Abstract
The Ag–Zn–Pb Blende deposit is located in the Wernecke Mountains, Yukon and is hosted by the middle Proterozoic Gillespie Lake Group dolomitic siltstones. The sulphide mineralization is localized within the axial planar cleavage of a kilometre-scale anticline and is dominated by galena- and sphalerite-cemented mosaic, rubble and crackle breccias with minor pyrite, galena, sphalerite and dolomite veins. 206Pb/204Pb values from galena range from 16.355 to 16.600, 207Pb/204Pb from 15.430 to 15.461, and 208Pb/204Pb from 36.016 to 36.283, respectively, and yield model ages between 1,490 and 1,430 Ma. A hydrothermal alteration zone, which is younger than the mineralization, has a poorly constrained U–Pb monazite age of 1,307 ± 180 Ma, which suggests that the Blende deposit is Proterozoic in age. Dolomites associated with the main- and late-stage mineralization have δ13C values that range from −1.8 to 0.9 ‰ and δ18O values of 15.7 to 21.9 ‰. The total range of δ34S values from pyrite, galena and sphalerite is 9.4 to 58.1 ‰, indicating that the sulphur in the deposit was derived from reduction of seawater sulphate in a closed system. Strontium isotopes suggest there were three fluids involved in the Blende mineralizing system: Fluid 1 was derived from seawater and formed carbonate and quartz veins pre-mineralization; it has an 87Sr/86Sr ratio of 0.70948. Fluid 2 has a high 87Sr/86Sr ratio of 0.73866, and fluid 3 has a Sr isotopic ratio of 0.71602. Fluids 1 and 3 have similar isotopic compositions but different total Sr ion signals (a function of concentration). This suggests that fluids 1 and 3 may have ultimately been derived from Proterozoic seawater but have undergone different amounts of water–rock interaction. The isotopic and geochemical data suggest the mineralization formed when a H2S-rich fluid derived from seawater (fluid 3) mixed with a metal-bearing fluid (fluid 2) in the high permeability zones of the axial planar cleavage. The Blende deposit is an unusual carbonate-hosted massive sulphide deposit which has features of both Irish-type and clastic-dominated Zn–Pb deposits. The deposit formed in response to a change in tectonism from a compressional regime to extension and rifting.
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Acknowledgments
This project was supported by Eagle Plains Resources plc. and a National Science and Engineering Research Council Discovery grant to S. Gleeson. The Radiogenic Isotope Facility at the University of Alberta was supported in part by a National Science and Engineering Research Council Major Resources Support Grant. We wish to acknowledge the reviews of Georges Beaudoin and an anonymous reviewer.
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A table of lead isotopic values from analyses of galena at the Blende. (PDF 62 kb)
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A table of U–Pb data derived from in situ LA-MC-ICP-MS analyses of monazite grains, from sample BE07113-1. (PDF 13 kb)
Online resource 3
A table of strontium isotope ratios, from in situ LA-MC-ICP-MS analyses of hydrothermal dolomite (PDF 85 kb)
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Moroskat, M., Gleeson, S.A., Sharp, R.J. et al. The geology of the carbonate-hosted Blende Ag–Pb–Zn deposit, Wernecke Mountains, Yukon, Canada. Miner Deposita 50, 83–104 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00126-014-0525-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00126-014-0525-4