AndreaBozzo/ceres-open-data-index huggingface dataset:
Experimental Trials for Restoring Disturbed Sites in Permafrost Areas Using Bioengineering Techniques

Placer mining has over a one hundred year history in the Yukon Territory. The majority of placer mining has taken place in the zone of discontinuous permafrost. Within the discontinuous permafrost zone, vegetated valley flats and north-facing slopes generally are underlain with permafrost. The permafrost thickness is highly variable and may reach depths of 60 meters. The active layer covering the permafrost also varies greatly in thickness.

To access gold bearing gravels, the removal of extensive quantities of overburden is usually required. Once this insulative cover is removed, the thermal equilibrium of the permafrost is disrupted and thawing occurs. This affects the stability of soils and vegetation and slope failure may occur. The extent that exposed permafrost melts depends partly on the amount and form of ice content. As melting progresses, the potential for mass movement of soil increases. Melting permafrost usually results in a wetter environment than was initially present, which further affects the natural revegetation process.

Bioengineering is the use of living plant materials to perform engineering functions such as erosion control and stabilization of steep slopes. Although bioengineering methods are now commonly used in the stabilization of steep problem slopes in more moderate climates (Polster, 1997), experimentation with these techniques in areas underlain with permafrost is still required. Advantages of using bioengineering systems are that they can be installed without machine access (which in permafrost areas would disturb the site even more), they strengthen with age, and they are less expensive than traditional hard engineering practices.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Placer Mining and Exploration Compilation (105A/B/C/D)

A placer mining and exploration compilation of parts of the Watson Lake and Whitehorse mining districts, southern Yukon Territory, Canada. This compilation includes the location, history and previous work, description of bedrock geology, surficial geology and mineralization, as well as lists of related references. Accompanying this report are four 1:250,000-scale maps (Watson Lake, 105A; Whitehorse, 105D; Teslin, 105C; and Wolf Lake, 105B) which display the locations of the placer occurrences discussed in the report.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
White channel gravel of the Klondike

The White Channel Gravel of the Klondike is an unconsolidated gravel preserved as erosional remnants lying on rock cut benches above younger streams. It contains important concentrations of gold, and eroded parts of the gravel are the likely source of gold in the newer gravels of streams cut through them (e.g., Bonanza, Eldorado and Hunker Creeks).

The purpose of this note is to point out that the base of the White Channel Gravel and the bedrock below it are altered and that this alteration coincides with the gold localized in the sediments. Groundwater flowing through the gravel may have precipitated the gold and produced the alteration of gravel and bedrock. Previously, gold in the White channel Gravel has been considered a fossil placer concentration.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Preliminary bedrock geology of the Ruby Ranges, southwestern Yukon, (Parts of NTS 115G, 115H, 115A and 115B) (1:150 000 scale)

This map is the product of collaboration between the Yukon Geological Survey and the Geological Survey of Canada, under the Geo-mapping for energy and minerals (GEM) program.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Arsenic in Plants Important to Two Yukon First nations: Impacts of Gold Mining and Reclamation Practices

This project examines arsenic in plants growing enar closed or reclaimed gold mines located in the traditional territories of two Yukon First Nations. A total of 238 soil and plant amples (comprising 9 different species) were collected from Mt. Nansen, Arctic Gold and Silver, and Venus Mine tailing properties. At each property, samples were collected near the suspected point source of contamination, approximately 1-3 km away, and from background sites. Species were chosen for their ethnobotanical significance to the Little Salmon/Carmacks and the Carcross/Tagish First nations, based on interviews with Elders and other knowledgeable people. Total and inorganic arsenic concentrations were determined using ICP-MS and AAS instrumentation, and organic arsenic concentrations were calculated from the difference. 
Uptake of arsenic by plants was low compared to soil arsenic concentrations. In both plants and soil, the arsenic form was predominantly inorganic. Concentrations in berries at all three sites were low or undetectable, and are therefore considered safe to eat under Health Canada tolerable daily intake guidelines for inorganic arsenic.
At Mt. Nansen, the lichen "caribou moss" (Cetrarial/Cladina spp.), Bolete mushrooms (Leccinum spp.), and the medicinal shrubs willow (Saliz spp.) and Labrador tea (Ledum groenlandicum/L.decumbens spp.) had high mean arsenic concentrations around point sources or at sites up to 1.5 km away. These localized high concentrations will not likely affect foraging animals, given their constant movement. However, Carmacks residents could avoid gathering all species with elevated arsenic around the Mt. Nansen mining property until reclamation is complete.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Paleoproterozoic volcanism and plutonism in the Wernecke Mountains, Yukon

The Paleoproterozoic Slab volcanics occur in three localities in the Wernecke Mountains. The largest exposure is at Slab Mountain and consists of a 0.6 x 0.25 km block of thin, steeply dipping mafic to intermediate lava flows. A zone of Wernecke Breccia (1.60 Ga), which crops out along the exposed margin of this volcanic block suggests that the megaclast foundered into the breccia zone from a higher crustal level. The volcanic rocks are typically aphyric. The groundmass consists mainly of laths of plagioclase (commonly altered to scapolite), anhedral biotite and magnetite. The scapolite, and possibly the biotite and magnetite, likely grew during hydrothermal alteration associated with Wernecke Breccia emplacement. Primary igneous mineralogy is uncertain. The Slab volcanics appear geochemically similar and are probably comagmatic with some of the 1.71 Ga Bonnet Plume River Intrusions. No correlative volcanic strata have been found in the Wernecke Mountains or in the neighbouring Ogilvie Mountains.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
The Quaternary history and till geochemistry of the Anvil District, east-central Yukon

Till geochemistry and glacial geology have rarely been integrated into Yukon mineral exploration. In the Anvil District, thick glacial deposits have consistently hampered exploration. From the initial (massive sulphide) discovery in Vangorda Creek, twenty years elapsed before the Grum deposit was discovered only two kilometres to the northwest. This work examines the utility of till geochemistry as a method to trace mineralized soil/till samples back to their source rocks in the Anvil District. The Anvil District was last glaciated during the McConnell glaciation, which had a significant impact on the local terrain. The relatively swift-flowing Cordilleran ice sheet deposited thick sequences of till in low-lying areas and eroded southeast-facing slopes and hill summits in the Swim Basin and Vangorda Plateau. This type of glacial history is conducive for till geochemical exploration. A 12 km 2 till grid was sampled northwest of the Faro deposit to map the glacial dispersion train. The till geochemistry on the -230 mesh fraction (silt and clay) indicated a broad dispersion plume for lead, zinc, and copper, extending more than 5 km west of the Faro Pb/Zn deposit. A section of the dispersion train may have a palimpsest origin. The soil geochemistry on the -80 mesh fraction, from 1964 data, indicated a much narrower dispersion plume extending directly from the Faro deposit. Till geochemistry, particularly on the fine fraction, has applications to similar drift-covered terrain, such as the Finlayson Lake massive sulphide district to the southeast.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Wolverine Massive Sulfide Project, Yukon

The Wolverine massive sulfide project lies within the Finlayson belt, an elongate composite body bound on the southwest by the Tintina Fault zone and on the northeast by the Finlayson Lake fault zone, and comprising mainly rocks belonging to the pericratonic Yukon-Tanana Terrane. The Wolverine Deposit is hosted by Devonian-Mississippian aged carbonaceous metaseediments and metamorphosed volcanic and pyroclastic felsic rocks of the Yukon-Tanana Terrane.

The Wolverine Deposit was discovered in 1995 after a surface exploration program generated multi-element soil anomalies. Drill testing intersected massive sulfide mineralization. The massive sulfide body is zoned, polymetallic and displays banded, clastic and massive-replacement textures. Drilling to date suggests that it has a tabular morphology. The main sulfide minerals in order of decreasing abundance are pyrite, sphalerite, chalcopyrite and galena.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Uranium-lead ID-TI MS and LA-ICP-MS ages for the Cassiar and Seagull batholiths, Wolf Lake map area, southern Yukon.

The Cassiar and Seagull batholiths are mainly post-tectonic felsic intrusions emplaced into the North American miogeocline and Yukon-Tanana Terrane, respectively, near the British Columbia-Yukon boundary. The two bodies range in composition from granodiorite and quartz monzonite to granite. Previous studies reported K-Ar and Rb-Sr dates of ~100 Ma for Seagull batholith and about 110 Ma for Cassiar batholith. Two samples of massive quartz monzonite from the interior of the Cassiar batholith, and a strongly foliated and lineated augen gneiss within a ductile shear zone near the western margin of the batholith, yield overlapping U-Pb monazite and/or zircon ages of 112.3 ± 2.0 Ma, 113.2 ± 2.2 Ma, and 110.2 ± 1.0 Ma respectively, by ID-TIMS methods. Samples of aplitic biotite granite and megacrystic biotite granite from the Seagull batholith give distinctly younger U-Pb zircon ages of 99.3 ± 2.2 Ma and 95.7 ± 2.1 Ma, respectively, using LA-ICP-MS methods.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Bedrock geology of Lansing Range map area (105N), east half, Hess Mountains, Yukon

Geological map (1:125,000 scale) of the Lansing Range map area (NTS 105N), east half, Hess Mountains, Yukon, including geological cross sections, mineral occurrences, fossil age determinations, isotopic age determinations and marginal notes on regional setting.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Geomorphic assessment of Tsälnjik Chú (Nordenskiold River) near Carmacks, Klondike region, Yukon

River course migration is controlled by discharge, sediment supply, and bank vegetation, and its study informs watershed responses to environmental stressors like climate change and permafrost thaw. We present a preliminary characterization of Tsälnjik Chú (Nordenskiold River) near Carmacks (Klondike region, Yukon), based on geomorphic observations, time-series photogrammetry and hydrological analysis. We report channel-migration data in relation to flooding patterns, including the records of a recent ~10-year recurrence flood that took place in the spring of 2022. Boreholes drilled in the river’s floodplain have encountered discontinuous permafrost at depths of >0.7 m, and preliminary morphodynamic analyses show similar relationships between channel size, curvature and migration rate to rivers outside the permafrost zone. Results provide a coarse characterization of hazards related to bank erosion and channel overspill at Carmacks, and will inform future work that integrates aspects of fluvial morphodynamics and biogeochemistry in relation to flooding elsewhere in Yukon.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Yukon Geoscience - A Blueprint for the Future (Yukon Geology Program) 1995

Mining is expected to remain as Yukon's most important industry during the next 5-10 years. The future prosperity of the mining industry in Yukon depends on the discovery of new mineral deposits. These new discoveries will depend on up to date geoscientific research: geological mapping, geochemical and geophysical surveys, and mineral deposit studies. Government and First Nations also need the results of this research to evaluate mineral potential and assist with land use planning and environmental impact assessments. With this in mind, the Geological Survey of Canada, Northern Affairs Program (DIAND), Government of Yukon and the Yukon Chamber of Mines collaborated on a 2-day workshop in April, 1995, to identify and prioritize Yukon's Geoscience requirements for the next 5 to 10 years. This document summarizes the results of the workshop. It represents a consensus between the four sponsoring agencies, based on input from 34 geoscientists currently working in Yukon, and will be used in planning geoscientific research to ensure that priorities are met and that maximum value is obtained from available funding.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Surficial Geology of Keno Hill, Central Yukon (105M/14)

Surficial geological map (1:50,000 scale) of Keno Hill area, central Yukon (NTS 105M/14) including marginal notes on physiography, glacial history, placer gold potential and terrain hazards. This map also includes 5 stratigraphic sections.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Hyland Gold property, southeastern Yukon

The Hyland Gold prospect is a low-grade oxide gold deposit hosted by Proterozoic sedimentary rocks. The deposit is associated with an almost flat-lying siderite manto cut by anastomosing vertical faults. Possible open-pit reserves of 6,750,000 tonnes grading 2.0 g/t Au are inferred from trench assays.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Brewery Creek Gold Deposit

Brewery Creek is a bulk tonnage gold deposit 76 km east of Dawson. The economically important intrusive bodies are the semi-conformable sills of quartz monzonite which intrude into upper Road River and lower Earn Group (dominantly clastic sedimentary) strata. Low angle faults, inferred to be thrust faults, appear to have controlled the emplacement of the Cretaceous quartz monzonite sills which host most of the gold mineralization.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Placer deposits of the Yukon: overview and potential for new discoveries

Historic placer mining areas in Yukon can be grouped into ten areas: Klondike; Sixtymile; Fortymile; Clear Creek; Moosehorn Range; Stewart River; Clear Creek; Mayo; Dawson Range; and Livingstone Creek. Each area has its own geomorphic setting and depositional history which is related to its glacial history. Several Quaternary glacial advances have been described in Yukon, and these are generally divided into three episodes, commonly known as the pre-Reid, Reid and McConnell, in order of oldest to most recent.

Placer deposit in the unglaciated Klondike, Sixtymile, Fortymile and Moosehorn drainages occur in valley-bottoms, alluvial fans, in gulch gravels and as high level terraces. Placer deposits in glaciated areas occur in variably reworked and buried valley-bottom, bench and gulch settings, in auriferous glacial till and glaciofluvial gravels, and in non-glacial gravels which were deposited on top of glacial drift.

Targets for new placer deposits in unglaciated areas include drainages such as Stewart, North Ladue and Yukon Rivers which lie outside of the pre-Reid glacial limit. Mineable placer deposits may also have formed on top of pre-Reid glacial drift and may be buried in valleys beneath Reid-age non-glacial alluvium. Prospective areas of this type are drainages which are near lode gold deposits in the Clear Creek area and in drainages near felsic volcanics in the Dawson Range. At the limits of both the Reid and McConnell glaciations, auriferous pre-glacial or interglacial gravel can often be buried by glacial and glaciofluvial deposits. Low-grade auriferous glaciofluvial gravel can also be derived form the reworking of pre-glacial gold-bearing gravel. Prospective areas for these types of placer deposits are the South McQuesten River valley and the creeks draining the Ruby Range on the east side of Kluane Lake. Within the McConnell glacial limits, placer deposits may be found in valleys oriented obliquely to the paleoflow direction of the glacial ice. Economic to sub-economic placers may also be found along meltwater channels within the McConnell ice limit. Prospective areas of this type of deposit are the drainages which lie to the north of Livingstone placer camp.

The possibilities for new placer mining areas within glaciated areas must be investigated, and new placer gold reserves will undoubtedly be found within these areas. These potential gold deposits may be explored by techniques such as surficial mapping, airphoto interpretation and bulk sampling of potential gold-bearing units.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
The Anvil District

The Anvil Pb-Zn-Ag District is located in central Yukon immediately north of the Town of Faro, 200 km northeast of Whitehorse. Five known stratiform deposits of the massive pyritic sulphide deposit type describe a curvilinear arc in plan view. The district contains an estimated total of 225 million tonnes of sulphide-bearing rock.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Late Triassic to Jurassic Magmatic and Tectonic Evolution of the Intermontane Terranes in Yukon, Northern Canadian Cordillera: Transition From Arc to Syn-Collisional Magmatism and Post-Collisional Lithospheric Delamination

End-on arc collision and onset of the northern Cordilleran orogen is recorded in Late Triassic to Jurassic plutons in the Intermontane terranes of Yukon, and in development of the synorogenic Whitehorse trough (WT). A synthesis of the extensive data set for these plutons supports interpretation of the magmatic and tectonic evolution of the northern Intermontane terranes. Late Triassic juvenile plutons that locally intrude the Yukon-Tanana terrane represent the northern extension of arc magmatism within Stikinia. Early Jurassic plutons that intrude Stikinia and Yukon-Tanana terranes were emplaced during crustal thickening (200–195 Ma) and subsequent exhumation (190–178 Ma). The syn-collisional magmatism migrated to the south and shows increasing crustal contributions with time. This style of magmatism in Yukon contrasts with coeval, juvenile arc magmatism in British Columbia (Hazelton Group), that records southward arc migration in the Early Jurassic. Exhumation and subsidence of the WT in the north were probably linked to the retreating Hazelton arc by a sinistral transform. East of WT, Early Jurassic plutons intruded into Yukon-Tanana record continued arc magmatism in Quesnellia. Middle Jurassic plutons were intruded after final enclosure of the Cache Creek terrane and imbrication of the Intermontane terranes. The post-collisional plutons have juvenile isotopic compositions that, together with stratigraphic evidence of surface uplift, are interpreted to record asthenospheric upwelling and lithospheric delamination. A revised tectonic model proposes that entrapment of the Cache Creek terrane was the result of Hazelton slab rollback and development of a sinistral transform fault system linked to the collision zone to the north.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Geological Setting of Mineral Occurrences in Fairchild Lake Map Area (106C/13), Wernecke Mountains, Yukon

The Fairchild Lake map area is underlain by two principal sedimentary successions, Middle Proterozoic Wernecke Supergroup and unconformably overlying Middle to Late Proterozoic Pinguicula Group. The angular unconformity between the successions was caused by an intervening period of deformation known as Racklan orogeny. A third succession, herein named the Slab volcanics, is inferred to have been deposited after Racklan orogeny and before Pinguicula Group deposition. Mineralization occurs as sedimentary exhalative, vein, and intrusive breccia occurrences within Wernecke Supergroup. The sedimentary exhalatives contain Zn, Pb, Cu and Ag in shaley horizons within a mainly dolomitic sequence. The vein occurrences contain Zn, Pb, Cu, Ag, Au and U. The intrusive breccias, collectively known as Wernecke breccia, host Cu, Co, U, Ag and Au. Wernecke breccia was probably generated by explosive expansion of volatile-rich fluids. Brecciation was preceded by Racklan orogeny and intrusion of igenous dykes. The dykes and the breccia-related mineralizing fluids may have a common source in postulated underlying magma chambers. Local supergene enrichment of breccia mineralization was caused by Middle to Late Proterozoic weathering before deposition of Pinguicula Group.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon
Updated bedrock geology of the southern Nash Creek area in central Yukon (parts of NTS 106D/2, 3, 6 and 7)

The southern Nash Creek area is located along the northern boundary of the Selwyn basin, and is underlain mainly by the Ediacaran–Cambrian Hyland Group, the Devonian–Mississippian Earn Group and the Mississippian Tsichu Group. Several Au and polymetallic mineral deposits are hosted by the Hyland Group and Paleozoic platformal carbonate rocks in the surrounding region. The southern Nash Creek area is bordered by regional-scale, southeast-striking thrust faults, which include the Dawson thrust to the northeast and the Robert Service thrust to the southwest. Based on stratigraphic relationships identified during 1:50 000-scale bedrock mapping, Hyland Group rocks in the area are considered to belong to the Cryogenian–Ediacaran Yusezyu Formation, the Ediacaran Algae Formation and the Ediacaran–Terreneuvian Narchilla Formation. Earn Group rocks include mainly shale and lesser amounts of interbedded dolostone, sandstone and shale. Tsichu Group rocks mostly comprise quartzite. The Yusezyu and Narchilla formations host (Paleozoic?) gabbro sills, and the Earn and Tsichu groups host gabbro sills that are considered to belong to the Triassic Galena suite. Rocks in the southern Nash Creek area exhibit a northeast-to-southwest dipping foliation that is axial planar to southeast-trending folds.

Organization: Government of Yukon | Gouvernement du Yukon