Attention all "rockhounds"

[Tassie Daz]

Hi all, I was out recently in my local area and came across this rock. This area has produced a huge amount of copper since 1860ish so it may be nothing but a copper specie, but as it weighs as it does [see the photo] on a set of "U-beaut" $26.00 scales, I was wondering if inside there may be pocket of the good stuff. I'd be extremely grateful for any insight. Check out the photos and make your predictions. Thanks in advance.

 

[shivan]

That looks like a beautiful specimen, you may get more for it like that than you would gold inside, if any. Was it a known gold area as well?

 

[mbasko]

The Kadina area seems to be all copper. I can't find any reference to anything else as a by-product including gold?
Being native copper it would be unlikely to have another seperate native metal, like gold, in the same specimen.
Nice find though.

 

[Tassie Daz]

MBasko, the local historian's book suggests that along with the '00,000's of tons of copper that came out of the mines in both Kadina [Wallaroo mines] and Moonta, there was 000's of ounces of gold mined as well. I'm not sure that it came from hunks of the yellow metal like you guys are all happy to find, but more from the sulphides about which I know nothing. [I'll try to dig out the reference so as to quote the actual mining results.]
I do know that right up until the '70's a company extracted the minute particles of gold that were contained in the huge heap of tailings that we locals called "the dump" a huge pile of dirt that was probably 50 or 60m high. Back in the '50's the locals and a great number of interstaters came to this town to try to conquer that heap of dirt using it as a hill climb for motor bikes. To my knowledge there were only a couple of guys that actually made it to the top. I don't know how they did it because as a kid, I found the task of climbing the "dump", totally exhausting. Its not here now because it was processed by that company, as I said in the 70's.

 

[mbasko]

Should have looked harder :lol:
http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/49512845
Found this so could be something there. "Gold specks are showing clearly"

http://www.cadiavalleyheritage.com....-and-smelting-history/wallaroo-moonta-kadina/
Going by this, apart from copper mining, the area's other industry was refining lead, silver & gold. It doesn't say where it came from but does say that the smelting works was set up at Wallaroo which became the seaport for local mines.

 

[Goldpick]

Nice specimen Daz, I think a majority of the gold found in the copper triangle mines was associated with chalcopyrite in the primary mineralisation (ie. disseminated, or very small inclusions in the sulphides). So probably aren't going to find any detectable stuff around, though might be some good "nuggets" of native copper.

Some of the old copper mines that I have been involved in drilling around SA, did actually have free gold in the drill core, though mainly occuring in voids where most of the sulphides had been leached away, unfortunately we are talking about under the hand lense type stuff.

It was mentioned that a total of 1.7 - 2 tons of gold was produced from the Moonta/Wallaroo mines, depending on which source you read.

 

[AtomRat]

Very nice find Daz!

 

[jethro]

Daz, did you clean that little bit of native copper in the photo with anything or was that the way it looked when you found it, as it looks now in the photo.

 

[Tassie Daz]

Hi Jethro. Yes I did clean it with a CLR bath and then a toothbrush as the whole rock was covered in green copper sulphate. Poking through in various spots was small glimpses of quartz so I knew that the host was Quartz. In this area, no matter was has laid on the ground, it either gets covered in copper sulphate or gets eaten away by the white ants [just the nature of the area].

Mbasko, at Wallaroo, just up the road from the Maritime museum, there was located the remnants of the old smelter and acid works. The rusted skeleton of the old plant was still there up until the early 1960's but when I started work at the Fertilizer factory next door in the late 60's, it had all been demolished. I don't know what part the acid works part of the thing was about, but it was where my grandfather worked for a long time I think. The stacks of the old smelter, and some of the built furnaces can still be seen from the waterfront down by the jetty and sailing club. Great stuff if you are into all that.

 

[Guest]

What a beautiful specimen well done

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[jethro]

Daz, Yeah thought it looked to shiny to be as found or there was more gold than copper in it.