

This is going somewhere, patience…

I grew up in Colorado. I lived on the Colorado River and on the Eagle River and I skied. It wasn’t until I started working in Cripple Creek at the mine that I learned to fly fish, and that was because most everyone I worked with was an avid fly fisher. Even one of the drillers owned a dory (I have often wondered at the similarity between “dory” and “doré “.) To this day, most of our fly fishing trips are with other mining people floating the Green River, the Rio Grand, the Arkansas, the Colorado, etc. When venues come up in conversation, we think of two things: the mining (can I work there?) and the rivers (can I fish there?) in the vicinity. For example:

• Butte, Montana: Arco and the headwaters of the Clark Fork River. (See “Fly Fishing a Superfund Site”, Infomine )

• Coeur d’Alene Mining District, Idaho: well, Idaho (like Montana, Alaska, Colorado) is simply one of the world’s premier fly fishing venues and you have way many choices of where to go on your way to or from work or during lunch to fish
• Stillwater, Montana: the Yellowstone River
• Delta Junction, Alaska: Arctic grayling on Clear Creek
• Juneau, Alaska: some fly fishing for salmon, but great halibut fishing with mighty hooks
• Ketchikan, Alaska: fly fishing for salmon / trout but great sea fishing too
• Bingham, Utah: The Provo River and Green River  and all those lovely streams to the east up in the mountains.

BTW – “one hundred years of open pit copper mining, grazing, and unregulated emissions from the old smelter at Magna, Utah took a toll on foothill areas. Current environmental management focuses on vegetation, water, and wildlife.

The mine’s tailings ponds are being reclaimed and replaced with green fields. The ponds were “pinched off” and planted to grasses. Cattle and wildlife now graze the area. In the image above, to the right of the green fields are active tailings ponds. In the background is Antelope Island in the Great Salt Lake. Various tree species are also used to vegetate the tailings ponds, including Salix and Populus species and occasionally tamarisk on very difficult sites. Vegetated tailings ponds provide habitat for many species of wetland birds as well.

South of the mine, material containing high levels of lead and arsenic was removed, clean soil deposited where needed, and more than one thousand acres of land recontoured and reseeded. The company has received three Earth Day Reclamation Awards and several national and international awards for these projects.”

– Source: Infomine

• Morenzi, Arizona: Um, this is predominately a lake fishing venue, but as long as you’re not going for an Arctic Grayling, there are (apparently) a few creeks that host trout all over Arizona.
• Elko, Nevada (You’re gonna have to drive): South Fork of the Humboldt (16 miles) Lamoille Creek (25 miles) Owyhee River (112 miles) Bruneau River (75 miles) Tabor Creek (35 miles)
• Colorado: Henderson, Cripple Creek, and many many many other venues all of which have a mine or mining district near them, whether active or historic – including:

Alma, Aspen, Breckenridge, Creede, Crested Butte, Fairplay, Georgetown, Idaho Springs, Leadville, Nederland, Ouray, Park City, Durango, Silver Plume, Silverton, Steamboat Springs, and Telluride (to name the mining towns-turned ski-towns that come to mind.)

Other mining towns in Colorado that do not benefit quite as directly from the ski industry but retain qualities both aesthetic and strategic for mining include St. Elmo (BTW, St. Elmo MURRAY is the namesake of that town, true!), Boulder, Meeker, Phippsburg, Oak Creek, Gold Hill, Lake City, Salida, Victor, Guffey, Buena Vista, Yampa, Walden, Tapona, McCoy, Burns, Bond. Those are the ones I have visited in Colorado for both mining and fly fishing interests.

My huzbun and I both work in the mining industry and it is no coincidence we both fly fish as a result. When we go somewhere to work as an exploration geologist we always fly fish. In the near future, we are planning to expand our fly fishing experience southward to Sinaloa, Mexico, for some world class bass fishing  as a result of an assignment there.

Note: InfoMine’s online magazine latest issue of Mining.com main topics are “GREEN ISSUES” this month (http://www.mining.com/). This is a nice electronic document to have on hand when engaged with an NMP who needs to learn more about how modern mining operates today.

“Today, the Colorado House of Representatives Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee voted to postpone indefinitely (kill) House Bill 08-1165.  The sponsors of the amendment had agreed to limit the scope of the bill to amending the prospecting provisions only and, at today’s hearing, stated that they were removing the provisions authorizing local governments to veto or condition mining projects because county authority in this area was already substantial. 

Following discussion and debate, the committee ultimately decided to kill the bill by a 7-6 vote.  Voting in favor of the motion to PI the bill were Reps. McKinley, Hodge, McNulty, Sonnenberg, Rose, Gardner, and Looper.  Because the committee killed the entire bill, it is likely that legislation will be introduced in the Senate, however, to amend the current requirements governing the confidentiality of notices of intent to conduct prospecting.   Although there are no absolute guarantees, we believe that the bill will be limited to prospecting but will keep you apprised of further developments.  

In offering to remove all but the prospecting provisions, the sponsors cited authority that already exists under the Colorado Land Use Act, the Colorado Land Use Control and Enabling Act, and the 1041 powers.  The sponsors also assured the committee of their intention to limit floor consideration to prospecting only, and not to reintroduce the provisions on local control.  They would also resist such amendments if offered. 

I wish to thank Dianna Orf and the other industry lobbyists and representatives who were instrumental in making committee members aware of our concerns about this legislation. Thanks are also due to the counties and county organizations who wrote letters in opposition to the bill - Aron Diaz, Associated Governments of Northwest Colorado, Reeves Brown, Club 20, the folks at Action 22, Moffat and Teller Counties, along with Mesa county commissioner Steve Aquafresca.  Equally important, I also wish to thank the CMA membership and those who participated in our standing committees; they responded to our call and spoke up in one united voice in opposition to the bill and in support of responsible mining.

We will now turn our attention to House Bill 1161 (which has passed the House and will be considered by a Senate committee in the near future) and on any prospecting bill.  There is much work remaining to be done.  CMA hopes to work cooperatively with our elected representatives in fashioning provisions that will address any legitimate environmental and citizen concerns, while making sure that Colorado law continues to provide for the orderly development of the state’s mineral resources.   A news release is attached.  I look forward to working with all of you during the remainder of this session.”

Stuart A. Sanderson

President

Colorado Mining Association

216 16th Street, Suite 1250

Denver, CO 80202

303/575-9199, fax 575-9194

This news comes on the heels of an anti-mining movement initiated by private groups up near Ft. Collins to try and block an in-situ uranium project proposed in Weld County. The bill was partially ill-written with redundancies that conflicted with current state law.