Spruce Creek flows northwest into Pine Creek about 4 kilometres east of the community of Atlin. The main creek is about 23 kilometres long with two main 4-kilometre-long branches at its head. The creek was worked for a length of about 5 kilometres primarily in an area around the midpoint of its course. Some work has been done in the upper reaches of the creek, but the operations have been small and less successful.

Some hydraulic mining and steam shovel operations were done on the main part of Spruce Creek but by far the majority of gold was recovered by significant underground development in the early 1900s. From 1896 to 1945, approximately 7,926,848 grams of gold were recovered from Spruce Creek making it the largest gold producer in Atlin (Bulletin 28). Records showing the exact amount of underground work are not available. Greater development on Pine Creek (104N 030) recently allowed it to become the largest gold producer in Atlin, overtaking Spruce in 1956.

The creek flows over primarily mafic volcanic rocks of the upper Mississippian to Permian Nakina Formation of the Cache Creek Complex. Minor chert, argillite and limestone of the stratigraphically higher Mississippian to Triassic Kedahda Formation (Cache Creek Complex) are also exposed both in the lower and upper reaches of the creek.

Two pay channels, the "grey" and the "red", have been developed on Spruce Creek. The red channel sits on bedrock; the richest pay came from the first 1.8 to 2.4 metres of gravel above bedrock.

The valley bottom of Spruce Creek along the Spruce Creek property owned by R. Edenoste is entirely blanketed by tailings and overburden. There were four objectives involved in a 2009 exploration program on the property: the first was to determine if any unworked parts of the paleochannel remain beneath the present day Spruce Creek valley floor; the second was to determine how thoroughly the gold was recovered from areas directly lying over bedrock; the third was to determine if any economic gold grades remain in tailings; and the fourth objective was to determine if part of the paleochannel floor extends into the western limit of the steep sided valleyside below deep ground. The exploration work involved seven test pits, seven refractive seismic survey lines, and a pilot mine pit measuring 100 metres long and about 50 metres wide.

The area explored along Spruce Creek was thoroughly worked by previous miners and the 2009 test pits and pilot mine pit shows that no economic gold grades remain. Results from five test pits (SC-3 to SC-7) excavated along the valley floor shows that the tailings and waste material created by previous miners contain uneconomic gold grades that average 0.13 gram per cubic yard. Bedrock was reached and scraped in each test pit and it appears that gold along the bedrock was thoroughly recovered by previous mining operations. Test pits SC-1 and SC-2 were able to reach in-place gravels above bedrock along the steep west valleyside wall. Significant gold grades were identified in both pits (0.72 and 0.79 gram per cubic yard), but these grades would be uneconomic to mine a short distances into the valley hillside where overburden quickly reaches 30 metres and more.