 | Washington Pass, Okanogan County, Washington, USA |
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LOCALITY IMAGES
GEOLOGY
Golden Horn Batholith - Tertiary period, Eocene epoch - (49 millions of years before present). The Golden Horn Batholith is a highly evolved alkaline (sodium-rich) granite that hosts a suite of rare minerals. About 50 million years ago, the magma that formed the batholith cooled and the rock-forming minerals began to crystallize. Through the process of fractional crystallization, the residual liquid became increasingly enriched in incompatible elements (such as lithium, zirconium, and the REE (rare earth elements)) as the rock-forming mineral phases that were crystallizing rejected them. Late stage volatile rich fluids carrying this highly fractionated chemistry precipitated a suite of rare minerals in miarolitic cavities within the alkaline granite. The Golden Horn Batholith is the type locality for three of these rare mineral species, zektzerite- NaLiZrSi6O15, the REE mineral, okanoganite- (Na,Ca)3(Y,Ce)12Si6B2O27F14 and calciohilairite- CaZr[SiO 3]3·3H2O. Over 50 mineral species have been identified at this locality, with a great potential for new mineral discoveries.
Collecting is within the Okanogan National Forest. The host granite covers a vast area of of alpine terrain.
MINERALS (complete list - based off of mindat.org, Golden Horn Batholith page)
CLICK for PHOTOGRAPHED
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Aegirine
Aenigmatite Agardite-(Y) Albite Allanite-(Ce) Anatase *Arfvedsonite *Astrophyllite *Bastnäsite-(Ce) Biotite Calciohilairite Calcite 'Ca-Catapleiite' Cerussite Chamosite |
Chevkinite-(Ce)
Chrysocolla Clinochlore Elpidite Epidote Euxenite-(Y) Fayalite Fergusonite-beta-(Y) Ferrohornblende Ferrorichterite Fluorite *Gadolinite-(Y) Gagarinite-(Y) Galena *Genthelvite Goethite |
Hematite
Kainosite-(Y) Löllingite Magnetite Malachite Masutomilite *Microcline Molybdenite Monazite-(Ce) *Okanoganite-(Y) Orthoclase Parisite-(Ce) Pharmacosiderite Polylithionite Prehnite |
Pyrite
*Quartz *Riebeckite Scorodite *Siderite Sogdianite Sphalerite Synchysite-(Ce) Thorianite Titanite Wulfenite Xenotime-(Y) *Zektzerite *Zircon |
* photographed
ARFVEDSONITE |
BASTNAESITE-(Ce) perched on ZIRCON |
BASTNAESITE-(Ce) Photo Copyright © Saul Krotki 2005 |
BASTNAESITE-(Ce) (not confirmed) |
CALCIOHILAIRITE |
GADOLINITE-(Ce) Photo Copyright © Saul Krotki 2009 |
GENTHELVITE Photo Copyright © Saul Krotki 2008 |
MICROCLINE, ARFVEDSONITE |
OKANOGANITE, ZIRCON Photo Copyright © Saul Krotki 2006 |
OKANOGANITE (fourling twin) |
Smoky QUARTZ with minor MICROCLINE |
Gemmy smoky QUARTZ |
Smoky QUARTZ with ARFVEDSONITE inclusions |
Smoky QUARTZ with ASTROPHYLLITE inclusion |
RIEBECKITE |
SIDERITE |
ZEKTZERITE |
ZEKTZERITE |
largest known ZEKTZERITE |
ZIRCON in miarolitic cavity |