The largest rodeo in the Southern Hemisphere took place this past weekend in the oasis of the outback: Mount Isa.
The Mount Isa Mines Rodeo is an annual program that was established in 1959, with around 750 riders descending on Buchanan Park for the three-day event.
The event is described as “where the romance of the Australian Outback meets the grit of a mining town, east meets west, and man meets beast”, according to Outback Queensland.
As reported by Mining.com.au, the company running the Mount Isa Mines Rodeo, Isa Rodeo, went into administration in 2024. The community banded together to form a new company, Mount Isa Pro Rodeo, in early 2025 to ensure the annual event could come back.
While the event has a rich history in the region, the rodeo isn’t the only thing placing Mount Isa on the map.
Sitting in the Gulf Country region of North West Queensland, Mount Isa is famous for being a massive outback mining hub.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, Mount Isa is home to around 18,000 residents as of last year, with a median age of 31.7 years old.
The 2021 census recorded 1,587 locals working in copper ore mining, equating to 16.9% of the Mount Isa population, followed by 840 residents working in silver-lead-zinc ore mining, covering 9% of the local workforce.
And although Mount Isa is considered a small regional city, the size of the town didn’t stop Glencore (LSE:GLEN) — one of the largest mining companies in the world — from operating in the area.
Prospector John Campbell Miles discovered lead ore in Mount Isa in February 1923 when travelling through the region. This ore was then assayed in Cloncurry, returning high percentages of lead.
The miner pegged out a lease, naming it Mount Isa. More prospectors joined Miles as the news of his discovery travelled, with 118 leases pegged out by the end of 1923.
The company, Mount Isa Mines, was established less than a year after Miles’ initial discovery, in January 1924.
Tracking through cattle and copper
Prospector Miles’ findings in 1923 were just the beginning of a century’s worth of prospecting for Mount Isa.
Not long after, rail transportation was prioritised in the area, with construction beginning for the branch line from Duchess to Mount Isa in 1926.
This was considered rather late for regional Queensland railways, with major regional lines and the unified coastal network already established by then.
However, before the railway line was open for business, Mount Isa Mines gained another win with the discovery of copper in diamond drill cores in 1927.
The railway opened in April 1929, with construction of the plant beginning in July of that year, before mining operations were able to begin in 1931.
Initial mining operations focused on lead, silver, and zinc, although copper was discovered six years later. Development to access the copper ore body commenced shortly thereafter.
With World War II just around the corner in 1939, mining in Mount Isa was considered to play a crucial role in history. The area supplied strategic metals needed for the war effort, including zinc, copper, and lead.
Mount Isa Mines began producing copper in September 1953, following infrastructure construction between 1950 and 1953.
The decades following were crucial for the expansion of mining in Mount Isa.
Mount Isa Mines focused on diversifying operations in the 1960s, becoming a major producer of copper, lead, zinc, and silver, before increasing smelting facilities to process and refine extracted ores onsite in the 1970s.
Saddling up for expansion
The name says it all … and Mount Isa Mines was restricted.
For the mining industry, the 1990s represented unusually low commodity prices, before the Australian mining boom of 2003.
The mining industry was described to deliver ‘mixed messages’ in the 1990s, with Pilbara-based iron ore miners becoming more profitable in the first half of the decade, all the while a ‘get big or get out’ sentiment echoed across markets, according to the Australian Financial Review.
Profit recovery for iron ore is connected to a partial recovery in the Japanese steel industry, which increased demand from other north Asian countries such as China and South Korea.
Back in Queensland, Mount Isa Mines knew it was time to expand. The company merged with other businesses to create MIM Holdings, allowing it to enter mining regions outside the Mount Isa region.
But as the Australian mining boom started to kick off, Swiss-based global mining company Xstrata acquired MIM, including the acquisition of Mount Isa Mines.
A new rider takes the reins
Historically, Switzerland is described as a neutral country. The country stays away from foreign wars, avoids military alliances, and does not allow foreign troops to enter Swiss soil.
To date, the country has minimal active raw mineral mining ongoing, though it has a history of alpine mining.
Regardless of the region’s name, Mount Isa is characterised by red dirt and low ranges — offering mines far from Switzerland’s high-altitude alpine environments. But maybe that’s what continues to reel in Swiss companies.
Just 10 years after the Xstrata acquisition, Glencore stepped onto the scene.
The Anglo-Swiss company, Glencore International, merged with Xstrata in 2013 to create Glencore Xstrata, before transitioning to become Glencore Mount Isa Mines in 2016 to reflect the company’s integration into the Glencore group.
Operations continued to run until Glencore shut down the Mount Isa Mines in July 2025, finishing up 70 years of production.
Glencore notes that the closure of the underground copper operations was due to the mineral deposits reaching the end of economic life.
The major shutdown was expected to affect 1,200 jobs in the region, however the number of redundancies was reduced to around 500.
Not ready to hang up the spurs
But that’s not the end of mining in Mount Isa. Exploration is only kicking off.
Renegade Exploration (ASX:RNX) holds a portfolio of North West Queensland assets, including the Selwyn South Project, the Cloncurry Project, and the North Isa Project.
The company is focused on reviewing historical data, field work opportunities, and geophysical targets across these assets, while also conducting exploration in Canada and the US.
Renegade previously held the Carpentaria Joint Venture with Mount Isa Mines, before divesting the joint venture to True North Copper (ASX:TNC) for $2.88 million in June 2026.
Renegade held a 22% interest in the joint venture and received True North Copper’s 91% stake in the Prairie Creek Project, located near Rockhampton, as part of the sale.
At the time of the transaction, Prairie Creek held an agreed value of $200,000. Along with this interest, the Carpentaria Joint Venture divestment provided Renegade with $300,000 in cash, three million shares valued at $0.50 each for a deemed value of $1.5 million, and two million performance rights with an agreed value of $880,000.
Renegade owns 75% of the North Isa Project, located north of this historical mining region. The project includes the historic Lady Agnes mine and existing prospective areas include the southern target area and Horse’s Head.
West of Mount Isa, Basin Energy (ASX:BSN) is focused on uncovering rare earth elements and uranium targets.
In late June, Basin announced that it had identified a 3.3km corridor of magnetic rare earth element (REE) mineralisation at the Newmans prospect, validating the company’s exploration model.
The company returned mineralisation from four of the eight scout holes conducted in maiden reverse circulation drilling at the prospect, which sits within the Sybella-Barkly Rare Earth Project in North West Queensland.
Basin returned its best drill result with the strongest preserved weathering profile at hole SBRC26006. The drill hole returned 24m @ 453 parts per million (ppm) magnet rare earth oxide within 2,247ppm total rare earth oxide from 6m.
Today, the company began follow-up drilling at the Newmans prospect, which will test the continuity of shallow MREO mineralisation.
Basin Energy is a critical minerals exploration company focused on rare earths and uranium discovery in North West Queensland.
The company entered the Mount Isa region in October 2025, after acquiring privately held critical minerals explorer NeoDys, providing a large landholding of exploration tenure in Mount Isa.
This is nowhere near the end for the Mount Isa mining region. With its rich history and emerging critical minerals policies, Mount Isa is coming back into focus for explorers.
Write to Maddison Elliott at Mining.com.au
Images: Mining.com.au, Glencore, iStock & Basin Energy
