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  3. Mineral Resource Data System (MRDS)

California Creek

Past Producer in Alaska, United States with commodity Gold
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Sections on this page
  1. Identification information
  2. Geographic coordinates
  3. Site location context
  4. Geographic areas
  5. Commodities
  6. Materials information
  7. Mineral occurrence model information
  8. Host and associated rocks
  9. Nearby scientific data
  10. Economic information about the deposit and operations
  11. Mining district
  12. Links to other databases
  13. Bibliographic references
  14. General comments
  15. Reporter information

Geologic information

Identification information

Deposit ID 10002481
MRDS ID A013417
Record type Site
Current site name California Creek
Related records 10137010

Geographic coordinates

Geographic coordinates: -159.90783, 61.05739 (WGS84)
Relative position California Creek is a headwater tributary of the Tuluksak River. The creek has been placer mined over at least 3 miles upstream from its mouth. The map site, near the mouth of Rocky Creek, is the approximate midpoint of the placer tailings. It is in the NW1/4 sec. 10, T. 11 N., R. 60 W., of the Seward Meridian. California Creek is included in locality 17 of Hoare and Cobb (1972, 1977).

Site location context

Political divisions (FIPS codes)

Bethel(Census area)

Alaska(state)

United States(country)

North America(continent)

Land(continent)

USGS map quadrangles

Russian Mission A-3(quadrangle 1:63,360 scale)

Russian Mission SE(quadrangle 1:100,000 scale)

Russian Mission(quadrangle 1:250,000 scale)

Hydrologic units (watersheds)

Kuskokwim Delta(hydrologic unit)

Lower Kuskokwim River(hydrologic accounting unit)

Southwest(hydrologic subregion)

Alaska(hydrologic region)

Federal lands

Calista Corporation(ANCSA Region)

ANCSA Region NTVPIC(Type of land area)

NTVPIC(Federal land areas administered by NTVPIC)

Geographic areas

Country State
United States Alaska

Commodities

Commodity Importance
Gold Primary

Materials information

Materials Type of material
Gold Ore

Mineral occurrence model information

Model code 119
USGS model code 39a
Deposit model name Placer Au-PGE
Mark3 model number 54

Host and associated rocks

  • Host or associated Host
    Rock type Unconsolidated Deposit > Sand and Gravel
    Stratigraphic age (youngest) Holocene
  • Host or associated Host
    Rock type Unconsolidated Deposit > Alluvium

Nearby scientific data

(1) -159.90783, 61.05739
ListMap

Economic information

Comments on the geologic information

  • Geologic Description = California Creek is an important placer-gold producing tributary to the upper Tuluksak River. At least 3 miles of California Creek have been extensively dredged, including about on-half mile of the lower creek along the Tuluksak River valley. Dredging continued for about 1.5 miles upstream of the mouth of Rocky Creek (RM027), and some mining may have taken place for another mile to the headwaters of California Creek. Most of the California Creek drainage is underlain by thermally metamorphosed Jurassic volcanic rocks along the east side of a large mid-Cretaceous granitic pluton (Box and others, 1993).
  • Age = Quaternary.

Economic information about the deposit and operations

Development status Past Producer
Commodity type Metallic

Mining district

District name Aniak

Comments on the workings information

  • Workings / Exploration = Dredge tailings cover about 5.6 miles of the California Creek drainage, including about one-half mile of the lower creek along the Tuluksak River valley. Dredging continued for about 1.5 miles upstream of the mouth of Rocky Creek (RM027), and some mining may have taken place for another mile to the headwaters of California Creek. The tailings have an average width of anout 0.15 mile and a maximum width of 0.4 mile near the mouth of the creek. Much of the mining took place from about 1947 to 1960 (Hoare and Cobb, 1977). Additional mining took place in the late 1980's.

Reference information

Bibliographic references

  • Deposit

    Hoare, J M., and Cobb, E.H., 1972, Metallic mineral resources map of the Russian Mission quadrangle, Alaska: U.S. Geological Survey Miscellaneous Field Studies Map MF-444, scale 1:250,000.

  • Deposit

    Hoare, J.M., and Cobb, E.H., 1977, Mineral occurrences (other than mineral fuels and construction materials) in the Bethel, Goodnews, and Russian Mission quadrangles, Alaska: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 77-156, 98 p.

  • Deposit

    Box, S.E, Moll-Stalcup, E.J., Frost, T.P., and Murphy, J.M., 1993, Preliminary geologic map of the Bethel and southern Russian Mission quadrangles, southwestern Alaska: U.S. Geological Survey Miscellaneous Field Studies Map MF-2226-A, 20 p., scale 1:250,000.

  • Deposit

    Hoare, J M., and Cobb, E.H., 1972, Metallic mineral resources map of the Russian Mission quadrangle, Alaska: U.S. Geological Survey Miscellaneous Field Studies Map MF-444, 1 sheet, scale 1:250,000.

Comments on the references

  • Primary Reference = Hoare and Cobb, 1977

General comments

Subject category Comment text
Deposit Model Name = Placer Au (Cox and Singer, 1986; model 39a)
Deposit Other Comments = Older references to California Creek refer to what is now called upper Tuluksak River (RM028) on USGS topographic maps.

Reporter information

Type Date Name Affiliation Comment
Reporter 10-JUN-01 Travis L. Hudson Millholland & Associates
Reporter 10-JUN-01 Travis L. Hudson Millholland & Associates

Beyond USGS

Supplemental information added by qvyshift.com. Not part of the original USGS MRDS record.

Maps centered on this site

Authoritative Alaska resources

These are landing pages for further research — the state agencies don't currently expose per-mine deep links.