DCHP-1 Online
gophering Slang 
n. the digging of small mines; prospecting and digging.
- 1944 [gophering. Digging for something. I once heard a cowman characterize a certain old prospector by saying he'd "been gophering in them hills as far back as an Injun could remember."]
- 1958 The mining fields in Canada were painfully restricted at that time to Eastern Ontario, Kenora, Sudbury and some gophering in Nova Scotia and British Columbia.
- 1944 [gophering. Digging for something. I once heard a cowman characterize a certain old prospector by saying he'd "been gophering in them hills as far back as an Injun could remember."]