SECONDARY MINERALIZATION IN AMAZING MAZE CAVE, PECOS COUNTY, TEXAS

Amazing Maze Cave is the third longest cave in Texas, located approximately 30 miles east of Fort Stockton on the southwest corner of the Central Basin Platform of the Permian Basin. It is a complex maze cave with development along with several distinct levels, leading to its name. The cave is thought to be produced by hypogene speleogenesis with a component sulfuric acid dissolution, very similar to Guadalupe Mountains caves which are located on the opposite side of the Delaware Basin. Throughout the cave are many unique secondary minerals that are associated with the speleogenesis, including calcite, gypsum and endellite. Secondary calcite is found as coralloids throughout much of the cave and flowstone in localized areas within the cave. Secondary gypsum is found in very large bodies in the middle of many of the passages within the cave, along with crusts in small joints, and gypsum flowers growing from walls. Endellite, a clay mineral, is most often found along thinly laminated bedding planes in the upper strata of the cave, and comes in a great variety of colors, such as purple and green. Secondary gypsum and endellite support a speleogenetic origin associated with sulfuric acid-rich waters as part of dominant phase of hypogene dissolution, while calcite speleothems and alteration of gypsum suggest late phase epigene overprinting by invasive meteoric waters.