Striking gold in a greenfield quarry in Rutland has proved to have opened up a gold mine of publicity for operators Goldholme, with the strike making television news and national newspaper headlines.

Phil Kerry, proprietor of Goldholme, says the publicity has brought about a wave of orders for the stone, which he is selling primarily as flooring and to meet the local demand for dimensional and walling stone.

The gold appears as flecks in the limestone from the quarry in Hooby Lane, Stretton, which is not far from Clipsham with its famous dimensional stone quarries.

Phil says: "We were looking at different beds and stratas and couldn\'t help but keep seeing these flecks of metal. We thought it might be pyrite, but for the sake of £25 we thought we would send it away for analysis."

The result was that it is indeed flecks of gold, says Phil, and they appear to be in every block extracted from the quarry. The amount so far established is 0.08mg per kilogramme of rock, which is not enough for economic production of the metal but is an unusual selling point to present to customers who want the stone.

And who knows what the 600,000 tonnes of reserves in the 8.9 acres of the quarry at Hooby Lane will yield. So far, only 10 beds of 30 have been exposed on part of the site.

Phil was last year prospecting for gold in Wales. He has sunk one shaft but has yet to hit gold. He plans to sink further shafts over the next year or two.