Divining-Rods,
Fact Or Fantasy

Some miners use Divining-Rods for locating fault concentrations and fault junctions. There is a theory that silicious water descended down through the overlying sandstone into the clay level through faults, cracks in the earths crust.

I tend to believe this, because every time I find opal it is close to junctions of two or more faults.

Water drillers use these rods for finding underground streams. They think their wires are picking up water channels but in fact they are faults that are reservoirs for the water, and yes they could be called underground streams because as we know, faults can run for miles.

Many people do not believe this is possible.

I use two pieces of wire bent in an "L" shape with the longer side being about 18" long and the short side about 4" long. Holding the short ends of the wire in both hands and pointing the longer end of the "L" in front of me. I keep my hands about 18" apart and walk slowly forward keeping the wires in front of me and slope them forward slightly. Hold the wires about 5 degrees off horizontal. When I walk across a fault the horizontal ends of the wires cross themselves.

I can detect faults, underground drives (tunnels), buried telephone lines and pipes. They even sense overhead wiring.

These rods do not find opal, but are a tool, a very helpful one at that.

Divining-Rods back to mining industry