The Black Pine Mine
Exploring one specimen
Life in the USA is not normal. It feels pointless and trivial to be talking about small looks at the fascinating natural world when the country is being dismantled. But these posts will continue, as a statement of resistance. I hope you continue to enjoy and learn from them. Stand Up For Science!
I’ve posted several times previously about minerals from the Black Pine Mine northwest of Philipsburg, Montana. This one reports the exploration of just one specimen from the mine.
Granted, it’s pretty big (14 x 15 cm), but even so, it has a fairly interesting mineral list: Quartz (big crystals, needle crystals, at least five Japan-law twin crystals), hübnerite (manganese tungstate), stolzite (lead tungstate), mimetite-pyromorphite (lead arsenate-phosphate), ‘bindheimite’ (more properly, probably oxyplumboroméite, lead-antimony oxide), and pseudomalachite (copper phosphate).
The “possible” list includes bayldonite (green lead-copper arsenate) or duftite (a different green lead-copper arsenate), goethite (iron oxy-hydroxide), chrysocolla (copper-aluminum silicate), cerussite (lead carbonate), olivenite (copper arsenate), and likely some tiny bits of other things. I don’t think there are any of the Black Pine hallmark minerals like pyrite, tetrahedrite, or veszelyite. All the photos here are from this one rock except as noted.
I’m certainly not claiming this to be the best of anything – but although it’s kind of clunky and not very aesthetic overall, I think it is larger than any of the 258 specimens from Black Pine on MinDat. The next closest is 13.6 x 12 cm (veszelyite). And I have had a lot of fun exploring it.
Because I’m including a lot of photos, I’ve made this report into a PDF rather than create a post that would perhaps be overwhelming for email. And note that in the PDF, I mention speculation about the origin of the whole piece – but that’s being saved for later!
If you happen to be in Butte May 16-17, 2026, this specimen will be part of my case on display at the Butte Mineral Show, but realistically, you can probably see the microminerals better in my photos here than in the case.
