Nannine Goldfield, Meekatharra Shire, Western Australia, Australiai

Regional Level Types
Nannine Goldfield	Ore Field
Meekatharra Shire	Shire
Western Australia	State
Australia	Country

John Connolly is generally credited with the first discovery of gold at Nannine in 1890. Later in the year McPherson and Peterkin found significant gold in the area, and a goldrush ensued. Within a year, 700 men were on the field. A town was proclaimed the same year, said to be the first in the region.

Nannine is 40 kilometres south of Meekatharra on the Great Northern Highway. The town was in serious decline by 1919, and is long gone. Now all that remains is a railway platform and information sign.

Most of the gold mines were found along reefs on an iron stone ridge, south of the highway which crosses the ridge, to the Lake Annean salt pan to the south. Today the area is dominated by the Caledonian open pit, which consumed several historic mining leases, accessing gold via shafts.

The area has produced over 200 000 ounces of gold. It is part of the Meekatharra-Wydgee Greenstone Belt, a sequence of mafic volcanic rocks, sediments and banded iron formation units. West of the greenstone belt at Nannine is the Nannine Tonalite, and east the Norie Pluton. The gold mineralisation is found in quartz veins mainly at the contact between the greenstone belt and tonalite. The quartz veins sometimes pass from the greenstone belt into the granite, but are generally gold poor in the granite.

The quartz reefs run north north-east, and dip slightly west. The ridgeline is traversed by north-west trending parallel bands of hematite bearing quartzite. Gold is found either at the intersection of the reefs with the quartzite, or at the contact between the greenstone and granite. The former the reefs vary in size with patchy irregular gold values except at the intersections. The latter the reefs are larger and values are more regular, although small rich chutes are sometimes found. Considerable quantities of alluvial gold was also found on Bailey's Island in Lake Annean, shed from small quartz reefs and leaders.

Modern mining commenced in 1988 by Endeavour Resources, then by St Barbara Mines from the 1990's to 2002 forming the large Caledonian pit.

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