Sheep Creek Mine, Fairbanks Mining District, Fairbanks North Star Borough, Alaska, USAi

Regional Level Types
Sheep Creek Mine	Mine
Fairbanks Mining District	Mining District
Fairbanks North Star Borough	Borough
Alaska	State
USA	Country

Location: The Sheep Creek mine is located in the NE1/4NE1/4 sec. 20, T. 1 N., R. 2 W., Fairbanks Meridian. The placer mine (open-pit mine) is marked on the Fairbanks (D-2) NW topographic map, approximately 2.7 miles northeast of the top of Ester Dome. Sheep Creek is a tributary of Goldstream Creek that drains the northeast side of Ester Dome, and the mining took place on the lower half-mile of the creek upstream of where it flows onto the flats of Goldstream Creek. The mine is included in locality 47 of Cobb (1972 [MF 410]).
Geology: Sheep Creek is a tributary of Goldstream Creek that drains the northeast side of Ester Dome. Bedrock in the drainage is Fairbanks Schist that consists of quartz-muscovite schist, quartzite, chlorite-quartz schist, and bleached feldspathic quartzose schist (Newberry and others, 1996). The area that has been mined, about a half-mile in the lower part of the creek, consists predominantly of frozen ground with a few scattered, thawed bog holes and a thawed area running the length of the old F.E. Co. stripping drain (May and Bundtzen, 1996). The depth to bedrock ranges from 30 to 100 feet and averages around 70 feet (May and Bundtzen, 1996). Within the mine section, 20-25 feet of frozen muck overlies the gravels (May and Bundtzen, 1996). In the early to mid-1950's, the F.E. Co. began hydraulic stripping of the 80-100 feet of muck overlying the thawed gravels of the Sheep Creek channel (May and Bundtzen, 1996). Dredge no. 6 began working the Sheep Creek channel in 1958 and continued until it was shut down in 1962 (May and Bundtzen, 1996).
Workings: There was probably earlier drift mining and prospecting, but in 1952, the F.E. Co. prepared a half-mile section of lower Sheep Creek channel for dredging after drilling approximately 200 to 300 prospect holes (May and Bundtzen, 1996). In the early to mid-1950's, the F.E. Co. began hydraulic stripping of the 80-100 feet of muck overlying the thawed gravels of the Sheep Creek channel (May and Bundtzen, 1996). In the fall of 1957, Dredge no. 6, which had just finished mining at Gold Hill (FB155) was hauled overland to Sheep Creek. The dredge began working the Sheep Creek channel in 1958 and continued until it was shut down in 1962 (May and Bundtzen, 1996).
Age: Quaternary placer.
Production: There is no information available on the amount of production but it must have been substantial, considering that it was dredged from 1958 to 1962.

Commodities (Major) - Au
Development Status: Yes; small
Deposit Model: Placer Au (Cox and Singer, 1986; model 39a)

Other Databases

Link to USGS - Alaska:	FB052

Other Regions, Features and Areas containing this locality

References