In Dahlonega, GA they had gold panning troughs for ignorant people from Atlanta. Charged like $35 to pan a five gallon bucket and the con artists put in bright brass filings that looked like 10k gold, not real 24k gold. But the flatlanders did not know the difference and bragged to their fellow flatlanders when they got home about the gold they panned. Same with minerals, they bought them wholesale from North Carolina and put one or two in the 5 gallon bucket of sand and small rocks. At least those were real gems, but not the really valuable ones. My boys and I had permission to hunt an original land lot sw of Dahlonega, in Auraria GA that had two actual mines (one productive) and two small branches that gave up an occasional bb sized nugget and lot of fine gold. Lots of fun and that is what got me into metal detecting in the late 1980's. I would use the Fisher Gold Bug to find bird and buckshot in different locations in the creek and almost always find some fine gold or very small nuggets trapped in the same area. Great way to find areas to dig the sand and rocks to pan or to run through our sluice box.