Eocene shoshonitic mafic dykes intruding the Monashee Complex, British Columbia: a petrogenetic relationship with the Kamloops Group volcanic sequence?

Abstract

The newly named Three Valley Suite (TVS) kersantite lamprophyre to shoshonitic mafic dykes of the Monashee Complex are inferred to be hypabyssal feeder dykes to an alkaline to calc-alkaline volcanic suite related to the Kamloops Group. These dykes were emplaced in a subvertical north-trending orientation coincident with inferred Eocene crustal extension (~50.0 Ma), based on the flat 40Ar/39Ar step-heating plateau of contact-metamorphic muscovite on the margin of a TVS dyke. These weakly altered mafic dykes are fine grained with phenocrysts (0.5–2.0 mm) of phlogopite, augite, amphibole, and olivine (pseudomorphed by clays), rare labradorite, and both primary and secondary carbonates set in a fine-grained groundmass of similar mineralogy consistent with their classification as plagioclase-bearing potassic diorite to kersantite lamprophyre. The dykes are weakly silica-undersaturated and alkalic (2.8 wt.% K2O, 7.7 wt.% MgO), with high large ion lithophile element contents (~300 times primitive mantle) and elevated high-field-strength element contents, with a prominent negative Nb (Ta) anomaly, and have radiogenic Nd and Sr isotopic signatures; these geochemical attributes are consistent with a calc-alkaline shoshonitic affinity. Therefore, it is inferred that the subducting oceanic plate influenced subcrustal mantle wedge metasomatism in the region. Decompression partial melting of this metasomatised lithospheric mantle was initiated by coupled rapid unroofing, regional trans pression, slab rollback, and slab window development to the south. The TVS is similar to the mafic volcanic rocks within the nearby Eocene volcanic rocks, suggesting that these dykes represent the feeder system to a volcanic field that is now eroded, i.e., a broad-terrane association.