Gora Zmeinaya

Gora Zmeinaya (Snake Mountain) is a geological and geomorphological nature monument in the Adamovsky district of Orenburg Oblast, Russia. A low hill with steep, sharply dissected slopes, it owes its relief to the many quartz veins that cut through its rock.

Geology

The hill is built of liparite-dacites pierced by numerous quartz veins. Acting as a kind of internal reinforcement, these veins give the low hill-and-ridge (melkosopochnik) relief its sharply dissected, contrasting look.

The monument is considered one of the most significant examples in Orenburg Oblast of rare-metal and rare-earth mineralization, linked to a black-shale layer of the Lower Carboniferous and to its silicification. Most researchers trace the ore mineralization to hypergene processes, that is, to the formation of weathering crusts, though the strong silicification of the rock also allows for a hydrothermal origin of part of the rare and rare-earth element concentrations.

At the south-eastern foot of the hill, outcrops and scree of vein quartz are exposed, and exploration trenches have uncovered quartz-sericite metasomatites and limonite of a gossan ("iron cap") zone formed over sulfides. The quartz vein itself contains rock crystal and tiny particles of gold and silver. One source also calls the hill the Kumys-Tyube quartz field, after the nearby Kumys-Tyube river.

Two monuments, one name

Two separate nature monuments in the Adamovsky district carry the name Gora Zmeinaya. One lies on the right bank of the Kumys-Tyube river, 11 km northwest of the Zhulamansay halt and the settlement of Yubileyny; it covers 49 hectares, and the hill rises up to 60 meters above its surroundings. The other lies 1 km northeast of the village of Enbekshi and covers 37 hectares. Sources describe both as sections of the same type of low hill-and-ridge country, with similar geology: quartz veins and rare-metal mineralization.

Getting there

Both sections of the monument lie in the steppe part of the Adamovsky district and are best reached by car: the Zhulamansay halt and Yubileyny settlement are reached via roads in the eastern part of the district, while Enbekshi village is reached by local roads to its northeast. There are no signposts or tourist infrastructure on site: this is a regionally protected nature monument, not a developed route.