Regional Report: Paramount Canyon, Sierra Co., New Mexico, USA

The Paramount Canyon site is within what is known as the Taylor Creek Rhyolite. The site is located about 400 yards south of NM State Rt. 59 about four miles west of Boiler Peak. There is a gravel storage area adjacent to the road where one can park. Bixbyite, pseudobrookite, and cassiterite can be found in cavity (lithophyseal) fillings and wood tin veins that crop out in the steep slopes leading to the bottom of the canyon. For more information and maps including similarly mineralized localities in the area see: USGS Bulletin 922-M "Tin Deposits of the Black Range, Catron and Sierra Counties New Mexico" American Mineralogist Vol. 27 pp. 305-322, "Bixbyite and Pseudobrookite from the Tin-Bearing Rhyolite of the Black Range, New Mexico" American Mineralogist Vol. 61, pp. 425-430, "Oxide Minerals in miarolitic rhyolite, Black Range, New Mexico" New Mexico Bureau of Mines and Mineral Resources Open File Report 57, "Tin Mineralization within Rhyolite Flow Domes, Black Range, New Mexico" see Min Rec 20:1 p 54 for location

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