Garnet Rocks [SEP] continent
Garnet Rocks
The Garnet Rocks are a group of three rocks lying east of the Refuge Islands in the northern part of Rymill Bay, off the west coast of Graham Land, Antarctica. They were first surveyed in 1948–49 by the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey and so named by them because of the occurrence of garnet in the rocks.
, and form an alkaline-nephelinite suite. The variations in composition reflect distinct proportions of melts produced from parent rocks. Phenocrysts include augite, labradorite, olivine and plagioclase; additionally spinels are found in the rocks. Xenoliths of amphibole, calcite, clinopyroxene, dunite, garnet, garnet peridotite, orthopyroxene, phlogopite, garnet pyroxenite, lherzolite and spinel have been described; the most common ones are dunite, garnet containing rocks and lherzolite and the relative prevalence of the various xenoliths is a function of the position of their source vent