Photos from Cerit Gruva
Cerit Gruva ('Cerite Mine') in Nya Bastnäs Fält at Riddarhyttan in Sweden
is the source and type-locality of rare-earth minerals like Bastnäsite, Cerite, and
Törnebohmite as well as the sulfide Linnaeite [need to check, but that should
probably be Linnæite, but it is often misspelled Linneite].
The dump forms a slope from the ledge above. There are two deep shafts on top of the
ledge.
This photo shows the deepest of the shafts in June 1984. The fuzzy-grey stuff at the
bottom is ice - though it is mid summer!
View of one adit near the bottom of a shaft. When you are there, it is
easy to see it is only a few meters deep, but that is not obvious from top of the shaft.
Damn! Have to climb back up - far more difficult than getting down.
Quick and dirty list of species in Claus Hedegaard's collection:
Actinolite (fibrous, dark green)
Allanite-(Ce) (black, greasy, massive)
Anthophyllite (fibrous greyish-brown aggregates, often intergrown with Cordierite)
Asphalt (massive black)
Bastnäsite (greasy yellowish in Cerite or small crystals in micaceous schist)
Bismuthinite (sparse silvery laths in skarn)
Brochantite (green smirch on rock)
Cerite (massive purplish red to brick-red, very fine-grained)
Chalcopyrite (brassy, massive)
Cordierite (mustard greenish massive, usualy with intergrown amphiboles)
Goethite (brown crud)
Lanthanite-(Ce) (pearly flakes of 'crystals' on fractures in Cerite)
Linnaeite (greyish metallic grains, rare minute crystals)
Magnetite (submetallic black grains)
Malachite (green smirch on rock)
Mckelveyite (I really don't trust this one, but that's what the label said! Dull grey)
Muscovite (... or some other pale mica)
Pyrite (brassy micro crystals)
Talc (small greasy flakes)
Törnebohmite (exactly identical to Cerite, except it is greyish green or even grass-green; intergrown in Cerite)
Tremolite (fibrous, pale green)
Wroewolfeite (bright blue crusts on Cerite with Chalcopyrite)
This page is written and maintaned by Claus
Hedegaard
