Gem, and especially mineral specimen, mining in the Gilgit and Skardu districts of Pakistan’s Northern Areas is a relative recent phenomenon. Although some gem deposits were noted during the British occupation of the area, it was not until mineral and gem dealers arrived in the early 1970s that the industry took hold in the region.
Most of the collector specimens have been produced from three general types of mineral deposits: pegmatite bodies, Alpine-type cleft occurrences and contact metamorphic rocks (marble).
The Pegmatite Minerals
Of all of the pegmatite minerals produced in the Northern Areas, the first many collectors would associate with this part of the world is beryl, the region having over the last 30 years been a very prolific producer of outstanding aquamarine, morganite and goshenite crystals.
Not nearly a plentiful as beryl, topaz is still easily the second most available gem species from the Northern Areas.
Among pegmatite minerals, fine specimens of the tourmaline group are not as common as one might think in the Northern Areas. Stak Nala, in the Skardu District, with its green and green/pink elbaite crystals is by far the most prolific source. The crystals are almost always color-zoned and very commonly associated with albite (cleavelandite). Schorl is found is several of the pegmatite deposits in both Gilgit and Skardu Districts.
Superb examples of spessartine-almandine, commonly associated with muscovite, quartz, and feldspar, are found in the pegmatite bodies around Haramosh-Dassu (Gilgit District) and Baralooma Valley, Sabsar, and Shengus (Skardu District). These are usually well-formed, deep wine-red crystals typically measuring from 0.5 cm to 2 cm, though exceptional crystals measuring more than 5 cm across are known.
These deposits have also produced world-class specimens of some of the rarer pegmatite minerals: beryllonite, fluorite, hambergite, hydroxylherderite, pollucite, and viitaniemiite.
The Alpine Cleft type Minerals
In terms of deposit types, the second most prolific producer of collector specimens are the Alpine-type cleft systems in the Tormiq valley and in the Shigar valley, near Hashupa and Alchuri, These valleys are in the Skardu district. Some of the world’s largest and finest epidote specimens, rivaling those of the classic Austrian locality, the Knappenwand, emerged in the 1990s from the deposits around Hashupa and Alchuri. As well, these areas have produced superb ilmenite roses, rutile, titanite, zoisite, clinozoisite, and rarely scheelite and axinite.
Marble Deposit Minerals
Corundum (ruby) as been mined on the mountain ridges above Haiderabad and Aliabad at least since the British occupied the area. The pink to deep red crystals occur in white marble, the effect of contact metamorphism by intruding granitic magmas on host carbonate rocks. Blue, purple to red spinel octahedra to 7 cm are also found in these metamorphosed carbonate rocks.
Similar rocks near along the Hunza River near Aliabad and Ganesh are producing emerald green (vanadian) pargasite as well as bluish to purple corundum; some of which is color changing.
Further Reading
“Edle Steine vom Dach der Welt” extraLapis No.24: Afghanistan & Pakistan.
“Pakistan - Minerals, Mountains & Majesty” extraLapis English Edition No.6
Stak Nala, in the northeast part of the Nanga Parbat, Haramosh Mountains Massif, Skardu District, Baltistan, Gilgit-Baltistan (Northern Areas), Pakistan
Tourmaline / Localité - Stak Nala, District de Skardu, Baltistan, Gilgit-Baltistan (Régions du Nord), Pakistan
Stak Nala, in the northeast part of the Nanga Parbat, Haramosh Mountains Massif, Skardu District, Baltistan, Gilgit-Baltistan (Northern Areas), Pakistan
Tourmaline avec Albite (var : « Cleavelandite ») / Localité - Stak Nala, Baltistan, Gilgit-Baltistan (Régions du Nord), Pakistan
Stak Nala, in the northeast part of the Nanga Parbat, Haramosh Mountains Massif, Skardu District, Baltistan, Gilgit-Baltistan (Northern Areas), Pakistan
