Geology of the Plata Verde Mine, Hudspeth County, Texas

MC0070. Geology of the Plata Verde Mine, Hudspeth County, Texas, by J. G. Price. 34 p., 13 figs., 4 tables, 1982.


About This Publication
Silver deposits in Permian sandstones occur in a Basin and Range horst at the Plata Verde Mine, which is located in the Van Horn Mountains of Trans-Pecos Texas. Mining from 1934 to 1943 produced small amounts of silver, copper, and lead from shallow orebodies rich in the secondary mineral bromargyrite. Surface mapping indicates that before secondary oxidation, the primary ore was restricted to reduced rocks within a dominantly oxidized section. Reduction resulted from a combination of early sedimentary-diagenetic processes and later introduction of sulfide-rich waters along Tertiary faults. On the basis of observed structural and lithologic controls, geochemical characteristics, and metal zonation, a mode of formation similar to that of some red-bed copper deposits is proposed for the Plata Verde ores. Elsewhere in Trans-Pecos Texas, deposits of perhaps an analogous origin occur in Precambrian and Cretaceous sandstones. Additional orebodies are likely where red-bed sequences are cut by faults that transmitted aqueous sulfides.

Keywords: Hudspeth County, mines, Plata Verde mine, Texas, Van Horn Mountains

Citation
Price, J. G., 1982, Geology of the Plata Verde Mine, Hudspeth County, Texas: The University of Texas at Austin, Bureau of Economic Geology, Mineral Resource Circular No. 70, 34 p.