In Discovery Channel's top-rated show `Gold Rush', gold miners, inexperienced as some may be, hope to strike it rich in the wilds of Alaska and beyond. Some dismal summers result, filled with injuries, malfunctioning equipment and constant fighting among the greenhorn miners, yet serious cases of gold fever always trump any talk of giving up and sometimes leads to dreams being salvaged. The companion series `The Dirt' presents the inside scoop on behind-the-scenes relationships between such miners as brash youngster Parker Schnabel and longtime Yukon resident Tony Beets, as the quest to hit the mother lode never stops.

• Christo Doyle