Geology

Geology of the Walton Area

The Walton shore is underlain by sedimentary rocks of the Carboniferous age Horton and Windsor Groups. Horton sandstone, shale and conglomerate were laid down in a sedimentary basin at a time of extensive erosion of adjacent highland areas. Windsor marine limestone, sandstone, shale and evaporates were then deposited over the Horton sediments in a large inland sea perhaps not unlike the Dead Sea today. Between these two formations lie the conglomerate and limestone breccia of the Macumber formation. The region was subjected to periods of intense folding and faulting together with mineralizing events ( Geology map). The key to the Walton barite, sulphide deposit was the porous nature of the Macumber conglomerate acting as a pathway for mineralizing fluids, intersecting faults that created a steeply dipping pipe-like structure that hosts the mineralization and the right time in geologic history that eroded the overlying rocks to a level where the mineral deposit was exposed at surface to be found at a time in human history when the minerals could be used.