AU Gemstones found here: Australia
14 deposits listed · 9 species catalogued
Known origins & mines
Argyle AK1 · diamond
Closed 2020 after supplying ~90% of world pink diamonds from lamproite — not kimberlite. Argyle pinks appreciate 20%+ annually sin…
Coober Pedy Fields · opal
"White man's hole in the ground" — the opal capital where half the population lives underground to escape desert heat; white and c…
Lightning Ridge Black Opal · opal
Only place on Earth producing precious black opal — dark potch backing makes play-of-color explode. Noodling fossicking fields wel…
Marlborough Chrysoprase Fields · chrysoprase
World's finest apple-green chrysoprase from nickel laterite near Marlborough — Frederick the Great decorated Sanssouci with Queens…
Queensland Boulder Opal Fields · opal
Quilpie-Winton boulder country: opal seams in ironstone matrix found nowhere else on Earth, mined since 1870s.…
Broken Hill Rhodonite Lode · rhodonite
Silver-lead mining's famous byproduct: Broken Hill pink rhodonite with black Mn-oxide dendrites defines Australian lapidary tradit…
Broome South Sea Pearl Fields · pearl
Eighty Mile Beach silver-gold Pinctada maxima produce the largest cultured pearls on Earth — Broome pearling port history spans pe…
New England Sapphire Fields · sapphire
Inverell-Glen Innes basalt fields of NSW, world's historic fancy-sapphire heartland supplying greens, yellows and the famed parti …
Anakie Sapphire Fields · sapphire
Central Queensland basalt fields (Rubyvale, Sapphire, Anakie) powered the world sapphire market for a century with deep blue-green…
Harts Range Zircon · zircon
Australian outback alluvials yield large reddish-brown zircon heated to blue and golden colors — Harts Range gemtraverse feeds Asi…
Kennedy Range Mookaite Hills · jasper
Western Australian radiolarite hills yield mookaite in mustard, burgundy and cream — Australian souvenir carving staple with uniqu…
Prospect Sydney Quarry · prehnite
Sydney's Prospect quarry produced world-class prehnite-epidote combinations now locked in museums — quarrying ended but specimens …
White Cliffs Opal Digs · opal
Australia's first commercial opal field (1889) whose pine-replacement opalized wood fooled London buyers — now a quiet fossicking …
Yowah Nut Fields · opal
Boulder opal grows inside ironstone "nuts" — cracking open a Yowah nut is Queensland fossicking's lottery; pattern names like koro…