Native Copper: Rocklands mine, Cloncurry, Queensland, Australia

Description

Species: Native Copper⠀
Locality: Rocklands mine, Cloncurry, Queensland, Australia⠀
Dimensions: 8.7 x 6 x 2.4 cm.⠀

A striking arborescent group of spinel-twinned copper crystals with a fantastic red cuprite patina and good luster from the Rocklands mine in Australia. The elongated, twisting spinel twinned copper crystals (up to 5 cm.) diverge from a central “spine” fo crystallized cppper and intertwine together in a very aesthetic fashion. A great Rocklands mine copper specimen from circa 2012-2015 finds. Mark Cross photo. 

(A little background: by now, native copper from the Rocklands mine in a remote part of Queensland, Australia has become well-known to most mineral collectors, due to the large quantity of material coming on to the market starting around 2017 when a major European dealer got the rights to do a specimen mining project at this relatively new (circa 2012) high-grade copper mine. While most copper recovered from the Rocklands mine from 2017 to now has been characterized by spongy to finely filligreed masses of small twinned copper crystals, early in the mine’s operation, a small number of superb to world-class crystallized copper specimens were found. Unfortunately the scarcity of these specimens on the market is mainly due to the strict no-collecting policy of the mine operator, CUDECO, during this period. However, in a testament to the amazing complexity of our globalized economy and mineral collecting world, I was recently able to acquire a small lot of some good to excellent crystallized copper specimens which were ‘rescued’ from scrap processing overseas by mineral dealers and collectors. These specimens feature well-formed spinel twins (exceptionally up to 18 cm!) as well as smaller modified dodecahedral and possibly octahedral copper crystals, often in aesthetic aggregates without matrix and with pleasing patinas ranging from red to brown to lustrous silvery-bronze. )