Wise prospect, San Cayetano Mining District, San Cayetano Mountains, Santa Cruz County, Arizona, USAi

Regional Level Types
Wise prospect	Prospect
San Cayetano Mining District	Mining District
San Cayetano Mountains	Mountain Range
Santa Cruz County	County
Arizona	State
USA	Country

‡Ref.: Schrader, F.C. & J.M. Hill (1915), Mineral deposits of the Santa Rita and Patagonia Mountains, Arizona, USGS Bull. 582: 358.

Lenon, Robert (1964) Lenon’s map of Santa Cruz County.

Drewes, H.D. (1971) Geologic map of the Mount Wrightson quadrangle, southeast of Tucson, Santa Cruz and Pima Counties, Arizona: U.S. Geological Survey Miscellaneous Geologic Investigations Map I-614, 1 sheet, scale 1:48,000.

U.S. Bureau of Mines card file.

U.S. Bureau of Mines field notes CU63.

Arizona Bureau of Mines card file Santa Cruz County.

MRDS database Dep. ID file #10039605, MRDS ID #M050447; and, Dep. ID #10234909, MAS ID #0040230409.

A Cu-Ag prospect with underground workings located in sec. 7, T22S, R14E, on the east slope of the San Cayetano Mountains near its middle point, 13 miles N of Nogales, at an elevation of about 4,600 feet, on private land. It is 5 miles NNE of Calabasas. Discovered 1870. Owned by J.E. Wise, of Calabasas since 1889. NOTE: Alternate coordinates provided: 31.6147N, 110.9442W (varies significantly).

The country rock is a greenish-gray dense rhyolite, which is locally porphyritic and which is cut by a dike of quartz monzonite porphyry that strikes N.70ºW. and dips 85ºS. On the south, or hanging wall, side of this dike the rhyolite is considerably sheared, crushed, and altered for a distance of 4 feet. In this sheared belt occur veinlets of quartz as much as 8 inched (20 cm) wide which carry ore containing sulphides. The vein in gneral is banded. In several places bands of quartz are separated by a band of the metallic minerals. Small stringers and films of quartz and metalklic minerals occur also in the banded crushed claylike gouge on the south side of the dike at the tunnels. The host rock units are the Grosvenor Hills Volcanics and the Salero Formation. Ore control was a permeable shear zone.

In a belt extending 150 feet north of the dike the rhyolite is considerably altered and is traversed by quartz veins ranging from a small fraction of an inch to 8 or 9 inches (20 to 22.5 cm) in width. Some of these veins are composed of pure-white quartz; others contain also a little pyrite and chalcopyrite.

Sulphides are found directly at the surface accompanied by oxidized minerals in small amounts, hematite and limonite films being the most conspicuous locally, with a small amount of malachite and cuprite. In some of the more open cracks occurs a very soft black mineral which is finely divided, containing principally copper and sulphur, and corresponds to chalcocite. The ore zone is 0.23 meters wide, strikes N70W and dips 85S.

Workings include about 110 feet (33.53 meters) of tunnels. No record of production. Rumored to assay $10 per ton (period values) in Ag and Cu. Physical dimensions not available.

Other Databases

Link to USGS MRDS:	10039605

Other Regions, Features and Areas containing this locality