Gypsum

specimen number:
9892026

location:
Red River Floodway, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada

description:
A loose cluster of semi lustrous mostly transparent twinned gypsum crystals, the largest measuring to 2.0 cm in size. This is complete all around with no points of attachment and in good condition.

The Red River Floodway, famously known as Duff's Ditch, is an artificial channel spanning 47 kilometers around Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Prompted by the devastating 1950 Red River flood, construction began in 1962, and the system officially opened in March 1968. It is an active, open flood-control project rather than a closed facility. Geologically, the channel is excavated through flat-lying sedimentary strata of the Red River Basin, which sit atop Paleozoic carbonate bedrock and extensive Quaternary glacial lake clays from the bed of glacial Lake Agassiz. Although gypsum is not the primary geological formation native to the immediate floodway channel excavation site, significant evaporite deposits containing thick beds of gypsum and anhydrite occur regionally within the broader Paleozoic and Mesozoic sedimentary sequence of the Manitoba basin.

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