Atacamite

specimen number:
8821954

location:
Mount Gunson Copper mines, South Australia, Australia

description:
Attractive grouping of crystallized lustrous green atacamite balls without matrix. In good condition all around with no points of attachment.

The Mount Gunson copper mines, located on the Stuart Shelf in South Australia approximately 500 kilometers north of Adelaide, have a mining history dating back to the initial discovery of surface copper in 1875. Operations across multiple open-cut sites, including the prominent Cattle Grid deposit, proceeded intermittently over roughly 130 years through various phases of extraction and heap-leaching before activity wound down in the early 21st century. Geologically, the area is characterized by sediment-hosted, stratabound copper deposits situated within flat-lying Neoproterozoic and Mesoproterozoic sedimentary sequences. Mineralization is heavily controlled by paleotopographic highs and unconformities, notably localized within the Cattlegrid Breccia and the overlying Whyalla Sandstone, where circulating groundwaters precipitated copper sulfides and secondary oxide minerals such as malachite, atacamite, etc.

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