Prospecting for gold - Poland

Prospecting for gold and its Mining has a long history and tradition in Poland. Just in the 6th century gold-bearing sand was washed out in the river valleys of Kaczawa and Bórb in Lower Silesia, and the gold production from placer and primary deposits in Lower Silesia might have reach 50 tons in the years 1175-1492. Later total gold output was distinctly lower, despite the several hundred years long exploitation of the skarn deposit at Złoty Stok and few small Sudetic vein deposits (Rdzimowice, Klecza-Radomice, Wądroże Wielkie, Czarnów etc…), which continued till 1930-ties. Presently the Kupferschiefer copper-silver ore mines are the only area of the gold gaining in the Fore-Sudetic monocline. Gold is separated during the silver refining. (S.Mikulski, A.Kozłowski; 2011)

In many historical location the prospection still can be provided.

Below I would like to present a collection of targets for gold prospects and identify areas that are still promising for gold prospection and exploration in Poland.

• Zloty Stok area
• Bardo area
• Kaczawa Mountains area
• Redziny and Rudawy area
• Sobotka area
• East Sudetes area

Prospecting for gold - Fe-Au skarn type

The old mine area in the Kłodzko-Złoty Stok intrusion contact zone

In northern part of kłodzko-złotostocki granite massiff pararell to the contact zone with metamorphic rock in the east and west side of mentioned massiff it is possible to occure the methasomatic contact type of gold deposits and quartz vein type gold deposits. The northern part of kłodzko-złotostocki massiff is cutted by tectonic foult and it is covered by younger strata with about 200 m of thickness. Hipothetically the northern part which have about 15 km long and 7 km whide is also very perspective for gold deposits occurance but thick cover of younger sediments is dificult in gold prospections. In the adjacent area of kłodzo-złotostocki granite the historical and not operating mine have location. Since first dicovery till the 1960 the arsenic-gold mine produce more than 14 500 kg of pure gold. The mine was exploitig Fe-Au skarn deposit along the contact with granitic intrusion. In the deposit main minerals are arsenopyrite with lollingite as impregnations in black serpentinites and magnetite with pyrrhotite in dolomitic limestones. The most intensive mineralization of gold was noted in black serpentinites where the avarange of gold was 40 g/t. After the second world war the arsenopyrite ore hosted only 2,8 g/t of gold. New estimations made by Polish Geology Survay show that the deposit has not finished yeat and still hosting about 1 500 kg of gold in arsenopyritic ore. The last research and investigations in the adjacent area of historical mine prove the continuuation of ore deposit in the north direction and in the south direction from old miner area. The additional Resources of gold was estimated on 300 kg of gold.

Prospecting for gold - Vein type in Ptasznik area

The macroenclave in Ptasznik area

The 3 km in the south-western direction rom Złoty Stok area the Ptasznik macroenclave is situated. In this area in rock samples from quartz veins and from porphyritic granites in the Jaszkowa and Droszkowa area the gold was discovered. The thin quartz with feldspars and as impregnations on the surface of crack of amphibolites the shellite-tytanite-suphides with gold mineralization was noted. The geochemical variety results show small numebrs ut to 18 g/t of gold. This mineralization have common characters like vein type deposit documented close to the Praha in Mokrsko where the Resources were estimated on 120 000 kg of gold. Unfortunatly this area is very small and strongly eroded so the resourecs are estimated on couple kg.