The flotation of quartz from dickite finer than 2 mu m was investigated using calcium chloride as an activator of quartz, corn starch as a depressant of dickite and sodium oleate as a collector at pH 12.0. It was found that dickite was selectively flocculated and depressed by corn starch and satisfactory separation between quartz and dickite was obtained. The preferential adsorption of corn starch on dickite to make the surface hydrophilic through hydrogen bonding may be attributed to the weaker electrostatic repulsive force between corn starch and dickite, since the negative charge of dickite in the alkaline pH range is much lower than that of quartz.