25^th New Zealand Micro-mineral
Symposium
Report is filed here on Mindat

24^th New Zealand Micro-mineral
Symposium

20^th – 24^th October 2006

 

This year our micro-mineral symposium was held in the South Island at North Loburn near Christchurch at Journey’s End Camp. On the Friday of  the symposium a large group of us went collecting at Pahau River prior to the official start on Friday evening. This site at the Grampions Station has exposed basalt along the river bank containing zeolites and other minerals. The minerals so far found here include calcite, analcime, natrolite, apophyllite, phillipsite and adularia. The natrolite crystals can be found up to several centimetres long and are some of the largest in NZ.

Mick Mackenzie also found green (chrome?) diopside, olivine and a possible chlorite mineral in conglomerate down river.

 

Friday evening – we all met up for the symposium start with wine and nibbles. Thirty eight people attended including five Australians so this was one of our largest symposiums. The camp had a big central hall and kitchen surrounded by cabins and larger sleeping annexes.

Saturday – the usual swapping and giving of minerals took place until lunch time when a decision was made to go on the official field trip instead of Sunday as rain was forecast. Unfortunately the bad weather arrived earlier than expected so by the time we arrived at View Hill Quarry the wind and rain made any collecting impossible. What we did see of the quarry – minerals or crystals for collecting were very scarce.

That evening Rod Martin gave us a talk on four North Island Quarries and their minerals. We were treated to a Hangi meal for dinner – brought in from Christchurch wrapped in muslin bags.

 

Sunday – still raining – we had the competitions for Best NZ, Overseas and Field trip specimens. Dick Dufton won the NZ trophy with a phlogopite blade impaled by a black crystal (hornblende?) from Hendersons Quarry and Rod Martin won second place with a meta-torbernite from Last Hope Adit, Hawks Crag, Buller Gorge. Rod also won the Field Trip trophy with hematite balls on a needle of edenite from Hendersons Quarry. The overseas competition was won by Yvonne Mackenzie with clinoclase from Tin Stope, Majuba Hill, Pershing Co., Nevada, USA.

 

Hornblende(?) impaled on phlogophite blade Hendersons Quarry Rotorua	Meta-torbernite Last Hope Adit Buller Gorge	Hematite balls on edenite Hendersons Quarry Rotorua	Clinoclase Tin Stope, Majuba Hill Pershing Co, Nev, USA

Monday – we had our usual lively auction run by Trevor Hosking and helpers. Some very fierce bidding saw one tiny tschernichite specimen from Waitakere NZ reach $200 and rising until Neville Berkhan generously donated another specimen for the same price. Well done Neville and two determined Aussie bidders. Manfred Seitz from Germany, David Hardman from UK and Ian Graham from Australia all kindly gave material for the auction and - many thanks for these well received specimens.

Yvonne Mackenzie and helpers pulled off a miracle to provide a symposium site and catered meals for 38 people given a very limited budget – well done. Future events will see an increase in symposium fees – we have done well to keep them down till now. Next year’s symposium will be run consecutively with the 30^th Joint Seminar of the Australian Mineralogical Societies. The combined event will run from 19^th – 28^th October, 2007 and will be held at Te Rau Aroha, Waihi Beach, New Zealand.

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  Attendees