Geological Description
Most of the lode gold deposits of Nova Scotia are restricted mainly to the southern half of the province in a series of metamorphic rocks of the Cambro-Ordovician Meguma Group. The Meguma Group consists of two formations, an upper slate dominated Halifax Formation and conformable underlying, metawacke and metasiltstone dominated Goldenville Formation. Most of the lode gold deposits of the Meguma Group are hosted within the Goldenville Formation and these rocks underlie the entire Wine Harbour Gold District.
The Meguma Group metasedimentary rocks of eastern Nova Scotia are characterized by large, regional scale, northeast- trending folds having amplitudes of up to 15 km. These folds host bedding parallel quartz veins many of which are Au-bearing. In addition, the anticlinal domes are frequently cut by transverse quartz veins some of which are Au bearing but generally less so than the bedding parallel variety. The gold-bearing veins at Wine Harbour occur on the south and southwest portion of one of these anticlinal domes. The Au-bearing portion of the anticlinal dome has a strike length of 2.4 km and stratigraphic width of 460 m. indicates the axial plane of the dome occurs immediately north of the Eureka and Barachois Properties. Exploration and prospecting have never been able to find whether the northern half of the anticlinal dome contains Au-bearing veins. The interval that contains the Au-bearing veins at Wine Harbour has bedding that strikes east-west and dips steeply to the south. Past mining has shown that northwest-trending normal faults are known throughout the district, and these displace the Au-bearing veins short distances. Many of these faults are shown on the existing detailed map of the gold district. Other structures, many northwest-trending, are evident from regional mapping and airborne magnetic and ground electro magnetic surveys.
Mineralization
Gold mineralization at Wine Harbour is associated with sulphide-bearing, interbedded quartz veins. Arsenopyrite and pyrite are the more abundant sulphides but chalcopyrite, pyrrhotite and minor galena and sphalerite are also found. Metawacke wall rocks often contain significant amounts of arsenopyrite for a few metres adjacent to the Au-bearing veins. The Au occurs as native Au within the veins. As well, there are reports of Au occurring within, and adjacent to, some of the large arsenopyrite porphyroblasts in the adjacent wallrocks.
Mining
Gold was first discovered at Wine Harbour in 1860. By 1862, seven leads carrying gold values had been found and development had started. Production had started that year and in the following year (1863), more gold was produced from the Wine Harbour District than from any other in the province. For the next ten years, mining activity fluctuated but by 1874 mining had virtually come to a halt.
Mining operations in the Wine Harbour Gold District resulted in a total reported production of 42,346.5 oz of gold, the ninth largest in the province.
The last recorded exploration diamond drilling was in 1988 although percussion drilling is reported in 2007 and 2012.