Canyon Creek

The Canyon Creek is a gold mine located in Alaska.

About the MRDS Data:

All mine locations were obtained from the USGS Mineral Resources Data System. The locations and other information in this database have not been verified for accuracy. It should be assumed that all mines are on private property.

Mine Info

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Site Name

Primary: Canyon Creek

Commodity

Primary: Gold

Location

State: Alaska
District: Council

Land Status

Not available

Holdings

Not available

Workings

Not available

Ownership

Not available

Production

Not available

Deposit

Record Type: Site
Operation Category: Past Producer
Operation Type: Unknown
Years of Production:
Organization:
Significant:

Physiography

Not available

Mineral Deposit Model

Model Name: Placer Au-PGE

Orebody

Not available

Structure

Not available

Alterations

Not available

Rocks

Not available

Analytical Data

Not available

Materials

Ore: Gold

Comments

Comment (Reference): Primary Reference = Smith, 1910

Comment (Workings): Workings / Exploration = Small-scale surface open cut and some dredging operations took place on the creek from between 1910 to at least 1918. Sainsbury and others (1972) show placer tailings along the lower 0.5 miles of the creek and Cobb (1972, MF442) shows mining to have occurred along the creek between the mouths of Sunshine and Boulder Creeks.

Comment (Deposit): Model Name = Placer Au-PGE (Cox and Singer, 1986; model 39a).

Comment (Geology): Geologic Description = The active floodplain of Canyon Creek is incised about 10 feet into terraces that are best developed on the north side of the creek. The terraces are cut into pelitic schist bedrock and mantled by about 12 feet of clean well-rounded gravel. The bench gravels carry gold throughout although it is concentrated on bedrock (Smith, 1910). Some gravels of the active drainage include large schist slabs probably reflecting the proximity of bedrock. The active stream gravels were 3 feet thick about 2 miles upstream of the mouth (Brooks and others, 1901). Although open cut and hydraulic mining was initially undertaken, a dredge operated on Canyon Creek at least in the period 1916-18 (Cobb, 1978, OF 78-181). Sainsbury and others (1972, OFR 511) show placer tailings along the lower 0.5 miles of the creek and Cobb (1972, MF442) shows mining to have been undertaken along the creek between the mouths of Sunshine and Boulder Creeks. Bedrock in the Canyon Creek area is mostly a pelitic schist assemblage of Cambrian or Precambrian age that is contact with a lower Paleozoic metasedimentary assemblage to the west in the headwaters of Canyon Creek (Till and others, 1986).

Comment (Geology): Age = Quaternary; the numerous incised terraces along the Casadepaga River and its major tributaries indicate that more than one cycle of erosion and deposition has developed placer deposits in the area. The low elevations between 170 and 270 feet along the first 11 miles of the river, suggest that Quaternary sea level fluctuations could have influenced placer development.

Comment (Exploration): Status = Probably inactive

References

Reference (Deposit): Till, A.B., Dumoulin, J.A., Gamble, B. ., Kaufman, D.S., and Carroll, P.I., 1986, Preliminary geologic map and fossil data, Soloman, Bendeleben, and southern Kotzebue quadrangles, Seward Peninsula, Alaska: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 86-276, 10 p., 3 plates, scale 1:250,000.

Reference (Deposit): Sainsbury, C.L., Hudson, T.L., Ewing, R., and Marsh, W.R., 1972, Reconnaissance geologic maps of the Solomon D-5 and C-5 quadrangles, Seward Peninsula, Alaska: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 511, 12 p., 2 sheets, scale 1:63,360.

Reference (Deposit): Cobb, E.H., 1978, Summary of references to mineral occurrences (other than mineral fuels and construction materials) in the Solomon quadrangle, Alaska: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 78-181, 185 p.

Reference (Deposit): Smith, P.S., 1910, Geology and mineral resources of the Solomon and Casadepaga quadrangles, Seward Peninsula, Alaska: U.S. Geological Survey Bulletin 433, 234 p.

Reference (Deposit): Cobb, E.H., 1972, Metallic resources map of the Solomon quadrangle, Alaska: U.S. Geological Survey Miscellaneous Field Studies Map MF-445, scale 1:250,000.

Reference (Deposit): Brooks, A.H., Richardson, G. B., and Collier, A. J., 1901, Reconnaissance in the Cape Nome and Norton Bay regions, Alaska, in 1900: U.S. Geological Survey Special Publication, p. 1-180.

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