Spring Valley Project

Producer in Pershing county in Nevada, United States with commodities Gold, Silver

Sections on this page

Identification information
Geographic coordinates
Site location context
Geographic areas
Public Land Survey System information
Commodities
Materials information
Mineral occurrence model information
Host and associated rocks
Nearby scientific data
Ore body information
Controls for ore emplacement
Economic information about the deposit and operations
Mining district
Land status
Ownership information
Links to other databases
Bibliographic references
General comments
Reporter information

Geologic information

Identification information

Deposit ID	10310357
MRDS ID	M060380
Record type	Site
Current site name	Spring Valley Project
Alternate or previous names	Spring Valley Placers, Horseshoe Mine

Comments on the site identification

This is an updated version of record M060380 for the historic Spring Valley Placers. The current record includes the Spring Valley lode exploration project.

Geographic coordinates

Geographic coordinates:	-118.11069, 40.33684 (WGS84)
Elevation	1490
Location accuracy	100(meters)
Relative position	The Spring Valley placer mines are located in Spring Valley on the northeast side of the Humboldt Range about 20 miles northeast of Lovelock, Nevada and 100 miles east of Reno, Nevada.

Site location context

Political divisions (FIPS codes)

Pershing(county)

Nevada(state)

United States(country)

North America(continent)

Land(continent)

USGS map quadrangles

Fitting(quadrangle 1:24,000 scale)

Lovelock(quadrangle 1:100,000 scale)

Lovelock(quadrangle 1:250,000 scale)

Hydrologic units (watersheds)

Dixie Valley(hydrologic unit)

Central Nevada Desert Basins(hydrologic accounting unit)

Central Nevada Desert Basins(hydrologic subregion)

Great Basin(hydrologic region)

Federal lands

Bureau of Land Management(Bureau of Land Management NV)

Bureau of Land Management NV BLM(Type of land area)

BLM(Federal land areas administered by BLM)

Geographic areas

Country	State	County
United States	Nevada	Pershing

Public Land Survey System information

Meridian	Township	Range	Section	Fraction	State
Mount Diablo	029N	034E	35 36		Nevada
Mount Diablo	029N	035E	31		Nevada

Comments on the location information

The Spring Valley placer mines are located in Spring Valley about 8 miles due east of Oreana, on the west side of Buena Vista Valley. The more recently prospected Spring Valley lode silver-gold property includes 25 unpatented mining claims located in Spring Valley Canyon about three miles northeast and along strike from the Coeur- Rochester silver-gold mine.

Commodities

Commodity	Importance
Gold	Primary
Silver	Secondary

Comments on the commodity information

Ore Materials: coarse and some fine free gold
Gangue Materials: gravels; clay

Materials information

Materials	Type of material
Gold	Ore
Clay	Gangue
Gravel	Gangue

Mineral occurrence model information

Model code	119
USGS model code	39a
Deposit model name	Placer Au-PGE
Mark3 model number	54
Model code	150
USGS model code	25c
Deposit model name	Epithermal vein, Comstock
Mark3 model number	16

Host and associated rocks

Host or associated Host

Rock type Unconsolidated Deposit > Gravel

Stratigraphic age (youngest) Quaternary

Host or associated

Host

Rock type

Volcanic Rock (Aphanitic) > Felsic Volcanic Rock > Rhyolite

Rock unit name

Rochester Rhyolite of Koipato Group

Stratigraphic age (youngest)	Late Permian
Stratigraphic age (oldest)	Early Triassic

Host or associated Associated

Rock type Unconsolidated Deposit > Clay, Mud

Host or associated	Associated
Rock type	Unconsolidated Deposit > Clay, Mud

Nearby scientific data

(1)	-118.11069, 40.33684	ListMap

Economic information

Ore body information

General form channels, blanket

General form	channels, blanket

Controls for ore emplacement

Stratigraphically limited to gravel beds

Comments on the geologic information

The gravels in the lower canyon are 20-30 feet thick and contain gold in gravel horizons underlain by clay. Placer gold was derived from stringer zones in the Koipato Rhyolite.

Economic information about the deposit and operations

Operation type	Surface
Development status	Producer
Commodity type	Metallic
Deposit size	Medium
Significant	Yes
Discovery year	1875
Year of first production	1875
Year of last production	1984
Production years	1880-1895,1910-1914,1920s , 1930s, 1980s

Mining district

District name	Spring Valley District
District name	Fitting District

Land status

Ownership category	BLM Administrative Area
Area name	Winnemucca BLM District

Ownership information

Type Owner

Owner Atolia Minerals, Inc. (Sept 1984)

Year 1984
Type Operator

Owner Midway Gold Corporation

Year 2005

Type	Owner
Owner	Atolia Minerals, Inc. (Sept 1984)
Year	1984

Type	Operator
Owner	Midway Gold Corporation
Year	2005

Comments on the workings information

Placer tailings, pits, ponds, mining equipment, recent drilling (2004)

Comments on other economic factors

Th placer mines were productive for the time intervals 1911-1914 and 1947-49, during which a total 2,000 ounces of placer gold production was reported. There was however considerably more gold produced than recorded, especially during the 1800s, and it is estimated that approximately 100,000 ounces of placer gold has been historically recovered from Spring Valley. The placer mined area transects the currently prospected Spring Valley lode silver-gold property.
In 2006 Midway Gold Corp. announced recent drill results at the Spring Valley Project and reported a drill-indicated resource of 10,030,000 tons of material grading 0.024 ounces of gold measured and indicated.

Comments on development

Placer gold was discovered in 1875. Chinese miners extensively worked the deposits from 1880-1895. The gravels in the lower valley were dredged from 1910-1914, and reworked locally by hand in the 1920s and 1930s. The placers were mined by Spring Valley Dredging Co. in 1949. The placer mining area was idle when examined in Sept. 1984, but there were obvious signs of recent activity including relatively new mining equipment and trucks on property. One area of the property in sec 36 was listed as active (the Horseshoe mine) in 1984, owned by Duane E. Bender, Dan Selzer, and Walter Martin of Lovelock, NV.
Since the 1970s, exploration on the Spring Valley Property by Kennecott Exploration, Ltd., and more recently, by Echo Bay Exploration, Inc., has identified several mineralized intervals within the rhyolite volcanic and volcaniclastic assemblage.
To date, a total of 23 reverse circulation (RC) and two core holes have been completed on the Spring Valley Property. Echo Bay and Kennecott drilled the initial 25 holes on the property. Midway Gold has completed 31 drill holes since it acquired the project in 2003. Of the 52 reverse circulation (RC) and four core holes completed to date, forty holes have encountered gold grades greater than 0.01 oz/st (0.3 g/t) gold. Economic gold grades over significant thicknesses have been encountered in 19 drill holes. Preliminary metallurgical testing on drill cutting composites indicates gold recoveries of 75 to 95 percent. Due to the coarse nature of gold at Spring Valley, metallic screen preparation of samples is required to provide representative analyses.
In addition to the Pond zone and its extensions, five new targets were identified through geologic mapping, CSAMT surveys, and geochemical sampling. These new targets have the potential to substantially increase the known gold inventory at Spring Valley. Midway began testing these targets with a 10,000 foot drill program in October, 2004. Preliminary results near the end of 2004 about halfway through this drilling project indicate the discovery of a new gold-bearing zone 500 feet east of the Pond zone, in a shallower structural block. The new zone consists of 60 feet of 0.034 ounces per ton (opt) gold (18.3m of 1.16 grams per ton (g/t) gold) in an angle hole in a rhyolite sill with quartz-tourmaline veins. A second drill hole encountered 5 feet of 0.076 opt gold (1.5 m of 2.6 g/t gold) at the alluvium-bedrock contact suggesting a nearby buried gold source. A third drill hole encountered 50 feet of 0.62 opt silver (15.2m at 22g/t) and 10 feet of 0.018 opt gold in the edge of a newly identified breccia pipe 2000 feet east of the Pond zone. Additional drilling was planned in early 2005 to test some of the thicker breccia targets, which were not then accessible.

Reference information

Links to other databases

Agency	Database name	Acronym	Record ID	Notes
USGS	Mineral Resources Data System	MRDS	M060380	MRDS dep_id 10109650 merged into this record.
U.S. Bureau of Mines	Minerals Availability System	MAS	320270334	MRDS dep_id 10174401 merged into this record.

Bibliographic references

Deposit

Johnson, 1977, Geology and Mineral Deposits of Pershing County, Nevada: NBMG Bull. 89
Deposit

Vanderburg, 1936, Reconnaissance of Mining Districts in Pershing County, Nevada: USBM IC 6902
Deposit

Schrader, F.C., 1914, The Rochester Mining District, Nevada; USGS Bull. 580-M
Deposit

Vikre, P.G., 1978, Geology & and Silver Mineralization of the Rochester District, Pershing County, Nevada; Ph.D. Thesis Stanford Univ.
Deposit

Vanderburg, 1936, Placer Mining in Nevada; NBMG Bull. 30
Deposit

NBMG Staff, 1985, NBMG OFR 85-3.
Deposit

Bonham, H. F., Jr., 25 Sep 84, NBMG Field Examination of the Placers
Deposit

Division of Mine Inspection, Aug 1985, Directory of Nevada Mine Operations Active During Calendar Year 1984.
Deposit

Long, K.R., DeYoung, J.H., Jr., and Ludington, S.D., 1998, Database of significant deposits of gold, silver, copper, lead, and zinc in the United States; Part A, Database description and analysis; part B, Digital database: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 98-206, 33 p., one 3.5 inch diskette.
Deposit

website: http://www.midwaygold.com.
Deposit

Midway Gold Corp. press release, Sept. 2006.

General comments

Subject category	Comment text
Deposit	The Spring Valley Property hosts a buried vein-stockwork gold system hosted in Permo-Triassic Rochester Formation rhyolite beneath 50 to 200 feet of alluvial cover. There are several mineralized intervals within the rhyolite volcanic and volcaniclastic assemblage. Gold at Spring Valley is hosted by a buried breccia and vein-stockwork system hosted in Permo-Triassic Rochester Formation rhyolite beneath 50 to 200 feet of alluvial cover. The gold occurs in and around a volcanic breccia interpreted to be a diatreme vent, called the Pond zone. This discovery is open to the northwest, southwest, and east. Mineralization is in quartz-tourmaline stockwork veins cutting quartz-sericite altered breccias and rhyolite volcanic rock. Narrow high-grade quartz-tourmaline veins with grades of 1 ounce of gold per sort ton of ore (31g/t) have been discovered in and around the breccia pipes. Most of these zones are oxidized from a 400 to 700 foot depth. The placer gravels in the lower canyon are 20-30 feet thick and contain gold in gravel horizons underlain by clay.

Subject category

Comment text

Deposit

The Spring Valley Property hosts a buried vein-stockwork gold system hosted in Permo-Triassic Rochester Formation rhyolite beneath 50 to 200 feet of alluvial cover. There are several mineralized intervals within the rhyolite volcanic and volcaniclastic assemblage.
Gold at Spring Valley is hosted by a buried breccia and vein-stockwork system hosted in Permo-Triassic Rochester Formation rhyolite beneath 50 to 200 feet of alluvial cover. The gold occurs in and around a volcanic breccia interpreted to be a diatreme vent, called the Pond zone. This discovery is open to the northwest, southwest, and east. Mineralization is in quartz-tourmaline stockwork veins cutting quartz-sericite altered breccias and rhyolite volcanic rock. Narrow high-grade quartz-tourmaline veins with grades of 1 ounce of gold per sort ton of ore (31g/t) have been discovered in and around the breccia pipes. Most of these zones are oxidized from a 400 to 700 foot depth.
The placer gravels in the lower canyon are 20-30 feet thick and contain gold in gravel horizons underlain by clay.

Reporter information

Type	Date	Name	Affiliation	Comment
Reporter	01-AUG-1973	Johnson, Maureen G.	U.S. Geological Survey
Reporter	14-NOV-1983	Western Field Operations Center (WFOC)	U.S. Bureau of Mines
Updater	01-MAY-1986	La Pointe, D.D. (Tingley, J.V.)	Nevada Bureau of Mines and Geology
Reporter	01-JAN-2005	LaPointe, D.D.	Nevada Bureau of Mines and Geology
Editor	01-SEP-2007	Schruben, Paul G.	U.S. Geological Survey	Converted from S&A FileMaker format to Oracle. Edit checks on rocks, units, and ages with Geolex search, and other fields.

Beyond USGS

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

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