I found Kimberlite! Now what?

NeoTokyo

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Aug 27, 2012
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Eyes - Nokta FORS Gold - Fisher Gold Bug II
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Location: Shasta Lake, Shasta County, California.

Heya everyone;

So a me and a friend went crushing through the thick manzanita around Shasta Dam in search of a mine that I had thought was on the hill side.

We found lots of overgrown trails, super old iron bean cans, metal bits, orange to red soil, crushed rocks, a square foundation made from rocks and very heavy rocks that had crystals all over them and were next to impossible to split, throwing off sparks near every hit.

The rock that I am going to show in the pictures is one sample that we brought out, and the crystal (Diamond ?) ontop was accidently cracked wide open with a misplaced swing of the hammer.

Inside we found lots of silver flecks (Under a 10x loop it looked like mercury blobs but this is not Cinnabar) which I think is either Graphite or maybe a Platinum metal.
There was also a pocket that was filled with loose carbon that stained the finger.

We also found stones that when cracked open (Super hard) were a flat gray with thousands of microscopic silver specs.
I was thinking maybe Dolomite but I am not very good at identifying rocks.

Have we found diamond bearing Kimberlite? Would that mean that there is a pipe somewhere?
There is volcanic rock sprinkled around.


So if this is Kimberlite, how do I go about processing it?
How do I test it for other metals?


Thanks

-Eric-

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The super hard gray rock filled with tons of tiny specs that in my 10x loop look like tiny mercury globs but one larger one was a rectangle.

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NeoTokyo

NeoTokyo

Bronze Member
Aug 27, 2012
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1,580
Redding
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Eyes - Nokta FORS Gold - Fisher Gold Bug II
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I forgot to mention, if you look at the large broken Crystal/Diamond and you see the weird gray marks on it, I was trying to scratch it with a steel pick, it did not scratch the Crystal/Diamond but instead it left metal streaks behind. That is pretty hard!

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After we finished cracking rocks we went to another mine and I found gold in the first quarts that I split open. :D

Sorry for the horrible pictures, it was hard getting the camera in close.

Also there is some reddish metal in a couple spots too, like a rosy copper...
There are also silver flecks in it too.

The location of this mine is about 2 miles west of where we found the possible kimberlite samples.

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Last edited:

austin

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Jul 9, 2012
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(1) I believe your sample is granite and your diamond calcite, which would explain why it broke so easily. The carbon is probably dirt that entered during the process of erosion and weathering. The sample also contains a great deal of quartz. Granite is hard and breaking it with a geology hammer is hard to do.
(2) Your quartz sample contains pyrite I think, not gold.
Just my opinion...
 

dave wiseman

Hero Member
Jul 23, 2004
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Angels Camp,Ca.
Some gem quality diamonds have been found in California,but most are industrial grade and the majority of the diamonds I believe were found in ancient tertiary gravels.
 

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NeoTokyo

NeoTokyo

Bronze Member
Aug 27, 2012
1,803
1,580
Redding
🥇 Banner finds
1
Detector(s) used
Eyes - Nokta FORS Gold - Fisher Gold Bug II
Primary Interest:
Prospecting
ok, Thanks guys.

Austin, the color for the photos is way off and I don't have any post editing programs right now like photoshop.
In natural light the color of the metal does not change not does it reflect any brighter and under a 10x loop it is not geometric.

I could always be wrong but that is why I am going to crush and pan it. :)
 

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