What Rocks would be of interest (photo)

[Westaus]

Hi All

Went away for a couple of days last weekend to test a few things and get a break. It was not really a prospecting trip as we didn't even hire detectors. I just took my CTX3030 which didn't find any gold, did find a few bit and pieces but nothing of interest. Not sure it was set right to be totally honest?

What we wanted to do was explore for future areas and collect some samples and generally look around the region. We came across an old mine which was worked pretty hard and was an open cut mine. There was a huge amount of Pyrite present, the largest amount and biggest sized Pyrite I had ever seen, it was everywhere literally, the floor looked like someone had thrown glitter in the air and it had fallen everywhere!

We tried some crushing, panning and detecting but nothing seemed to show, what we didn't know was what was the host rock they were getting out?

From across the whole area and weekend we collected a few samples, I do have some more as well but this is the main selection and varieties. Anything shiny on the rocks is Pyrite. Would appreciate any comments and what we should be looking for perhaps with the minerals and host rocks. The obvious would be Quartz however this was also intruded with Pyrite (in this location). Thanks

Edit - Those two rocks bottom right corner are solid Pyrite 8)

 

[Minelab Gold]

Hi Westaus,

If you study the area and have access to geological maps and other documentation for the specific area - especially determining the actual mine name you were looking at it will be of some help to assist in your findings.

As we know gold in reef, host rock etc is usually associated with iron ore, iron oxide, iron pyrite - all the heavy materials. And travels with in many cases quartz, silica - gold is not always found with quartz but often is - remember quartz is the second most abundant mineral on the planet from memory feldspar is above it.

It can be associated with many different host rocks because gold is so stable over a wide range of conditions - its often associated in quartz veins because of the abundance of quartz within the earth during the period of intense metamorphism and intrusion of the igneous rocks.

Anyone wanting to increase their knowledge base and obtain some extremely inspirational footage - watch all of the video's on this channel

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClcZXBMeHSw-4BwOfVQPK_g

All the best and happy prospecting - hopefully you can get a geologist to look at the image and advise rock types/findings