Latitude & Longitude (WGS84):	34° 18' 48'' South , 117° 36' 33'' East
Latitude & Longitude (decimal):	-34.31359,117.60944
GeoHash:	G#: q9gsu32sf
Locality type:	Mine
Köppen climate type:	Csb : Warm-summer Mediterranean climate

Barite was discovered at the location in 1897, by local farmer J.H. Cox. As there was little market for the material at the time, it was not investigated further. Government geologist C.J.R. Le Mesurier sent a sample to be examined in 1912, which proved to be high quality barite.

The deposit came to notice mostly (and appears the last time) due to a government geologist's report in 1920. F.R. Feldtmann stated the barite was finely crystalline opaque white, with irregular lenses of more coarsely crystalline translucent, and sometimes transparent barite of divergent crystal groups he called 'crested barite', and occasional irregular or broadly lenticular areas of coarse crystalline material, stained red by iron oxide. No other impurities were found.

The country rock is fine grained pale reddish or cream coloured quartzites, with dark reddish sandstone with quartz veinlets topping the hills.

Three barite veins were found. One traced for 380 feet, 4 feet wide at the surface but narrows with depth, and the vein forks to the east. A shaft had been sunk to 10 feet, and three costeans dug. The second vein was traced for 235 feet, 4 feet wide on the surface. The third vein was smallest, traced for 50 feet, with a 40 foot deep shaft sunk on it. The vein was 18 inches wide on the surface but narrowed at depth. It differed also from the above description, bring entirely dense fine grained barite, slightly translucent, creamy coloured, or opaque white, the latter in walls and vein cracks.

May 16 1920, J.H. Cox pegged 277H 48 acres. 22 May 341H 12 acres by L.M. Healy. C.G. Stevenson and W.E. O'Neill controlled lease 9H. Little substantial mining was found.

The location is approximately 2 kilometres east north-east of the Sukey Hill lookout, in turn about 5 kilometres east of Cranbrook. The area is farmed for cereal crops, the only hope any historic shafts remain being in areas of forest on the upper slopes of ridges.

Commodity List

This is a list of exploitable or exploited mineral commodities recorded at this locality.

Mineral List

2 valid minerals.

Rock Types Recorded

Regional Geology

This geological map and associated information on rock units at or nearby to the coordinates given for this locality is based on relatively small scale geological maps provided by various national Geological Surveys. This does not necessarily represent the complete geology at this locality but it gives a background for the region in which it is found.

Click on geological units on the map for more information. Click here to view full-screen map on Macrostrat.org

Neoproterozoic - Paleoproterozoic 541 - 2500 Ma ID: 861822

Stirling Range Formation Age: Proterozoic (541 - 2500 Ma) Stratigraphic Name: Stirling Range Formation Description: Sandstone, quartzite, shale, slate, phyllite Comments: sedimentary siliciclastic; metasedimentary siliciclastic; synthesis of multiple published descriptions Lithology: Sedimentary siliciclastic; metasedimentary siliciclastic Reference: Raymond, O.L., Liu, S., Gallagher, R., Zhang, W., Highet, L.M. Surface Geology of Australia 1:1 million scale dataset 2012 edition. Commonwealth of Australia (Geoscience Australia). [5]

Mesoproterozoic 1000 - 1600 Ma ID: 3190121

Mesoproterozoic sedimentary rocks Age: Mesoproterozoic (1000 - 1600 Ma) Comments: Yilgarn Craton; Stirling Range Lithology: Sandstone,shale Reference: Chorlton, L.B. Generalized geology of the world: bedrock domains and major faults in GIS format: a small-scale world geology map with an extended geological attribute database. doi: 10.4095/223767. Geological Survey of Canada, Open File 5529. [154]

Data and map coding provided by Macrostrat.org, used under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License

References