Gold mining in the Moscow region: map (where to look), is there any in the rivers

Not only legends, but also historical facts claim that in the old days gold mining was quite active in the Moscow region: maps of deposits, preserved since then in various versions, still attract the darlings of fortune and gambling adventurers.

The gold rush at different times alternately covered the vast expanses of Russia. Gold panning began in a variety of regions, and often such enterprises achieved very significant success. And this is not surprising, because the Russian subsoil contains almost the entire periodic table, including precious metals. From time immemorial, miners in Rus' washed gold, which was more than enough for jewelry for the royal families, for precious church utensils and frames for icons, for minting coins and even for trade with close and distant neighbors.

Today, there are several hundred large and small deposits of this noble metal in the country. The Krasnoyarsk Territory, Chukotka, Yakutia and the Magadan Region have held the championship in its production for many years.

Region name	Average annual production, tons
Krasnoyarsk region	47600
Amur region	30600
Chukotka	24600
Yakutia	22300
Magadan Region	21400
Khabarovsk region	20700

Statistics do not mention information about the mining of precious metals in the central part of the country, and therefore not every resident of the areas adjacent to the capital knows that gold mining is possible in the Moscow region. To this day, enterprises that actively mined placer gold in Soviet times have been preserved in mothballed form, producing up to 4 tons of precious metal per year.

Many of the deposits near Moscow are highly profitable from the point of view of gold mining, since they contain over 17 milligrams of gold per ton of processed rock. For comparison, we can say that in world practice a deposit is considered promising if its gold reserves are 10 milligrams per ton of rock.

Where to look for precious deposits

From ancient times to the present day, gold can most often be found in the rivers of the Moscow region. If you believe the surviving maps, which indicate the most promising places for prospectors, the bulk of them are in the northern part of the Moscow region.

For example, in the area of the village of Iksha, a network of small rivers originating at the tops of the Klinsko-Dmitrovskaya ridge erode layers of glaciers with their flow. In the thickness of these ice masses formed over centuries, a lot of precious metal has accumulated, which enriches the river sand.

And today one of these small rivers in the Iksha region tirelessly delights fans of the gold rush with the alluring shine of precious grains. The old-timers of these places tell the miners a legend according to which one of the rivers once turned into a real golden stream, from which miners washed not fine gold sand, but relatively large precious nuggets.

Legends are legends, but small grains of yellow metal, which are called “signs” in the language of prospectors, are found in rivers near Iksha in our time.

Moscow region mines. How we searched for gold in Zelenograd

Once upon a time there lived King Midas in Phrygia. One day he saved the drunken satyr Silenus, the teacher of Dionysus, and begged for a rare gift: everything he touched turned into gold. As a result, he died of hunger and thirst. His colleague in love for metal No. 1, the greedy Raja from the brilliant Soviet cartoon, was also unlucky. The magic antelope, saving a beggar boy, allowed the ruler to have as much gold as he wanted until he said “enough!” Feeling that he was drowning in gold, like in a swamp, he uttered the cherished word, and all his wealth turned into shards. Alas, these instructive stories do not stop countless treasure seekers in the depths of the earth.

“I’m going to my mine again tomorrow morning,” Vadim called me, “are you with me?”

- Again? You are restless! Tomorrow at eight at the bridge, okay?

Vadim is a successful manager, with a scientific bent, a candidate of technical sciences. And also an amateur prospector. At the same time, he basically does not spend his vacation in the Urals or Kolyma, hoping to find the coveted metal in the Moscow region, in an area literally a fifteen-minute walk from his 20-story building. In Zelenograd, on the Skhodnya River and Golenevsky Stream.

— Vadim, maybe we can go to Klyazma?

“There is a hundred times less gold on Klyazma than we have.” I checked. This is clear even to an amateur: look at the rock, at the sand, at the trees - black alder in the floodplain. They ate thick. You can also go to Yamuga or Lipnya - there are only willow trees along the banks, and then collective farm fields. No, we are going to our native places.

According to experts, gold is everywhere. In all geological rocks - from sea pebbles to the liquid fraction of the earth's core. In microscopic quantities even in melt water, the atmosphere and living organisms. From one person, for example, with a certain skill, it is possible to isolate about 0.0002 g of pure gold (I wonder what the Auschwitz doctor Joseph Mengele thought about this?). But usually it is found in the form of so-called golden sand in river floodplains and specific rocks, much less often in gold-quartz ores.

Nuggets exist in the form of scales, grains and pebbles, which, as a rule, immediately awaken various base desires in a person and radically change the nature of relationships between people (see Shishkov “Gloomy River”, Patterson “Lanfear Colony”, London “Smoke and the Kid” "). The largest of them, the Hatterman Slab, was found by deported Irish bandits in Australia in 1809. His weight was 285 kg. It did not survive: it was melted down and taken to London. In Russia, the largest nugget was found in 1842 in the Miass River basin in the Urals. It was called the "Golden Triangle" and weighed about 36 kg. Still intact.

The total reserves of the world's unmined gold are about 75 thousand tons. About half of them are in Nelson Mandela's homeland. Among the remaining countries, the leaders are the USA, Canada, Ghana, the Philippines and Papua. In Russia, which is in 9th place (according to other sources, from 7th to 11th - confusion arises due to the secrecy of data and hostility between our and South African concerns), gold is mined in Kolyma, in the upper reaches of the Lena and Yenisei, in Taimyr, as well as in the Republic of Sakha. But some enthusiasts are seriously looking for it almost within Greater Moscow.

“In this way,” Vadim teaches, “they have been washing gold since the 18th century; First you need to determine whether there is the right sand under the soil cover in the floodplain. — He demonstrates the tools of labor - a shovel, a scoop and a cast-iron tray.

“Rechenka has already done the main work for us, but we need to work with the spatula.” Move one meter closer to the center of the Earth. So get on with it. Oh, look, mink! — a graceful black animal ran across the virgin white snow. - Oh, that's a tricky face. They say he can smell gold. It is good to filter it with sandpaper: it shines perfectly on black.

- Listen, candidate, how do you know all this?

- Wash my little gold... Here every little thing needs to be taken into account. How many books have I sifted through, how many experienced people have I talked to? And experience is the son of difficult mistakes, and genius... In general, I identify water and sand by sight and crunch. My friends joke: you found an apartment and a job closer to the mine.

Today's artisanal gold mining differs minimally from prehistoric times. The same manic twinkle in the eyes and professional arthritis from standing knee-deep in icy water with trays and buckets in tired hands. A special highlight of this craft is squirrel or mink (!) skin, on which the smallest particles are deposited. In a day of work at a promising mine, you can mine up to 200 grams of what you know. The lower limit, you understand, is zero.

Gold was the first metal discovered by man. Apparently, the gloomy Cro-Magnon man in the foul-smelling skin initially considered the pliable yellow pebbles, lazily glistening in the shallow water, only a weak substitute for the usual obsidian or flint. The main attraction of gold in those brutal times, as well as today, remains its amazing inertness, that is, non-oxidization in air even when heated. Only concentrated selenic acid can dissolve it. This same quality can also be considered the only useful one, because gold simply has no others. It is too soft for any serious work, fusible and heavy. But this eternity of the “solar metal” with the development of civilization quickly made it a universal currency throughout the Old World.

The Sumerians were the first to mint gold coins (square!). They were the first to start “putting them in a corner” - cutting off the hands, and even the heads, of counterfeiters. Don't be naughty! At the same time, expressions arose in ancient languages where the adjective “golden” was an excellent property of anything - from the personal qualities of a cannibal governor to the shades of the bouquet of overseas wine. This is also familiar to us: the golden rule, the golden soul, the golden heart and golden hands are found much more often than Sonya the Golden Hand. It is noteworthy that in Russia there was also a kind of semantic outflow: the goldsmiths have long been called sanitary workers, and the golden company - proto-homeless people. In criminal structures, since the time of Vanka Cain, gold was contemptuously called red, and in the circles of Italian colleagues - polenta (corn porridge). True, both of them used it liberally in their everyday wardrobe in the form of chains and crosses. In order to understand how things are today, just look at the environment of rappers from Harlem.

Digging mother earth under snow is not the most pleasant thing. But here it is, the treasured sand. Scary, brown. The principle of working with the tray is simple: you splash the collected sand, constantly stirring and washing. And listening to the master's instructions.

- Gold will settle below; “if it exists, of course,” Vadim continues the educational program, “what remains after washing is called concentrate—the heaviest fraction.” However, there is not even a handful on the tray - just a pinch, where specks of gold should sparkle. If you're lucky, there will be a nugget. About a bean, about a seed. Look, what you have lathered up is actually small pebbles. The glacier was dragging it along with it, and the redhead was at the same time with it. Where else in the Moscow region can you find something like this?

It's no secret that all great chemical discoveries were made by accident. For thousands of years, people have persistently searched for the philosopher's stone. Only, unlike the hero Harry Potter, they wanted only one thing from the magical mineral: the transformation of base metals into gold. This was done by Aristotle, Nostradamus, Leonardo da Vinci and Nicolaus Copernicus. Only Faust succeeded, and that was thanks to the wild imagination of the great Goethe. And the real gold rush began in the 80s of the last century, when North American scavengers wandering along the spurs of the Klondike River discovered gold-bearing sand there in sizes that eclipsed any imagination.

Long before this, Vasco da Gama, Magellan and Columbus promised their kings that the ships they equipped would return back with holds full of gold. The conqueror of Mexico, Hernan Cortes, amazed the Aztecs not only with his red beard, exactly like that of the god Quetzalcoatl, but also with his spiritual simplicity. He stubbornly refused such priceless gifts as jasper and sprigs of native copper, but he filled the porters' coolies with gold, from which the Indians made cleavers for garden trees. They were generally interesting, these Aztecs: on the one hand, they achieved incredible success in astronomy, on the other, they did not know wheel traction, pack animals and metallurgy.

Cortez began to introduce them to the benefits of civilization, so actively that after 7 years of his governorship, the indigenous population was almost halved. His colleague, the conquistador Francisco Pizarro, the conqueror of Peru, resolved issues much more radically. To free the Supreme Inca Atahualpa, he demanded that a room 4x6x2.5 meters be filled with gold. When the Indians complied with his request, just in case, he burned the ruler as a heretic and unreliable person. He also came up with the idea of searching in the jungles of Bolivia and Ecuador for Eldorado, a mythical all-gold city-state. It is not known exactly how many Europeans perished in the hospitable jungle. The search for the treasured miracle city continued with manic persistence for 300 years, until rubber and cocaine began to be exported from the completely plundered region.

Diligent work is not easy! The waterproof branded boots were filled with ice water after 20 minutes. The fingers became numb a little later. My lower back hurt. The tea from the thermos did not warm at all. And the result is zero. And suddenly - bingo! Something sparkled at the bottom of the tray!

“This is a product of human activity,” comments Vadim, “foil from candy.” The most famous professional aphorism: if you have doubts whether you have found gold or not, then it is not gold. Let's go upstream. Below, if there was gold, it’s already gone.

Yes, it seems that he is also a candidate of gold sciences. Hillock, as they say in Kolyma. And I should be silent and wash. He does this regularly. Before work, at dawn. On weekends. While on vacation. Is it successful? Well, he doesn’t look like someone in poverty or needy. Although it doesn’t happen often in Hawaii.

- Listen, Vadim, aren’t you afraid that your unusual hobby, as Gorbaty from “The Meeting Place” said, will lead to zugunder?

- No. Firstly, we need to be caught by the hand, and what crazy policeman would believe that we are here, on Skhodnya, my little gold?! Secondly, in order to be held accountable, “large sizes” are needed, and this is from a kilogram of raw materials. And even then, we would have faced a maximum fine of 3,000 rubles. Don't get distracted, shake the tray. But we must remain silent about the little piece of gold. Two or three people should know about it, otherwise it will float back into the river. And forever.

In the dark times of the cult of personality, the camps where prisoners were engaged in mining were considered the most terrible. In some Siberian villages, prospectors have long been buried behind the fence of cemeteries, like buffoons and suicides. In South Africa and Botswana, illegal mining carries a life sentence, but several million people are involved in it. The situation is similar in Indonesia and on the island of Borneo. In Morocco and some states of India there are gigantic fines, non-payment of which leads to a debt trap. In the DPRK, leftist miners can be shot with a grenade launcher. In America and Australia, a production license costs about $30. The Sheridan Act of 1886 allowed any US citizen, for a nominal fee of $4, to stake out a plot of up to one square mile in Alaska and calmly wash you guess what there.

- Well, that's enough for today. No luck. However, let’s take a little concentrate “for reporting purposes.” There you can clearly see the “feathers” under a magnifying glass.

Lord, is this hell really over?

— Vad, did you actually pan for real gold here? Well, at least once, at least a little?

“Let’s go home,” he smiled slyly, “I’m not looking for material enrichment.”

- And what?

- Do not understand? Well, okay. Let's come to my place.

At home, he took out a painted folding box - it's called a folding box - and from it came nuggets: one like a pea, another like a bean, the third like a grain of rice.

- These are exhibition pieces. Or as a keepsake.

- And others?

— Skhodnya is keeping the others for now.

Cartography to help

Persistent rumors that there is gold in the Moscow region and that it is not so difficult to find it received unexpected confirmation from cartographers. Not long ago, a modern map of attractions located in the Moscow region was published. The attentive eyes of fortune hunters saw on it the symbol Au between two villages of the Dmitrov region.

One of them is Protasovo, and the second is Ignatovo. Any high school student knows that a similar sign denotes an element of the periodic table, which has atomic number 79 and is a noble metal, or, more simply, gold.

For gold mining in the Moscow region, a map indicating deposits where there is at least any significant amount of gold sand is simply necessary for the prospector. It helps to weed out rumors and legends that have no basis, and direct your energy to finding truly promising places for mining the precious metal.

The Moscow region managed to find its own gold-bearing placers

In his interview with RBC, the general director of the largest Russian gold mining company, Pavel Grachev, provided specific figures. Currently known reserves of gold that can be extracted from Russian subsoil are estimated at 7500-8000 tons. Of this volume, about 330 tons are mined annually in the country.

The simplest arithmetic operation suggests that if these quantitative indicators are maintained, our grandchildren may not get the newly minted gold.

“If this trend is not reversed, then within 10–20 years the industry may face a structural shortage of the raw material base,” concluded Grachev.

Will it be possible to rectify the situation and once again make the distant future sparkle with golden reflections?

According to the expert, this cannot be done without thorough investments in geological exploration, which will make it possible to replenish the now depleting raw material base of the gold mining industry.

In the Russian depths, nature hides many more minerals that our specialists have yet to reach. Among other things, there are gold deposits there.

It is interesting that this valuable metal can be mined even in the capital region. If we turn to the chronicles of bygone days, we can find out that at least one attempt was made to organize industrial mining of gold near Moscow.

In the summer of 1903, on the pages of Moscow newspapers, the attention of readers was attracted by catchy headlines: “Russian California”, “Klondike near Moscow”... In the notes below, reporters reported that gold placers had been discovered north of the Mother See.

In fact, this fact was not an absolute sensation. Digging in the beds of streams and rivers flowing among the hills of the Klinsko-Dmitrovskaya ridge, some successful naturalists sometimes found precious “souvenirs” - they fished out small grains of gold from the sand.

Even the authors of one of the guidebooks to the Moscow region mentioned the presence of natural gold near Moscow. Although they limited themselves to only very meager information. “Near the Iksha station of the Moscow-Yaroslavl-Arkhangelsk railway, gold-bearing placers were found - gold was found in gristly boulder deposits of glacial origin.”

It turns out that “imported” gold is hidden in the depths of the Moscow region.

In prehistoric times, a powerful glacier crawled into the territory of the current capital region from the north. On his previous long journey, he worked like a giant bulldozer: he raked up a mass of stones, rubble, sand and dragged all this mass hundreds and hundreds of kilometers to the south. The glacier left part of its “prey” where the Klinsko-Dmitrovskaya ridge is now marked on maps. Moreover, among the pebbles “brought” by him, some turned out to have a gold “filling”.

However, geologists who examined the environs of the village of Iksha in the pre-revolutionary years came to little encouraging conclusions: there is practically no chance of extracting any significant amount of precious metal in the “Moscow Klondike”.

But at the beginning of the last century, an enterprising person was found who decided to get rich on the Ikshan placers.

This is what the MK correspondent managed to find out on this matter by leafing through files of old newspapers.

One of the landowners, a certain Ponomarev, announced the creation of a joint-stock company to organize industrial gold mining on the lands he owned near Iksha. We must pay tribute to the PR talents of this gentleman. The advertising campaign he successfully organized quickly brought results - there was no end to Muscovites wanting to purchase shares in the new commercial enterprise. However, in the midst of such a “gold rush,” Ponomarev’s nerves could not stand it. The potential gold miner could not resist the temptation to quickly grab the sure cash jackpot in exchange for the hypothetical profits from gold mining. As a result, the newly minted entrepreneur tried to escape, pocketing part of the money received from the sale of shares in his Gold Mining Company.

Unfortunately for him, this number did not work. The fugitive was detained and they even wanted to throw him in prison. However, Ponomarev found influential defenders who eventually managed to help him out of trouble.

It was not possible to find any information about the further adventures of the Ikshan “criminal” landowner. And the gold from the Moscow region, “Klinsko-Dmitrovskoe”, still remains “not raised”.

Although from time to time its existence is remembered. On the Internet you can find videos filmed by enthusiasts who demonstrate the results of their diligence: with good magnification, you can see that a person is holding tiny golden “grains of sand” in the palm of his hand.

How profitable is such a mining business? It seems that even collecting and recycling aluminum cans is many times more profitable. After all, gold near Moscow was and remains something of a beautiful mirage.

A little history

Gold from the Moscow region has been mentioned in historical references since the beginning of the 19th century. The soldiers of Napoleon's army, having occupied Moscow, first of all began to inquire from the local residents where the extraordinary “golden” river was located, in which, instead of fish, gold nuggets await their catchers.

After the expulsion of Napoleon and the end of hostilities, envoys from the Russian imperial court came to Moscow. The purpose of their visit to Moscow was the same as that of the French: to learn about large gold deposits near Moscow. However, the residents of the Moscow province did not reveal their secret, and the royal envoys returned to the court with nothing.

Another outbreak of the “gold rush” occurred in the lands near Moscow before the October Revolution. The reason for it was an incident that helped a peasant from the Dmitrov region find two rather large nuggets on the banks of a small nameless river. The lucky plowman resold the find to a capital merchant. Soon after this, “top secret” maps with the designation of a gold-bearing place began to circulate around Moscow.

In response, many Moscow residents succumbed to the excitement and decided to try their luck with a prospecting tray in their hands. Even the famous master of reporting, Vladimir Gilyarovsky, succumbed to the general excitement, and went along with everyone else to catch their luck. Moscow guidebooks responded to the increased demand and began to publish data that there really are gold deposits near the village of Iksha, and they can be found in:

gold placers;
alluvial boulders of glacial origin.

The baton of general excitement was picked up by local newspapers, which began publishing articles with tempting, action-inducing headlines:

"Klondike near Moscow";
"Russian California";
"Golden River"

The successful entrepreneur Ponomarev was not at a loss at the right moment. In the wake of popular interest, he created a joint-stock company with the goal of organizing gold mining on an industrial scale. Very respectable people of that time became members of the society. However, their hopes for quick enrichment were not realized.

The gold rush died out as suddenly as it started. And the reason for this was not at all the absence of the sought-after gold in the rivers near Moscow.

Industrialists did not have the technology to make metal mining economically interesting. At that time it simply did not exist.

Gold of the Moscow region.

If there is gold in the rivers of the Moscow region? It turns out there are, and quite a lot. During the Soviet years, enterprises near Moscow processed about 4 tons of gold per year. Lately, these specialized plants and factories in the region have been “sitting around doing nothing.” At the same time, according to experts, there are places in the Moscow region where there are more than 17 milligrams of this precious metal per 1 ton of rock! And industrial mining of alluvial gold is considered profitable if there are at least 10 milligrams per ton.

How realistic is gold mining in the Moscow region? It must be said that rumors about local gold have been circulating for a long time. According to ancient legends, up to 300 pounds of gold were mined in Muscovy annually! Jewelry was made from it, coins were minted, and even sold to neighbors...

Gold was also “washed” in Moscow itself, in Sokolniki. But most of all, judging by pre-revolutionary newspapers, it was mined in the north of the Moscow region, near the village of Iksha . Here, small rivers flowing from the Klinsko-Dmitrovskaya ridge erode glacial deposits containing a small amount of precious metal, and gradually enrich their sand with gold. One of these rivers, flowing under Iksha , still delights local residents and lovers of stone souvenirs with small gold grains. And among the old-timers, the legend of the “golden stream” is still alive, in which successful miners washed not individual grains of gold or “signs,” as the grinders call them, but grams of the precious yellow metal!

In recent years, these rumors have received, so to speak, “cartographic” confirmation. If you look closely at the recently published map of attractions of the Moscow region, then in the Dmitrovsky district you can see between the villages of Ignatovo and Protasovo the symbol “Au is a chemical element with atomic number 79, a heavy, shiny yellow metal - gold.”

Gold in the Moscow region was first remembered at the beginning of the 19th century; rumors about gold filled Moscow. Even Napoleonic soldiers unsuccessfully inquired about the “golden river”. After the end of the War of 1812, envoys of the Russian Emperor also became interested in gold near Moscow. But the residents of the Moscow province and the capital did not reveal the secret of the gold near Moscow.

Just before the revolution, the “gold rush” broke out again in the Dmitrov region. On the bank of an unnamed river, a local peasant found two gold nuggets. They were bought by a capital merchant. Soon, “absolutely secret” lists and drawings showing the “right place” were visiting Moscow taverns and bazaars. Many people flocked to Iksha for the golden mirage. The king of reporters, Vladimir Gilyarovsky, who also happened to be among the get-rich-quick lovers and visited one of the “faithful places,” could not stand it either.

In the guide to the Moscow province the following lines appeared: “Near the Iksha station... gold-bearing placers were found - gold was found in gristly boulder deposits of glacial origin.”

Tempting headlines flashed in articles in Moscow and St. Petersburg newspapers: “Klondike near Moscow”, “Russian California”, “Golden River”... Entrepreneur Ponomarev created a joint-stock company to organize industrial mining of gold near Moscow, which was joined by serious and respectable industrialists and merchants. But... the Moscow region “gold rush”, having flared up brightly, quickly went out. There really was gold in the rivers, but the technology for economically profitable extraction of fine gold, which was contained in small quantities in sediments, did not exist.

There is gold in the sediments of the Sestra and Volgushi rivers. To prove the reality of the existence of gold near Moscow to the journalists of the Rossiyskaya Gazeta, several years ago, a researcher at TsNIGRI - the Central Research Geological Prospecting Institute of Non-Ferrous and Precious Metals Nikolai Ivanov dragged them through the swamps to Sestra, and then drove them into the water, handing over a tray - the main tool of gold fishing. After several hours of hard work, the journalists managed to mine five milligrams of gold. Through a microscope, the results of journalistic “diligence” look more than impressive: smooth, river-rounded “cobblestones”, pleasing with their weight. But to the naked eye it is just dust, although some grains were still visible to the naked eye. But all the same, the novice gold miners-journalists were happy: five milligrams of gold as a souvenir “warmed their souls.”

Not only in the north of the region are “coveted” gold deposits found in river sediments. In the 70s of the last century, a student at the Moscow Geological Prospecting Institute, Alexey Abramzon, boasted to his students that he had panned gold in one of the streams in the Podolsk region and even showed off a few tiny grains.

Gold deposits are usually associated with intrusive rocks - granites and accompanying quartz veins and dikes, or with metamorphic rocks formed as a result of their alteration under the influence of high temperatures and pressures. The Moscow region is composed of sedimentary rocks on the surface. Where did gold come from in the Moscow region?

Here is how Doctor of Geological Sciences Yuri Lavrushin explains the appearance of gold in the beds of some rivers in the Moscow region:

— Many thousands of years ago, a giant tongue of ice slid down from Scandinavia onto the Central Russian Upland. Along the way, it absorbed boulders, stones, and rock fragments. Centuries passed, the climate began to change, and the glacier began to melt. In those places where rapids and rifts formed, unique natural enrichment factories began to operate. Heavy minerals, including gold, settled to the bottom, sharply increasing the concentration of minerals...

The gold content in water-washed sediments still remains insignificant, and they do not form any significant accumulations. Why is it necessary to develop seemingly insignificant deposits in the Moscow region?

The identified reserves of relatively easily mined alluvial gold in Russia will ensure the extraction of the precious metal for only ten years. The indigenous reserves will last for a century or so. But to develop them, it is necessary to create a complex infrastructure, consisting not only of mines or deep open pits, but also of expensive processing plants. Then we still need to create a transport network serving this gold mining plant, because almost all newly discovered gold deposits in bedrock are located in uninhabited areas. It is much cheaper to extract gold from loose and, especially alluvial deposits located near rivers. There is one more circumstance that can make gold mining in the Moscow region economically viable. In the center of Russia, including the Moscow region, the precious yellow metal is contained in sand, which is used in large quantities in construction, laying roads and other works. Therefore, gold in the Moscow region can be mined along with construction materials. For example, in the sand mined by the Khramkovsky mining and processing plant, the precious metal is contained in an amount sufficient for economically profitable extraction, provided that it is simultaneously extracted. And another mining and processing complex - Vyazemsky, just before perestroika, according to Alexander Klyukvin, who at that time was in charge of regional geological work in the Moscow region, was already planning to begin work on creating a technology for associated gold extraction. But, unfortunately, cuts in funding for the geological industry did not allow him to do this.

Golden river beds

Employees of the Central Scientific Research Geological Prospecting Institute of Non-Ferrous and Precious Metals (TSNIGRI) told Rossiyskaya Gazeta journalists that not only the rivers near Iksha are of interest to prospectors. There is also noble metal in the beds of the Sestra and Volgusha rivers near Moscow.

To prove their words, they organized a real mining expedition for the workers of the pen, leading them to the shores of the Sister. Journalists had to pick up trays and get down to work. Their efforts were not in vain. After several hours of hard work, they lathered 5 milligrams of pure golden sand.

If you look at this catch through a microscope, it looks very impressive. All grains of sand have a smooth, water-polished surface and a bright, inviting shine. Unfortunately, it was difficult to see the microscopic nuggets with the naked eye. But the fact that a certain number of gold signs were found in a short time suggests that this metal still exists in the rivers of the Moscow region.

And not only the northern region of the region can boast of the presence of gold. There is evidence that in the mid-70s, one of the students of the Moscow Geological Prospecting Institute managed to wash gold grains in streams in the Podolsk region. To prove the veracity of his words, he willingly showed off his booty to his classmates.

“Golden rivers” flow in the Moscow region

Gold was also “washed” in Moscow itself, in Sokolniki. But most of all, judging by pre-revolutionary newspapers, it was mined in the north of the Moscow region, near the village of Iksha. Here, small rivers flowing from the Klinsko-Dmitrovskaya ridge erode glacial deposits containing a small amount of precious metal, and gradually enrich their sand with gold. One of these rivers, flowing under Iksha, still delights local residents and lovers of stone souvenirs with small gold grains. And among the old-timers, the legend of the “golden stream” is still alive, in which successful miners washed not individual grains of gold or “signs,” as the grinders call them, but grams of the precious yellow metal!

In the guide to the Moscow province the following lines appeared: “Near the Iksha station... gold-bearing placers were found - gold was found in gristly boulder deposits of glacial origin.”

Here is how Doctor of Geological Sciences Yuri Lavrushin explains the appearance of gold in the beds of some rivers in the Moscow region:

The identified reserves of relatively easily mined alluvial gold in Russia will ensure the extraction of the precious metal for only ten years. The indigenous reserves will last for a century or so. But to develop them, it is necessary to create a complex infrastructure, consisting not only of mines or deep open pits, but also of expensive processing plants. Then we still need to create a transport network serving this gold mining plant, because almost all newly discovered gold deposits in bedrock are located in uninhabited areas. It is much cheaper to extract gold from loose, and especially alluvial, deposits located near rivers. There is one more circumstance that can make gold mining in the Moscow region economically viable. In the center of Russia, including the Moscow region, the precious yellow metal is contained in sand, which is used in large quantities in construction, laying roads and other works. Therefore, gold in the Moscow region can be mined along with construction materials. For example, in the sand mined by the Khramkovsky mining and processing plant, the precious metal is contained in an amount sufficient for economically profitable extraction, provided that it is simultaneously extracted. And another mining and processing complex - Vyazemsky, just before perestroika, according to Alexander Klyukvin, who at that time was in charge of regional geological work in the Moscow region, was already planning to begin work on creating a technology for associated gold extraction. But, unfortunately, cuts in funding for the geological industry did not allow him to do this.

Author: Mikhail Burleshin

And the impossible is possible

Experts say that gold deposits should be sought in layers of igneous rocks, which include granites and quartz, or in the vicinity of metamorphic rocks transformed under the influence of high pressures and significant temperatures.

Gold from the Moscow region is an exception to the rule. The fact is that the territory of the Moscow region mostly consists of sedimentary rocks. How, in this case, can one explain the presence of gold in the Moscow region?

Scientists have found compelling reasons to explain this phenomenon. According to the presented hypothesis, the reason for the appearance of gold in the Moscow region was a giant glacier, which several thousand years ago slid from the Scandinavian mountains to the Central Russian Upland. During its journey, it accumulated boulders, stones and fragments of various rocks in the ice layer.

As centuries passed, the climate changed and the glacial tongue began to gradually melt. In the places where the rapids formed, a natural enrichment process began to occur, as a result of which heavier minerals settled to the bottom of the glacier, thereby forming mineral deposits. Gold did not escape this fate either.

Where does the gold come from?

As the science of geology teaches, gold deposits are associated with so-called intrusive rocks. These are, as a rule, granites with quartz veins. They are formed as a result of complex geological phenomena. Therefore, the precious metal is found in foothills or mountainous areas, from where it is washed out by stormy rivers and deposited on shallows and bends in the riverbed.

There are no mountains in the Moscow region, but during the Great Glaciation in the direction of the city of Dmitrov, the glacier moved rocks from the northeast. People have long found grains of gold in the rivers flowing from the Klinsko-Dmitrovskaya Upland. These are the rivers Yakhroma, Sestra, Volgusha and many others, small and unknown. In the sediments of the Ikshanka River at the end of the 19th – beginning of the 20th centuries. found gold particles (0.1–0.25 g/t) in the form of small grains.

Why mine in the Moscow region?

Despite the fact that gold has been mined in places near Moscow for a long time, its reserves are assessed by experts as insignificant from the point of view of industrial interest. In this case, who is developing these unpromising deposits and why? Scientists know the answer to this question too.

Gold from the Moscow region is of interest because it is of the alluvial type, which makes it possible to organize a fairly easy process of its extraction. According to experts, there will only be enough such placer gold in Russia for the next decades.

The reserves of gold that lie along with the bedrock can be mined for more than a century. The problem is that the development of primary deposits requires significant financial investments from gold miners to create:

complex and expensive infrastructure, including the development of mines and quarries, as well as the construction of processing plants;
transport and logistics network designed to serve the enterprise, since most of them are located away from housing.

Placer gold from loose rocks or alluvial deposits that form on river banks cannot boast of significant reserves, but in terms of extraction it is much cheaper for miners. There is one more factor that allows gold deposits near Moscow to become profitable.

In the central regions of the country, including the Moscow region, the main reserves of gold are contained in sand, which is actively used in the construction industry. Taking this factor into account, experts offered gold miners a technology that allows for the accompanying extraction of metal. This method makes gold mining economically interesting.

Russian gold rush: expert showed where ore reserves are in Moscow

Will the gold rush hit the capital?

It’s hard to even imagine that somewhere here, in the very center of the metropolis, among thousands of high-rise buildings and tens of millions of people, treasures are hidden underground. Alexander, a candidate of geological and mineralogical sciences, and I met at the Vorobyovy Gory metro station. A narrow path leads directly from the station to the forest park. Walk along it for about five minutes and you come out to lakes framed by hills.

- Do you see these layers of earth? “Alexander slowly gestured around the snow-covered shores of the lake. “Once upon a time, tens of thousands of years ago, a landslide occurred in this place, exposing bedrock. For this reason, the probability of finding paleo-floodplains of ancient rivers with gold content here is much higher than elsewhere in Moscow.

I ignored the mysterious word “paleofloodplains”. But she grabbed onto the “gold” like someone drowning in the abyss of a crisis at a straw.

“Right here, deep in these hills?” Gold?.. - I couldn’t believe my ears. - Where does it come from here, in the city?

I immediately heard in my head: “Piastres!” Piasters” I already imagined myself as young Jim Hawkins from “Treasure Island”, and my companion as the insidious one-legged John Silver. It's okay that he has two legs. Now we will go strictly according to the map, dig into the frozen March soil and...

In fact, “everything has already been stolen before us.” As it turned out, there is no big secret that the Moscow soil may contain paleoalluvial deposits containing gold. Geologists have known about this in theory for a long time, it’s just that none of them went out into the fields.

“In principle, gold deposits are located throughout the earth’s crust, but on the Sparrow Hills it is easier to expose them,” Soleny explained as we walked through the park past the Klondike. — The Moscow River has washed away the soil here over hundreds of years, creating rather high slopes. As a result, layers of sedimentary rocks were formed, which, like layers on a cut pie, became very clearly visible.

— Why has no one ever carried out excavations in these places? - I didn’t let up.

“Not profitable,” Solyony shrugged. — Excavations are carried out where there is really a lot of gold. None of the professionals will strain themselves if it is not economically profitable.

By the way, as many treasure hunters assure, deposits of small and thin gold are found not only in Moscow, but also in the Moscow region - in sand and gravel glacial layers. Gold-bearing deposits are supposedly those rocks that were brought here by a glacier from Scandinavia many thousands of years ago. And the most promising places for gold laundering are the Iksha, Yakhroma and Volgusha rivers.

But what do we care about professionals! A few pieces of yellow metal will be enough for us. And yet, as the expert said, it’s not worth going to the mines with just one shovel. The hills are covered with a layer of clay, grass, and now snow. First, you should wait until summer, and then you can dig a quarry. Not with a shovel, of course, but with an excavator.

Photo: Kirill Iskoldsky

...And in the rivers of Moscow there are gems

If you still fail to find the gold, there is another backup option - to go in search of semi-precious stones. These jewels have been precisely preserved in Moscow, and we know about them not only from books.

— About 10 years ago, researchers from the Moscow Geological Prospecting Institute (now the Academy) decided to test their knowledge. We went to Bitsevsky Park to the river and a week later, with the help of concentrate trays, we actually washed two cups of precious stones. They had 200 grams then,” says Solyony, as if matter-of-factly.

This is what a scientist means - no excitement. And I got goosebumps. Such a vein is disappearing!

Now there’s no time to walk around in the park either. The snow is knee-deep. To get to the Gorodnya River, Alexander and I had to try pretty hard - to trample a path in the snowdrifts and make our way through dead wood.

“The entire Bitsevsky Park is riddled with rivers and their tributaries,” says the researcher as we descend to the reservoir. “However, the forest itself and the upper part of the earth’s crust here remained in their original form. Previously, this was the case throughout Moscow. The geology of the area is represented by Mesozoic sedimentary deposits, under which Paleozoic rocks are located at a depth of 5-6 km. They contain so-called accessory minerals - about 1%. These are zircon, tourmaline, monocyte, topaz, apatite, quartz and other semi-precious and precious stones. Therefore, our task is to find sections of the river where it just cuts into the Paleozoic.

- Can you find such areas now?

— In the summer I’ll find it within 4–5 hours. In general, you first need to look for floodplains where rocks are exposed. It happens that water washes away this layer in such a way that so-called brushes are formed on the surface. Geologists often look for minerals there.

- But still, why can you find gems here?

— There may also be stones in other rivers in the capital, but Paleozoic deposits are practically not exposed there. The river simply did not wash out the layers so much and did not reach the Paleozoic yet.

As Alexander explained, there are a lot of processes going on in the river all the time, slow and fast flows. And each stone has its own properties. For example, tourmaline requires certain conditions for it to fall and stop in this particular place, while another stone requires different conditions. Years go by, the water in the rivers moves, and the pebbles stop in certain places. They accumulate and accumulate and end up with river placers.

By the way, gold (if it is in rivers) is easier to find, according to an expert, than stones. The metal is heavy, so when everything unnecessary is washed out of the tray, it remains. Gems are lighter in weight and this makes washing them much more difficult.

“For 1 cubic meter you get 1 gram of useful minerals,” he says. — During washing, a lot of different pebbles remain in the tray. The plane in the tray is large, and the minerals are scattered over a large area in a thin layer, but it is still not so easy to see them. Geologists look for them with a magnifying glass: the average size of one such gem is about 1–1.5 mm.

Tourmaline, for example, has a variety - indigolite - which is a transparent blue gemstone. It's quite expensive. So, you can find this pebble in this river in the park. The main thing is not to confuse it with calcite - also a transparent stone that is worth nothing.

How to distinguish tourmaline from calcite by type? They differ in hardness. Gemstones have a hardness greater than 7 on the Mohs scale (1 to 10). 10 is a diamond, 1 is talc. It’s difficult to beat hardness by eye, but it’s possible (if you’re a professional). According to the scientist, calcite itself is a rather soft stone, so in constant movement it is relatively easily ground with water and becomes more or less round, oval. Tourmaline should have a surface with sharp edges. A sign of hardness is a conchoidal fracture. Additionally, another characteristic of gemstones is shine.

In fact, finding gold and precious stones in layers of earth and water is not so easy, and perhaps simply impossible for an ordinary untrained person. Firstly, in order to go to the mines, you need to obtain a special license (fortunately, soon it will be enough to create an individual entrepreneur to obtain it), secondly, buy expensive equipment, and thirdly, stock up on a lot of free time and remarkable patience. But we advise beginners to take a guide with them to the excavations - a professional geologist who will help them find the right place and discern that treasured treasure among a million grey-brown-crimson stones and pieces of earth.

Of course, the opinion of geologist Soleny is not the ultimate truth. According to scientists from the Institute of Earth Physics of the Russian Academy of Sciences, there is no trace of any gold or precious stones in Moscow and the Moscow region. Due to geological conditions, in Moscow there are no quartz veins where gold placers may be located. And you need to go for it to the northeast of the country. But, as they say, there are so many scientists, so many opinions. Therefore, do not rush to part with your dreams of treasures.

In addition, the Central Federal District, including the capital region, is a leader in the number of explored deposits of underground drinking and industrial water. More than a third of all the country's resources are located here - 37.6%. Moreover, more than two-thirds of water reserves are concentrated in the European part of Russia. The Moscow region remains the leader in the extraction of drinking groundwater, as well as the Krasnodar Territory, Kemerovo and Sverdlovsk regions.

In addition, a fairly large amount of sedimentary rocks are localized in the Moscow region - these are various sands and clays. There are such deposits in Lytkarino. Near Mozhaisk, according to geologists, there are quarries where limestone, sand, gravel and even agates are mined. To the east of Moscow is the village of Gzhel, where clay of a certain composition is mined. It is from this that dishes with the famous painting are then made.

The MK reporter did not find gold on Sparrow Hills, no matter how hard he tried. Photo: Kirill Iskoldsky

It is theoretically possible to find gems in the Bitsevsky Forest.

NEW GOLD MINING RULES

The head of the Ministry of Natural Resources of the Russian Federation, Sergei Donskoy, has already sent amendments to the Law “On Precious Stones and Metals” to interested departments, as well as law enforcement agencies, for approval, where, in turn, they must assess the possible risks of criminalization of the industry.

Let us remind you that according to the draft law, Russian citizens will be able to go in search of gold by registering only as an individual entrepreneur. Then the entrepreneur will need to submit an application to Rosnedra and obtain a license to conduct excavations.

As the Ministry of Natural Resources explained, Russians will have the opportunity to mine the precious metal where the deposits have long been explored and developed for industrial purposes. Therefore, everyone will be given a permit to mine gold in a specific area of no more than 15 hectares, where gold reserves are no more than 10 kg. People will be able to use manual labor or apply some new mining technologies. By the way, entrepreneurs will not even have to pay mineral extraction tax (MET).

However, do not rush to dig your nose (or whatever you have prepared there) into Moscow soil. Officials decided to work out all the nuances of the new scheme in the Magadan region. And if no problems arise with the control of lone diggers, the “golden” experiment will be extended to other regions.

MEANWHILE

According to the Ministry of Natural Resources of the Russian Federation, a number of mineral resources are localized in Moscow and the Moscow region. Among them are phosphorite ores (phosphorus), which are located in one of the largest deposits - Yegoryevskoye in the Moscow region. The ores here are characterized by high iron content, which is why they require complex technological processing or are only suitable for producing low-quality fertilizers - phosphorus flour and phosphate ameliorants.

Private mining

The low profitability of gold mining does not frighten residents of the Moscow region, who in the summer turn into numerous private miners, happily spending time on the banks of large and small rivers.

For their purposes, they use simple, but time-tested and reliable mining technology. Most prospectors only need a few items to get started:

tray;
shovel;
bucket;
scoop.

The main difficulty is the main question: where to dig? Some miners dig through river sediments, while others go to quarries where sand and gravel are extracted. Once the location has been determined, you can begin to work.

Here another difficulty awaits the lover of precious metals. The prospector will have to patiently and carefully carry out the same constantly repeated movements for a long time. In general, the proverb applies to prospectors like no other profession: “Persistence and work will grind everything down.”