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Volume 10 : February 2010
SPECIAL ISSUE - Impact of Large Gold Dredges.

All mining is destructive, especially placer gold mining with large bucket-line gold dredges. Best Available Techniques (BAT) is to rehabilitate the dredging site as quickly as possible, by smoothing the landforms, spreading topsoil, planting and after-care. This 'best practice' is challenged by research that shows benign neglect often leads to a better long-term environmental gain in terms of landscape diversity and wildlife gain. Examples of bucket-line gold dredging operations in Alaska, California, Montana, Mongolia, Siberia, Russian Far East, China and Australia demonstrate that abandonment as derelict land eventually produces strong gains in biodiversity and especially in creating new habitats that display a higher degree of naturalness than possible by expensive orthodox 'best practice'.

Robin Grayson and Chimed-Erdene Baatar
Large gold dredges - impacts in USA, Canada, Russia, Mongolia and China.
World Placer Journal
2010, volume 10, pages 1-20.