Emu NorthMine (Mararoa; Emu gold mine), Reedy's Goldfield, Cue Shire, Western Australia, Australiai

Regional Level Types
Emu NorthMine (Mararoa; Emu gold mine)	Mine (Inactive)
Reedy's Goldfield	Ore Field
Cue Shire	Shire
Western Australia	State
Australia	Country

A closed gold mine located approximately 50kms North-East of Cue.

This first notification of the Emu lease appears to be 1920 when prospectors Sugrue and Party were sending stone to the battery to be crushed. The ore body was discovered in 1919, although H. Reed found gold in the area in 1899.

No significant mining took place until the Mararoa Company abandoned its lease on the Cue goldfield, and decided to develop the deposit in 1923. J.V.W. Mathers was appointed mine manager. A shaft was sunk to at least 180 feet on the Emu North lease with levels at 110 and 160 feet with the lode driven on for 450 feet. On the Emu South lease the shaft was sunk to 160 feet with levels at 35, 80 and 130 feet, the lode driven on for 240 feet. Machinery was acquired from the nearby Culculli mine in 1925. A five stamp mill was already erected at this time, having been removed from the Cue One mine on the Cue Goldfield. It was carted to the mine by train and camel.

The Emu deposit is a large and low grade affair. It is hosted within greenstone lavas and tuffs, interbedded slates, and some sediments, intruded by granite and porphyry. The main workings was Emu North, with the smaller Emu South 1 kilometre south. Both ore bodies are on the same lode, striking north-south, and dipping vertically. The Emu North lode averages 12 to 15 feet wide, seldom less than 5 feet wide, and reaches in parts up to 30 feet wide. On the same line 1 kilometre north is the Rand and Rand North deposits. The lode is a mineralised bed between massive lava flows to the east, and a mixed series of tuffs and thin lava flows to the west. The lode material is hard, fine grained, dark coloured with faint banding. Albitization is significant, with considerable biotite, and abundant pyrite the later containing gold. There is lesser pyrrhotite, being barren of gold.

Drilling in the late 1920's by the Western Australian Government, and Western Gold Mines Ltd who had an option over the area, showed a significant large low grade deposit to the north of Emu. Mararoa did not have the funds to develop it, and after a series of complex financial transactions involving several major companies, the Triton Company acquired the 84 acres of leases held by Mararoa. The South Emu mine was developed as an open pit in the 1990's.

Other Regions, Features and Areas containing this locality

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