Glenn Rhein’s Amazing Mineral Discovery in Amity New York

During the Tucson Gem, Rock and Mineral show, we met up with Hershel Friedman to discuss our joint workings on the New York/New Jersey Mineral show exhibit organization. That is, the two of us have selected people to put in collections of minerals from New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Connecticut and Massachusetts.

While we were going over this subject, we got to talk about how excited we were for Glenn Rhein to show off his mineral finds from his property in Amity, New York. Huge Scapolite crystals, Spinel and all sorts of wild things are being found and will be on display at the NY/NJ show in April 2013.

This video documents the recent discovery of new minerals from Glenn Rhein in the classic locality of Amity, New York, near Warwick. Glenn discovers amazing crystals while excavating on his property, and reaches out to the mineral community for help in figuring out what they are. Glenn then becomes an expert in the deposit and starts finding amazing minerals. Produced and documented by Hershel Friedman of Minerals.net, and filmed by Mark Gilden of Rombus Digital.

Great Video showing the Amazing Finds by Glenn Rheim in Upstate New York!

We hope you enjoyed that video, be sure to share it with your friends. It would even make a great video to show your rock club next time a speaker is unavailable! Thanks to Minerals.net for making this video and promoting a great story! We are looking forward to more videos from minerals.net

Thanks for visiting Wheretofindrocks.com!

Visiting the Tucson Gem and Mineral Show with the Staff from the Los Angeles Natural History Museum

Tucson Rock and Gem time again, from the end of January until well into the month of February tens of thousands of people involved in minerals, rocks and gemstones flock to Tucson for the annual three weeks of trade shows. During this time the buyers and the sellers need to be housed, fed, and entertained, in addition to the countless hours everyone spends going from one show to another, visiting with friends and going to dinner parties, it is a whole world apart for many individuals in this line of work.

Several people post updates about the Tucson show, like Jolyon Ralph of MinDat.org or John Veevaert of MineralShows.com.

The set of show reports we like the best are the ones from the ladies of the Los Angeles Natural History Museum.

Assoc. Curator Eloise Gaillou, work-study student Caroline Im and Collections manager Alyssa Morgan of the LANHM 2013

Assoc. Curator Eloise Gaillou, work-study student Caroline Im and Collections manager Alyssa Morgan (3/4 of team L.A. County)

In these three blog entries, Elouise, Caroline and Alyssa share with the general public the life of three los angeles museum workers during the Tucson show. Though, I am pretty sure no mention of the cramped sleeping quarters are mentioned.

The first report is on the AGTA and GJX gem shows
http://nhminsci.blogspot.com/2013/02/tucson-part-1-gem-shows.html

Red Beryl and Sapphire Bracelet on display at the GJX show in Tucson 2013

This is the bracelet I’d do terrible things for. Red Beryl and Montana Sapphires. Ouch.

The next blog entry is about the various mineral shows around the Tucson area, from the Inn Suites (Hotel Tucson) to Riverpark and onwards to some of the more…less visited areas of the Tucson Gem Show.
http://nhminsci.blogspot.com/2013/02/tucson-part-2-hotel-shows.html

Roy Foerster, donating a flat of Pyrite crystals the LANHM

There were neat pyrites from Merelani, Tanzania, with interesting morphologies. Roy Foerster, Gem and Mineral Council Treasurer bought us a flat of them. Thanks Roy!!

Then, finally, the BIG show, the Tucson Gem and Mineral Society Show at the Convention Center, which caps off the whole event. A behind the scenes look at one of the important parts that makes the TGMS so legendary, the display cases.
http://nhminsci.blogspot.com/2013/02/tucson-part-3-main-show.html

Not to brag or anything, but you KNOW my team here in LA walked away with the GRAND PRIZE for professional educational exhibits

Los Angeles NHM Tucson Gem Show Exhibit 2013

So, while other show reports talk about what minerals are new, why prices are so high and so forth, these reports give you a much better look into the lives of the professionals who make Tucson their home, for a large percentage of their total lives, in the month of February.

The iconic Steamboat Tourmaline – an American Treasure

In 1907 the famous Steamboat Tourmaline was unearthed by Frank Barlow Schuyler in San Diego County in a rich tourmaline-bearing pocket zone in the mine which was named the Tourmaline King. It was then sold by Schuyler to Washington A. Roebling and it is now housed at the Smithsonian Institution.

professional photograph of the steamboat tourmaline cluster

Although the Steamboat Tourmaline is well known, few people are aware of its discovering in California by Schuyler. Schuyler was born on August 20, 1872 in Falls City, Nebraska. Schuyler took up the same work as his father, a machinist and manufacturer of mechanical tools and married his wife Ella S. Libby in San Luis Rey, California in November of 1894. Then in 1897, their only son Gerald Barlow Schuyler was born.

Schuyler teamed up with D.G. Harrington of Oceanside, California in March of 1903. The pair was exploring the Pala Chief Mountains in San Diego County for pegmatites. During their exploration, they stumbled upon a huge tourmaline deposit which they named the Tourmaline King Mine. Schuyler and Harrington began to construct an underground drift into the pegmatite directly under their surface discovery in 1904. About 60 feet underground and a few years later, the team found a gigantic tourmaline crystal-filled pocket. It extended almost 30 feet in length, about 10 feet wide and was uninterrupted for about 30 feet down dip. This single zone produced around 8 tons of pink tourmaline. The bulk of this discovery was sold to the Imperial Chinese government for a considerable price of $187.50 per pound.

business card of Frank Schuyler
Business card of Frank Schuyler

Schuyler presented and sold his tourmaline gems that he had extracted from the Tourmaline King Mine, at the 1915 Panama Pacific international Exposition in San Francisco. His slogan during the exposition was “wear a tourmaline for luck”. Schuyler also sold and presented other specimens that he had extracted from the Tourmaline King Mine in San Diego County at the exposition.

Robert Max Wilke, a California mineral dealer, purchased the patent grant deed from Schuyler in 1916 for rights to the Tourmaline King Mine so he could work it himself. This purchase by Wilke is the end of Schuyler’s involvement with the Tourmaline King Mine. Wilke went on to discover large amounts of lepidolite, morganite, tourmaline and kunzite at the mine. Wilke eventually abandoned the Tourmaline King Mine in 1922.

photograph of the steamboat tourmaline on display
photograph taken by Chris Stefano at the Smithsonian

The amazing Steamboat Tourmaline is housed at the Smithsonian Museum in Washington D.C. The Steamboat Tourmaline is one of the best tourmaline specimens from the Tourmaline King Mine in San Diego, California.

Rockhounding 101 – How to REALLY FIND minerals and rocks!

Rocky Rockhammer MascotOn this website we are sharing information about locations that some of the various contributors to this site have gone to. All of us find out about these mineral locations from various sources. Many locations have been talked about in every media format available, some published locations are so well known it is common to run into another collector at any time, some of the locations published are visited less than a couple times a year, if at all. By media, I mean, printed in magazines, books, club newsletters, posted online in forums, websites, on homemade video, on professional video and on television. Some collectors will grumble that all this publicity will make the location run dry. It makes local officials either look forward to increased tourism, or look for ways to restrict access, as if rockhounding was a hobby that allows one to retire early (on public gains!), rather than typically be retired to enjoy! Mineral collecting is a truly patriotic hobby! Knowing and understanding minerals and the deposits has always been a matter of national security, public knowledge and scientific outreach.

While many websites will tell you about what tools you need and speak of rock hammers, backpacks and boots, our #1 tool is knowledge. First hand, published and in modern mythic tales, obtaining information about locations is something that is the first step to find out as much as possible about a location before ever visiting it.

Field Guides are a great resource, as well as magazines focused on rockhounding, from now all the way back into the beginning of the 20th century! Old magazines like “Rockhounds” and “The Mineralogist” are great resources, as well as old and current issues of “Rocks and Minerals” and “Rock and Gem”. All of these can be found for sale on eBay and at various mineral shows around the united states. You never know when you are going to come across a great article about a location you had JUST heard about! One of the most amazing online databases is the complete run of “American Mineralogist” on http://www.minsocam.org/msa/ammin/toc/
The older issues have articles that have lead me to locations that might have been completely forgotten about.

Mindat.org is an amazing database that many of you are already familiar with, however, we often forget to think about just how amazing this database is, including lists of references for corresponding articles and books about the subject.

Geology Departments of the state you live in or adjacent to you, has produced several state reports on mines and minerals, which will often include information that can be very useful now. In the early 1900’s, feldspar was an important commodity, unlike now. Knowledge of mineral deposits will tell us commercial feldspar deposits also had garnets and schorl tourmaline, sometimes quartz or even topaz. Often an entire hardcover book has been produced, detailing the minerals and the locations they are found, across the state. California has at least THREE editions of this kind of text and I’m sure there are several people planning the next edition.

Road Atlas are great to have when you are planning and while you are en route. I personally love the DeLorme series, nice large print maps that have helped guide me to countless locations. The BLM has a program you can use, the LR2000, but my personal favorite database is the MRDS, Mineral Resource Data System, detailing the principal and secondary ore and location of all working, placed and closed mines and mineral locations. Just load the map and locate your location. I think you’ll be surprised what you might not know about the mines in your proximity. While traveling through Utah and Colorado, our Road Map was invaluable, showing BLM land that was open for public camping.

Clubs are a real mixed bag, but as such, you will inevitably come across information from all directions. Both of my favorite beach and fossil collecting spots were told to me by a lady at the Searcher’s Rock Club in Anaheim California. Right now in 2013, I’m cleaning minerals and going field collecting with a friend I made from attending the Culver City Club back in 2004. That is a collecting friend who has gone on dozens of collecting trips with me over 9 years. I’ve learned about so many parts of this hobby from mineral clubs and it has been an enlightening experience in many ways. You can get a complete list of mineral clubs here.

We loved this idea so much, we made it. The Mineral Search Page located Right Here on WheretoFindRocks.com, is something that we made from our LOVE of the general searches for states, countries and forms on eBay. The idea behind this is that if you check out the eBay results for your state, or general area, you’ll come across people who have gone out collecting at public locations and put something on eBay. This can easily lead you to general areas to collect minerals. It is a great first step in researching current producing locations.

Museums and local collections are great resources. You’ll find the museums thing to be easy, if not a long term task. Searching out collections, both old and current, are wonderful sources of information. For instance, if you wanted a good run down of California locations, the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles has an entire wall devoted to very beautiful representations of our state, as well as the California Mining Museum in Mariposa. I LOVED the Wagner Free Institute which had this amazing OLD collection, untouched for a century. In the same vein, the Natural History museum of Prague featured minerals that had not been updated in decades, revealing a great deal of history that is so often removed from the more mainstream commercial museums. Local collections require a bit more finesse and luck. For example, getting to visit private collections can be mind expanding, as many long time private collectors have seen things that were so common for a small amount of time and now virtually unheard of. However, without some sort of recommendation from someone of some sort of personal relation ship with a private collector, most of them are not exactly looking for random visitors. However, if you had been a member of the Mineralogical Society of Southern California, you would have had the chance to visit with several outstanding collections belonging to members of that club. Which takes us back to Mineral Clubs, and why it is a wise idea to be involved with at least one of them.

Going to mineral shows is a great source of information, as the display cases often reveal locations that are open to collection. In fact, the name tags in the cases often match up to the club member’s name tags, the people running the mineral show, and often you can strike up a conversation about their display case.

Libraries all around have lead me to some wild collecting adventures. Your local library is going to have a couple things for sure, often books about the geology of the area, as well as a collection of the state’s publications on geological topics. A great for instance is back in the very beginning of my collecting days, some friends of mine discovered the 1962 edition of “Mineral Collecting in Pennsylvania”, which drove us in a search for the “Azurite” included quartz crystals of Kunkletown. The book was wrong, but there is nothing wrong with Anatase included Quartz, which we found. My most recent discovery of Lawsonite on the beaches of Southern California due to a geological sand sample report. You can read all about that in my upcoming blog entry.

Google Maps and Google Earth are to powerful tools that everyone has at their fingertips. You can do amazing amounts of research with both of these tools, locating mineral locations right down to their visible mine tailings! Understanding the various uplifts, errosion patterns, depressions and faint roads to nowhere are very useful for today’s mineral collector. A simple test, pick your favorite collecting area and look at it on google earth. You will see things you might have never noticed on foot.

Now, my secrets are revealed to you. I hope you use them wisely!

I want to leave you with this note, written by Rock Currier in the publication, “About Mineral Collecting” released by the Mineralogical Record.

Field collectors are a remarkable and accomplished breed. They are perhaps the rarest and purest kind of mineral collectors. They hearken back to the very beginnings of what we now call the earth sciences, and in many ways they embody the simple thrill and youthful joy of the treasure hunt. If you look you will find them “out there” trekking over just one more mountain, digging down just another foot, and hoping for just a little bit longer that they will find something. But remember, the first law of field collecting states: “The best to be found is still in the ground and the best that has been found has be ground!” (that is, ground up into powder in the mill and processed into metal)

Collecting Howlite an hour North of Los Angeles

Mineral Club collecting at Tick Canyon in 1957
VGMS collecting at Tick Canyon back in 1957
For decades rockhounds have collected tons of howlite from the dumps of Tick Canyon.

To this day, tons of howlite still overflow at the mine dumps, dormant for over 100 years.


View Tick Canyon Howlite Collecting in a larger map

This location, clearly seen on the map above, is amazingly easy to find, park, and collect. The borate mine in Tick Canyon is called the Stearling Borax mine, which had its own mini railroad, a “dinky” sized rail, hauling borates out of the canyon to the station in Lang. The by product of colemanite mining at this location was an odd soft white material, with thin black spiderweb like inclusions running throughout. This material, Howlite, has no economic worth, as it is not an ore of borax, it is found littering the mine dumps.

Brandy Zzyzx collecting Howlite in Tick Canyon
The old mining area is now fenced off with no trespassing signs. Years ago, this main area was a common field trip location for clubs from all over Southern California. Uncommon minerals like Priceite and Veatchite could be found on the dumps, along with softball sized cauliflower shaped howlite nodules. You would think that with the original mine dump off limits, collecting would be impossible.
Howlite cut in half
This howlite nodule was cut in half, then mounted in a block of plaster. Photo by MiddleEarthMinerals.com
Something wonderful for mineral collectors, a large amount of the dump was pushed to the other side of Davenport Road, into the canyon below. This huge dump pile is full of howlite, as we found out visiting this location on December 23rd, 2012.
Howlite found in the dump material of the Stearling Borax Mine
Chunks of white Howlite can be seen in the dark gray dump
Forty pounds of howlite was gathered in what seemed like no time, with no digging required. The howlite was everywhere, even down the wash dozens of feet from the main dump pile.

Howlite is soft enough to carve easily, yet hard enough to be a popular lapidary item for cabbing, tumbling, and polishing.
Howlite chunk in Concrete block
You can see that the material was so unwanted, they would use it as a filler rock in concrete.

This location is a perfect place for anyone, it is easy, interesting and filled with desirable minerals!
Article from The-Vug.com Fakes Issue about Howlite
The article above is an excerpt from The-Vug.com Quarterly Magazine Fakes Issue, which was reprinted in the compilation book, available for sale directly from the publisher!

Garnets in the Fairmount Park area of Philadelphia Pennsylvania

We just love the city of brotherly love and you can discover a beautiful feature of this area, the mica schist deposits running through this area, outcropping all over the Fairmount Park area and beyond. There is Wissahickon formation schist all over the place, not all of it has garnets and they never get big, but having one as a reference sample and visiting this area are well worth the time spent.

ducks in fairmount park
Ducks lined up by the Wissahickon Creek

While we have visited many outcrops of rocks around the area, the one where we took these photos is by the wissahickon creek, just north of the free public parking area by the Vallery Green Inn.

View Fairmount Park Garnet Deposit in a larger map

This area is beautiful and you can see blocks of Wissahickon schist used for building stone, with garnets poking out of some of the blocks. There is a beautiful stone bridge there, along with all sorts of birds, small animals, providing a beautiful setting just outside the city. We went down to the wissahickon creek, descending on the west side of the bank. Trails form around the creek, revealing water worn mica chunks with garnets sticking out. The red color is interesting, but few if any are of any gem quality, they are simply a mineralogical interest item and a beautiful example of a mica schist. Philadelphia is a beautiful city and this deposit of Kyanite is just one more great reason to visit! Check out Hotels.com for great deals on hotel rooms in Philadephia!

down by the wissahickon creek
A view from the trails by the Wissahickon Creek
Friends of Wheretofindrocks.com collecting garnets
Looking through the rocks down by the creekside
a tiny gemmy red garnet in matrix
A tiny gem red garnet in matrix
typical size of mica and garnet specimen
A rockhammer to show you the typical size and color of the garnet baring mica schist
flipping over rocks at the wissahickon creek
Finding a good specimen takes luck
Having fun looking at rocks in philadelphia
A beautiful setting for a nature outing, the mica schist of the Wissahickon Creek is a great way to spend an afternoon!

Collecting minerals from “Cross Hill”, Nuevo California

A friend of mine asked to go visit the feldspar mine on the mountain in Nuevo California, about an hour and a half outside of Los Angeles, toward Riverside and on the way to San Diego. I had not been to the location in five years and I had heard that there was a lot of activity in the area with houses being built. As this has been a classic collecting location, along with the possibility of general prospecting around the area, I wanted to see what was going on.

View Nuevo Quarry pinpointed in a larger map
First I heard there was a gate up. That did not seem to bode well, but it looks like the Korean Church at the bottom of the hill put a gate up at the beginning of the road. It was open (and public land!) so we drove through. Going up the hill was no problem, just like in the past. The odd thing was, going up the hill, the graffiti was out of control on those rocks, empty ammo cases littered the ground alongside empty beer bottles. In addition, these signs saying that the road was PRIVATE were sprayed on the boulders, which is just plain nonsense! This is a road. You can not simply buy the rights to some land and close off a public road. There were work crews, lots of construction going on and shockingly, houses were springing up in this area. The turn off to the quarry was way worse than I remember, as they graded the dirt road down, down, down, so that the turnoff was a six foot climb in the Jeep, which was a little shocking. But, then the road seemed fine, as I remember, and we pulled into the parking area to start our walk to the quarry and dump pile. Seriously, nobody is going to tell me that, as a citizen of California and America, that I am not allowed to go on a public road, to an abandoned quarry to collect some worthless rocks that nobody will miss. Just because some chumps want to spend millions of dollars to build their secluded homesites doesn’t mean they can keep me from the public road outside their house. Keep those ATVs, the gun nuts and the teenage drinkers away, I’m here for some science and some nature.
Smithsonian Nuevo California Garnet
Here is the photo that got me interested again, a photo from the Smithsonian of a nice garnet from this location.

The quarry is very interesting, mainly feldspar and massive quartz, with huge crystals of schorl tourmaline embedded inside the feldspar. Along with this are garnets, most always forming in one thin layer on the outside of the feldspar blocks, the rare find of a scrap of aquamarine is possible and uncommon radioactive crystals of monazite and thorianite. I wanted to try and find some of the radioactives and nice garnet plate, my friend was looking for schorl chunks to put into reference kits for the kids. We found everything that you could expect to find from the quarry and spent about 2 hours collecting before hitting the road back to Los Angeles, with a wide open freeway, pre-rush hour, it was a great trip. If you are in the Southern California area, this is an interesting place to check out and I hope you make it without any problems and who knows, maybe in a few years the road will be paved! (and gated, to keep you ruffians out) This is BLM land, no person should DARE to stop entry to that land. Access to this area has been served by that road which far predates the church or the houses being built up there. It is absolutely shameful if anyone tries to stop you.

Overlooking the felspar quarry in Nuevo California
Overlooking the quarry from the parking area.
Huge Crystals of Schorl in feldspar
For size reference, here is my hand.
Nuevo Quarry with John
A human for size reference.
Another view of the schorl wall at Nuevo
More mouth-watering schorl!
Schorl Crystal in Matrix
This schorl crystal would fall to bits if we tried to remove it from matrix.
loose schorl crystal
A typical scrap of Schorl Tourmaline found on the dumps.
Garnet crystals on feldspar matrix
Commonly seen are the blocks of feldspar, more uncommon is a coverage as rich as this with well formed crystals.
Unidentified radioactive minerals
You can tell these are radioactive due to the radiation rings discoloring the quartz/feldspar matrix.
leaving the quarry with some kid rocks
Leaving the quarry with some rocks to share with the kids.

Our Top 10 Favorite Mineral/Rock/Gem Memes

While the old definition of “Meme” would simply imply a behavior learned from cultural or non-family social interaction, the standard for “Meme” now is these humorous photos. Memes start when someone takes a photo, puts some words on it and posts it online. With enough approval, blanks are requested so that the public can start producing their own. The one unfortunate aspect of this is memes becoming too popular and being generated by people who do not have the aptitude to CREATE, leading to some very poor examples floating around on the internet.

Minerals have been the subject of these online jokes since nearly the beginning of their production. As terrible b/tards, tumblr uses and redditors, we have seen and collected dozens of mineral themed memes over the past few years and now we want to share them with you!

And now, onto…

#10 – Brace Yourself – The Mineral Posts are coming

Game of Thrones Meme for Minerals

This meme comes from the HBO show, Game of Thrones,
with Ned Stark saying his legendary line…”Brace Yourself, Winter is coming”, denoting the approaching LONG seasonal change in that fantasy world, which can last for a decade or more. In Memespeak, these are created when a meme goes viral, someone will inevitably produce Ned warning the audience that soon there will be a flood of that meme, most, poorly produced.

#9 – TheOatmeal.com – “We Require More Minerals!”

TheOatmeal Starcraft Meme for Minerals

Starcraft is a great game by Blizzard and while it has a huge fan following, South Korea is well known as the country with the most rabid players. While the South Koreans are plugging away at their computers looking for pixelated crystals, in North Korea, minerals are a more serious business! Created by the great comic creator, TheOatmeal.com

#8 – Halite Makes Me Hot

Models for Minerals

A favorite of online mineral memes is the paring of a mineral with a model and “quoting” the model telling the audience how incredibly turned on they are by a ugly rock. One of the misnomers about mineral collecting is that it is a bunch of old crusty men, when in reality there are, my god, WOMEN that collect minerals! Not only are they…Female…many of them are BEAUTIFUL women! Gasp! This is one of our favorites, because we can’t think of anyone who comes away from the halite filled brine pools thinking about anything besides getting a shower and lunch.

#7 – Disregard Marie, Acquire Minerals – Breaking Bad

Breaking Bad Hank Meme

A Meme within a meme within a meme, hey we have a meme to specifically make fun of that, but let’s focus on THIS one, which is, for our non-USA viewers or those who are not familiar with the excellent AMC Drama, Breaking Bad.
In the show, DEA agent Hank is shot and needs a lot of recouping time, bedridden he starts to obsess over minerals, buying them from various websites, including the one mentioned on the show, mineralemporium.com, which of course, takes you to Breaking Bad’s website. On top of that, this meme is a tribute to the Joseph Ducreux portrait, which traditionally says “Disregard Bitches, Acquire Money.”
Now, one of the funny things for Non-US visitors is that we wonder if the plot of Breaking Bad makes any sense…A School Teacher, who is poorly paid, gets cancer and is told that treatments are going to leave the family destitute. In hopes to pay for his medical treatment, he starts cooking methamphetamine. We would think in any real civilized society, someone shouldn’t have to worry about their family being torn apart by medical expenses. That’s a truly American way of life! Go USA!

#6 – Phillip J. Fry – Futurama – Not Sure if…

Futurama for Minerals

We would like to think the writers at Futurama would approve of this meme, the standard Phillip J. Fry “Not Sure if x or y” meme, done for the appreciation of minerals. There are hundreds, nay, might I guess THOUSANDS of stoners getting lost inside a quartz crystal or aragonite cluster, maybe even RIGHT THIS MOMENT! Put down the bong, son, Minerals are cool, even when not high.

#5 – Holy Shit – This Rock is PERFECT!

Found the perfect rock for my collection

There is a positive way to look at that face planting that is about to occur. Makes my face hurt…and makes me wonder…is it a quartz crystal? We hope so!

#4 – Bismuth

Bismuth Meme

The internet has a hardon for Bismuth. Lab grown Bismuth crystals are shared with reckless abandon, so this great meme, featuring a NATURAL BISMUTH crystal, a winner in our books!

#3 – Bill Larson, your argument is invalid

Invalid Meme

The meme that is dedicated to the form “This is x, your argument is invalid” where X is a something completely random and pointless, used as a tactic to make distracting point in a dispute to which you have no good retort. At an annual Tucson party celebrating the TGMS, a wild iguana appeared, coupled with countless bottles of wine, several people posed with the reptile. When it took to Pala Minerals owner “Burma Bill” Larson, a man with more untold mineral stories than you might ever hope to acquire over a lifetime, the flashes went off all over the place and as soon as an image was posted online, this meme was created.

#2 – Gave that Bitch a Crystal, Bitches love Crystals – MineralClassics’ founder Richard Kosnar and the legendary phosphophyllite.

Richard Kosnar Phosphophyllite Meme

Brian Kosnar showed me this meme that was created with a famous photo of the standard smiling face of his dad, Richard Kosnar. In his hands, the ultimate phosphophyllite. The meme? Based on a line from the TV show “The Boondocks” where the rich, violent whiteboy gangster styled after another dimensions’ George Bush Jr, saying, while texting a woman “Hold Up, I’m gonna send this bitch a smiley face. Bitches love smiley faces.”. Thus, the “I’m going to give this X a Y, X’s love Ys.” You can find wonderful minerals from Bolivia (where this crystal comes from), colorado and more at the website www.minclassics.com

And, finally, the Meme we believe might have been the first…

#1 – Out of nowhere…Feldspar!

Feldspar Meme

What could have been the first mineral meme, and surely, one of the most popular…”Out of Nowhere…It’s X” where X is the thing in the picture, in this case…two nice feldspar crystals.

There you have it, our Top 10 Mineral/Rock themed Memes! We certainly had MORE to share, but these were our favorites around the office. Hope you enjoyed it!

Gem and Mineral Clubs across the United States need YOU!

Love to collect gems and minerals?
Then you have to join a Gem and Mineral Club. Mineral Clubs are a great resource for anyone interested in mineral collecting.
One of the problems with Gem Clubs is that many new members feel that it is not a good fit for them. They may feel uncomfortable in the new environment or feel that you are being forced into a job with the club. Not every meeting will feel like this, and it may even become an invaluable club that you enjoy attending. Here are my three tips to find a Gem and Mineral Club and have a blast dong it.

1. The secret is to just keep going. It gets better.

Since the world of rocks and minerals is very vast and varied, there are going to be times when the club will talk about something that is totally unrelated or interested to your interests. For example, during my first meeting the members discussed the jewels that were worn by the first ladies. If I had quit attending the club because I did not know anyone or care about the gems of the past president’s wives, I would not eventually become the field trip leader for the group. In fact, sticking with the club, I eventually made several life long friendships and met several digging partners. I cut my first cabochons, served as the show chairman for their annual gem show and learned quite a bit about how mineral clubs worked.

2. You aren’t intruding.

With the next club I went to join, the atmosphere was harder to break through. This club was a group whose members were much more educated about the topic of mineralogy. Talk about intimidating! Myself and other new members felt as if they were intruding on a private gem club meeting. It took several visits to this club before any member would say more than a handful of words to me. It simply took holding my ground and visiting over and over again before many members started opening up to me. In that club I met several people who were legendary in the regional mineral world, curators, teachers, speakers and miners. Within a year I was serving as their show chairman for two years, serving on the board of directors of a non-profit and learning even more about this hobby of mineral collecting. If I had been scared away by this group, I would not have taken my hobby and collecting to the next step.

Presentation at a Gem Club
3. Find a club that fits you.

Each mineral club meeting is going to be different depending on the members and the location. Try out a few in your area to find one that really clicks with you.

Most clubs have a neat welcome for new visitors, where they will let you select a rock from the visitor rock box, which can make it all worthwhile! Some clubs have great field trip leaders and help you find out about local collecting areas. Many clubs have lapidary workshops and have classes teaching basic lapidary skills, such as cutting slabs, making a cabochon or setting a stone into jewelry.
In the end, if you want to get more involved with your collecting, a Gem and Mineral Club is the perfect spot to do so. Many of the clubs love new members and will even welcome their help with various rolls within the club. Most importantly, if you visit a mineral club and do not see people of your age group, your skill level, your passion for the craft, just keep going!

Mineral Clubs instill a feeling of required civil service to promote our hobby
I highly suggest The-Vug.com’s List of Gem and Mineral Clubs across the United States to find out about clubs near you.
Take a look at their page at http://www.the-vug.com/vug/vugclubs.html

Rock Club People are full of information

A Presentation at a Mineral Club

2012 Christmas Gifts: Ideas for the Rockhounds in your life!

Gift giving season is officially upon us and for the RockHounds in your life, we made this list of our top 10 suggestions for gifts this year! From stocking stuffers to the item that will make a certain someone squeal with joy, everyone in the office had our eyes set on a few of these items.

#10. Mindat.org Sticker Book – A few years ago Mindat.org published this cute stickerbook and the sticker sets were somewhat difficult to put together. The 10 sticker set is fun, one sticker for each number on mohs hardness scale. For $8.00, these are fun stocking stuffers for kids and adults!

Mindat.org Sticker Book

#9 Colored Mineral Tack – We love this idea, tinted mineral tack. One of the best ways to stabilize a specimen for display, the goal of using mineral tack is to hide it from view. The stark white color makes this task difficult, but these tinted tacks can be a close match for the matrix or crystal color, allowing you to not worry as much about the white tack being the thing distracting from your crystals. In little lumps of colored tack at $1.49 each, you could visit this eBay store and select a few colors and make a set. Every mineral collector NEEDS mineral tack, you can’t go wrong with giving a rockhound mineral tack!

Colored Mineral Tack

#8 The Mineral Art of Hildegard Konighofer – Hildegard Konighofer’s art is shockingly realistic, capturing the spirit of each crystal she paints. This book features dozens of her paintings, which feature a wide array of selections and locations. A beautiful way to cross the worlds of art and minerals together, these limited edition books are sure to be a long treasured item for any mineral collector. Available from Blue Cap Productions for $170.00

Hildegard Konighofer

Hildegard Konighofer
#7 A Rock Tumbler – Rock tumbling is a wonderful way to get something done with all the rock chunks pouring out of every knapsack and cardboard flat in garages of rockhounds around the world. Everyone, seriously, everyone, can use a rock tumbler! This website, RockTumbler.com, has everything you need to know about selecting a unit, and this Lortone is the perfect universal size and under $100!

RockTumbler.com most popular rock tumbler the Lortone Model 3a

#6 Cuprite T-shirt – If Copper is wrong, I don’t wanna be Cuprite. A funny pun that will be highly appreciated at any mineral club meeting, collecting trip, mineral show or geology class! Available in Small through Double Extra Large, this is a great christmas gift idea, available for under $20 shipped, fortysevenpress.com

Mineral Pun T-shirts
#5 Arkansas Diamond Combo – Diamonds! There is only ONE public diamond mine in the world and it is in the tourist friendly section of the rural south, Murfreesboro Arkansas. For a nominal fee you can visit the park and try your luck at finding a diamond. The Blue Cap Productions combo pack includes two DVDs, hosted by Glenn Worthington, one of young mineral collectors searching for diamonds, the other a professional video tour of the area. Everything you need to know about collecting at the Crater of Diamonds State Park is found between these two items! Over $10.00 off the retail price, both DVDs for $32.99

DVD set Find your own Diamonds in Arkansas
#4 Magazine Collection/Vug Book – For the book collector that has it all, we can certifiably say that they do not have a full set of The-Vug.com Quarterly Magazine. These sets were HARD to put together, as some of them were only available in Europe, some of them had very small print runs and they were all distributed around the world at different mineral shows. The publisher has made a few complete sets available, but it might be a wise option to buy the full reprint book instead. The magazine (and book) have tons of beautiful photos, articles, maps and information. Any rockhound would love to get this book as a gift! The Original Magazine set is $229.99, the book reprint of the entire series is $34.95

Mineral Website Magazine Book Reprint
#3 All in One polisher – The classic, workhorse all in one flat lap. The perfect item for so many various uses for the rockhound, from grinding matrix, making things display better, polishing cabochons, making freeforms, putting a window on an agate, polishing a face on a quartz crystal, the all in one flat lap is a great gift item for the rockhound in your life! A model like this one, with a series of different grit wheels, runs around $549.99 new. They hold their resale value for many years.

Ameritool All in One Universal Grinder
#2 Blue Cap DVD Sets – Blue Cap Productions produces these fantastic, high quality, in-depth videos of minerals, mineral shows and subjects related to the hobby. I have been witness to what happens when these DVDs are played in a room of mineral collectors…silence. Everyone is so fixed on the screen, looking at the beautiful crystals being presented. These DVDS are awesome, you can put them on anytime, you learn by experiencing all these minerals shown by the people who know them best! Blue Cap productions has these sets of DVDs, one that has all of the What’s Hot in Tucson DVD’s and the other has EVERY DVD produced by Blue Cap, with some great topics! We highly recommend these. $145.00 for the What’s Hot in Tucson Set and $315.00 for the whole production line, the most complete documentary of mineral collecting in the last decade.

What's Hot in Tucson DVD Package

Complete Blue Cap Productions DVD Set
#1 Best sized Sledge Ever – 12 pound short handle – You can NEVER, EVER, have too many short handled sledge hammers. If the rockhound in your life has never had one of these short handled sledges, they are in need of this eye opening experience. The short handle allows for higher accuracy and the ability to work in a tight situation. Short handles fit into your knapsack with ease, better than trying to haul that long handled sledge on a hike. At $34.95, these are a great gift item for your favorite rockhound!

Short Handled Sledge Hammer

And of course, rocks rocks rocks! Everyone loves rocks! Quartz Crystals, Kyanite, Tourmaline, Garnets, you can never go wrong with some rocks for the rockhounds in your life! We suggest checking out Jewels Fine Minerals on eBay, you can not go wrong with any single item in that entire selection. That dealer ships quickly and is worth checking out.

Agate Collecting in Colorado – Wolf Creek Pass Zeolites

Near the border of Archuleta County in Colorado, Wolf Creek Pass and Treasure Mountain contain a deposit of silicates and zeolites that have made their way into mineral collections around the world. The collecting area, spread out over the rocky mountainside, is often referred to as Wolf Creek Pass. However, Wolf Creek Pass is actually a 10,000 foot mountain pass that wraps around Treasure Mountain and follows the Wolf Creek. The mountain does not bear gold or jewels, but the volcanic basalt deposits are near a very photogenic waterfall, Treasure Falls. Surrounded by scenic views, this basalt deposit is one of the most thrilling areas of Colorado. Hotels.com has great deals on hotels around Wolf Creek Pass, Colorado

Quartz specimen with banded agate and a crystal center with a slight purple hue.
Quartz specimen with banded agate and a crystal center with a slight purple hue.
Photo by Mathew Marulla (marulla.com)

Treasure Mountain is named after the legendary stash of gold, left behind by a French expedition in 1790. Several search parties have tried to find the fortune of gold bars acquired from a gold deposit near the Peak of Treasure Mountain, but none have been successful in finding the bars or the deposit.

Much of the collecting area is adjacent to highway route 160 and in the boulders and exposed rock of the mountainside just north of the falls. The mineralized area is fairly large and boulders containing the material have been distributed across the area, both naturally and due to the construction of route 160 and Wolf Creek Pass. In fact, due to the close proximity to Archeuleta county to the south, part of the deposit crosses this manmade border separating the counties which only serves to cause confusion in geographic labeling of specimens from this deposit.

Map of the Treasure Creek Agate and Zeolite location
Map of the Agate and Zeolite locations around Wolf Creek.

Rounded amygdaloids fill the voids in the volcanic deposit of basalt, as with many occurences. These host crystals of quartz and about half a dozen zeolite minerals.

The quartz and agate are similar to that found in many other volcanic silica deposits. The agate is typically clear, white and/or shades of blue, often with alternating layers that make it desirable for lapidary use. Some have crystallized centers. Typically the crystals form on a layer of agate, which varies in thickness from miniscule shells to thick rinds. Sometimes the crystals are amethyst, making attractive specimens on dark colored volcanic matrix. Though the agate and quartz found here do not rival that found at many other locations, it is one of only a few still open for collecting.

Of course, the zeolite species are what makes the location a true Colorado classic. Analcime is typically found as very small crystals usually below 1 cm in size. However, at one location, analcime is found up to 3.5 cm. Chabazite occurs here, but not in crystals larger than a few millimeters in size. Heulandite is sometimes found as crystals up to 5 cm across. However, typically the crystals are only millimeters in size, lining the cavities and serving as matrix to other minerals. One such mineral is mordenite, which is found as well formed clusters of white fibers. These clusters, up to a few centimeters in size, were referred to as being one of the best locations for the species in the United States for many years.

Mordenite crystals in a vug of basalt
Mordenite crystals in a vug of basalt
Photo by Mathew Marulla (marulla.com)
Mordenite Crystals up to 2 cm long can be found at the location
Mordenite Crystals up to 2 cm long can be found at the location
Photo by Mathew Marulla (marulla.com)

Other associated minerals include globular common opal, small rhombs of calcite, and small pyrite crystals. The locality is also a classic locality for the clay minerals celadonite and nontronite, which form in abundance. Laumonite, natrolite and wellsite also occur in the deposit, but they occur rarely and only as small crystals

Isolated Heulandite crystal on matrix.  Specimen size is 6 millimeters
Isolated Heulandite crystal on matrix. Specimen size is 6 millimeters
Photo by Luigi Mattei
Several voids filled with celadonite
Several voids filled with celadonite overall size 10 x 5 x 3 cm.
Photo by Martins da Pedra

Due to the vast deposit and mountain conditions, this source of colorful quartz, agate and zeolites will always exist in the mountains of Colorado. Maybe the lack of gold is a bit disappointing for a mountain with such high aspirations, but to many mineral collectors around the world, the real treaures are the mineral collecting opportunities and the often-visited Treasure Falls.

If you enjoyed this article, it was originally printed in The-Vug.com Magazine, which was released as a hardcover coffee table book, collecting all 16 issues of the original magazine. It is 324 pages, hardcover and full color, available directly from the publisher at FortySevenPress.com For $34.95, it is full of great photos, articles, collecting locations and more! Get your copy to add to your mineral book library!

The Curse of Illegally Collected Arizona Petrified Wood

Petrified Wood from Tom Wolfe Minerals

Illness, Divorce and Attacking Ants – The “Curse” of Stolen Petrified Wood


At the Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona, stealing used to be a very prominent problem. People would frequently smuggle pieces of petrified wood they called “rocks” on their way out, leaving the park 12-15 tons short of these scientifically valuable fossilized minerals.

The Petrified Forest

Petrified tree branches and roots there had transitioned into a solid and rock-like state in a process called permineralization. It has spanned over the course of millions of years, leaving a terrain with smaller and larger pieces of petrified wood scattered everywhere.
Naturally occurring Arizona petrified wood plays an important role in multiple ongoing scientific studies, and their integrity had been put under risk by the rampant cases of stealing. After all, people who take tiny rocks don’t feel liable for the fact it amounts to more than a ton worth of stolen petrified wood per month.

Red Colored Agate Quartz replaced Petrified Wood
Iron inclusions in the stone cause the red color commonly found in petrified wood from Arizona

Trying to Combat Theft

Rangers would set up inspection stations on the road out of the park, run regular roadside sweeps and put up signs telling people to be more conscious of the regulations at Petrified Forest National Park, with mixed results.
In an unusual twist of events, however, the cases of stealing start to decrease as people become caught up with a certain mysterious “curse” that hits all thieves of petrified tree branches and roots. One of the odd psychological effects seen comes from the signage at the park. During years of having signs indicating that collecting was forbidden, theft was at an all time high. Without the signage, reported volumes of stone removed from the park plummeted. Possibly, the signs indicated that the wood is something WORTH stealing.

People Cursed by Arizona Petrified Wood

It appears that in the years of its existence since 1906, the Petrified Forest National Park of Arizona has been swept by people who return pieces of petrified wood and share stories of their misfortunes on small, sincere paper notes. The park now has them displayed in the aptly named Guilt Room. A single tour of the place persuades many people not to challenge the terrible “curse”.
The touching stories told by cursed individuals are nothing short of heartbreaking, and sometimes quite funny.

• A woman had stolen the unlucky rock on her honeymoon trip, which lead to a bitter divorce and a 20-year relationship with an abusive man.
• A man was dumped by his girlfriend of 3 years on his drive out of the park.
• One woman wonders if her husband’s early death and grandchildren’s pneumonia could be induced by the curse.
• Right nearby, someone writes about stomach cramps and diarrhea that followed the act of stealing.
• A different note tells a story of a group of five girls, each of them suffering the consequences of defying the curse that involved illness, vomiting, an attack of flying ants and many spilled drinks.

Legitimate or not, the countless notes found in the Guilt Room contain reports of seizures, hernias, giant blisters, plane crashes, drinking problems, divorces and other misfortunes that all link back to that time when their authors picked up the cursed rocks at the park.
At least their sacrifice has not been for naught, as it shames some of the visitors into keeping to the park’s rules to avoid a similar fate.

Red Colored Agate Quartz replaced Petrified Wood
Petrified wood is better when it is free of guilt, such as buying a slab from a dealer who specializes in wood, like Tom and Steven Wolfe of TomWolfeMinerals.com

No Happy Ending?

The stories keep coming and the rocks are returned. Sadly, the recovered pieces of petrified tree branches and roots can no longer be returned to their rightful place. With no way of knowing where each piece originated, important patterns of scientific research would surely be tainted.
Fortunately, both these “cursed” rocks and the sad notes that tell their story find a new home in the Guilt Room at Petrified Forest National Park, so the would-be thieves can be warned by others not to repeat their foolish mistakes.

Do not trifle with the curse of Petrified Forest!

Instead of risking for your note to be in the spotlight at Guilt Room a few years down the lane, why not buy Arizona petrified wood from TomWolfeMinerals.com? There are legal collecting spots outside the park as well as plenty of park adjacent places to buy wood, but for those who are just in love with petrified wood, Tom and Steven Wolfe of TomWolfeMinerals.com are passionate about petrified wood and not only do they have great petrified wood material from Arizona, but also from around the world.

Rarely, specimens of chromium rich wood are found, such as this green wood
While not from the petrified forest, this is found nearby, near Winslow Arizona. The green color is from inclusions of chromium, which is very uncommon.

Top 10 Mineral Dealers on eBay 2012

eBay is a fantastic place to find everything for sale. While there are plenty of dyed, glued, misidentified and various other hoaxes online, there are also some fantastic dealers who are honest, well educated and provide amazing service. As per customer satisfaction results gathered by The-Vug.com, we present to you the Top 10 Mineral Dealers on eBay for 2012!

Top 10 Rock and Mineral Dealers on eBay for 2012

#10 – Heliodor

Three generations of the mineral dealers, Star and Elena Van Scriver have a wide variety of minerals available. Specializing in Russian minerals and Moroccan minerals, this store has over 4,000 items to chose from, mostly as store items with buy it now pricing. You can view their store by clicking this link.

Missouri Calcite Cluster with Chalcopyrite from Heliodor
Missouri Calcite Cluster with Chalcopyrite from Heliodor


#9 – Benson’s Collectibles

Alan Benson has been selling minerals on eBay for several years, helping to finance his college studies. That’s right, this man helped pay for his textbooks with eBay! He has a fine selection of minerals from worldwide locations, with a focus on New Jersey minerals, as he is close to the locations. You can view his store by clicking this link.

Fine Tourmaline Crystal from California
Fine Tourmaline Crystal from California from Alan Benson Collectable Land


#8 – ScepterGuy

Joe George is an avid Quartz miner. The crystals he has dug out of the ground have made it into magazines, museums and fine collections around the world. Crazy scepters and amethyst from Hallelujah Junction, fascinating terminations and twinning in specimens from Washington state, this man does the hard work to rescue these crystals from the mountain! Not only does he have a fine mix of specimens, people love his acrylic bases and mineral tack, something somewhat hard to find. You can view his store by clicking this link.

Pink Fluorite on Matix from France
Pink Fluorite on Matix from France from Scepter Guy


#7 – Meryln8804

Christopher Stefano is a recent graduate, another self supporting college student for a time. Now he does his ebay and website while working two jobs and raising a newborn! What a guy, because his store is constantly full of great mineral, with a focus in the unique and uncommon minerals of the world. As a specialist in Michigan minerals, if you are looking for an interesting mineral from that area, contact Chris! You can view his store by clicking this link.

Copper Crystals from Michigan
Copper Crystals from Michigan from Merlyn8804


#6 – JMineral

A bad reputation is being cast on many Chinese dealers, as fake and treated minerals are common in many of their eBay stores. JM Mineral is an extreme exception to this, with amazing minerals, popping up on eBay often WELL before any American ever lays eyes on them! The new finds out of Mongolia has made this dealer shine! You can view the store by clicking this link.

Fine Tourmaline Crystal from California
Green Quartz Cluster from JMineral


#5 – Crystal Springs Minerals

Crystal Springs focus is South African and Namibian minerals. With so much to chose from in that area of the world, Crystal Springs Minerals is a great source from that area of the world. A richly stocked eBay store and constant restocking has made them a favorite dealer to buy from! People love their red quartz, green fluorite, gem crystals and interesting minerals from the Kalahari. You can view his store by clicking this link.

Ajoite inclusion in Quartz from South Africa
Ajoite inclusion in Quartz from South Africa sold by Crystal Springs Minerals


#4 – Open Adit

Open Adit is a fine dealer of LARGE minerals and FRESH imports. Evolving over time, the minerals have always been FINE and amazingly inexpensive! As importers of hundreds of thousands of minerals, Open Adit has found a great way to make large sized cabinet specimens available to the public by presenting them online. Weekly auctions and tons to chose from, if you need a colorful addition to your collection or a display piece, Open Adit is the place to go! You can view the store by clicking this link.

Green Fluorite Cluster from South Africa
Green Fluorite Cluster from South Africa sold by Open Adit


#3 – Globe Minerals

Nik, the man behind the operations at Globe Mineral, has a FINE eye for natures beauty. One thing for sure, there is rarely a specimen that we would not like to have for our collection here at WheretoFindRocks.com! Colorful, bold and hand picked, Nik travels around the world hand picking selections to showcase on eBay. As eBay is Globe Minerals main distribution source, there is nothing held back, everything fine is presented on eBay and his customer service is top notch! You can view his store by clicking this link.

Vanadinite Cluster from Morocco
Vanadinite Cluster from Morocco sold by Globe Minerals


#2 – Jewel’s Fine Minerals

It has been a beautiful experience to watch this ebay dealer constantly improving the quality of the minerals, photos and service. It is almost impossible to imagine that Jewel’s Fine Minerals can get much better. A wide variety of minerals, this dealer is constantly traveling to mineral shows, buying collections and sniffing out all the great minerals to present to the public on eBay. The large amount of store items, weekly auctions and great attention to quality minerals makes Jewel’s Fine Minerals one of the accounts to constantly keep checking out! You can view his store by clicking this link.

Calcite and Fluorite from USA
Calcite and Fluorite from USA sold by Jewel’s Fine Minerals


AND, as a result of all the activity and customer feedback to The-Vug.com in 2012, the #1 Mineral Dealer on eBay…

#1 – Mineral Man 999

Mineralman999, Jasun and Mandy McAvoy, are legendary sellers of minerals on eBay. For good reason! They have had mineral auctions, ALL of them, starting at .99 cents, every week for over 7 years. Sometimes the sales prices of these minerals are in the THOUSANDS of dollars, but they ALWAYS start at .99 cents! Fantastic photos, minerals from all over the world, there is not a week that goes by that we do not find at LEAST one mineral that would be something worth fighting over! Classic minerals, new finds, gem crystals, gold, crazy locality specimens. MineralMan is THE place to visit each and every week. His #1 status is well deserved! You can view his store by clicking this link.

ineralman999 on eBay
Gold Crystal from Venezuela sold by Mineralman999

Cummingtonite – We know you were looking for iron rich amphiboles…

As mineral collectors on the internet know, the jokes can often lead back to one mineral.
Cummingtonite. Eliciting snickers in a room of freshmen geologists (and honestly, still getting chuckles from aged field geologists under the right conditions). Lately it is the most popular iron rich amphibole mineral to be searched for on Google. We all know when we see that fact it is not because people are looking for their favorite ugly brown rock! Most minerals are searched for their beauty, this mineral can only claim its name as the claim to fame.

Cummingtonite is a rather uncommon mineral, hailing from the riverside on the far western edge of Cummington, Massachusetts. Here is a sample of the mysterious brown crusty amphibole they were mining. Scratching their heads, someone noticed this as an unknown mineral and dubbed it Cummingtonite, in honor of the town it was found. This is often the case, such as Elbaite, Annabergite, and Boleite.
Thick vein of Cummingtonite
Cummingtonite with label from original find
Cummingtonite Specimen
Garnets and Cummingtonite
This specimen pictured is from the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences. It shows a chunk of brown radiating crystals with embedded garnets. Donated by a prominent American Mineralogist Charles Upham Shepard, a man who submitted the approvals for Danburite, Microlite and others. He had one of the largest collections of minerals in the United States, donating specimens to various museums in life and death. He was a well respected lecturer on subjects of Natural History. Charles Upham Shepard graduated from Amherst College in 1924, the same year that Cummingtoite was accredited.

1824. Cummingtonite. (Dewey.)
“I have here given this name to a mineral found by ‘Dr. J. Porter in
Cummington. It appears to bo a variety of epidote. Its color is gray,
sometimes with a faint reddish tinge, unless when acted on by the
weather, when its color is yellowish. It is in distinct prisms, with oblique
seams like’ zoisite, and in radiated or fascicled masses, which are com-
posed of slender prisms. Luster somewhat shining or pearly. It is nearly
as hard as quartz, and sometimes makes a slight impression upon rock
crystal. Before the blowpipe it blackens, and a small portion melts, when
the heat is very great, into a black slag, which ik attracted by the mag-
net. With quartz and garnet .it forms a largo mass in Cummington.”
C. Dewey : Geol. Min. Mass.; Am. Jour. Sci., 1st series, Vol. VIII, p, 59.
1824. Cummingtonite. Lies by the roadside in the east part of
Cumnimgton.
Known to the common people for several years under the name.of copperas
rock; occasionally used in dyeing as a substitute for sulphate of
iron.
J. Porter: Min. Loc.; Am. Jonr. Sci., 1st series, Vol. VIII, p. 233.

Cummingtonite, the inspiration for snickers, memes and lame t-shirts, has a much more benign beginning!

With your knowledge of what Cummingtonite is, beyond a cleaver play on words, now I will tell you how you can go collect your very own specimen, along with brightly colored Lepidolite mica, UV reactive opal hyalite and shiny Hematite crystals. Far off in the desert of Arizona, nobody will hear your terrible off color humor besides your collecting partners. If you’ve ever been collecting petrified wood with a group of geologists who loudly exclaim “I’VE GOT WOOD!”, you have an idea of what to expect.

The location to collect Cummingtonite is just off to the north of the BBC Mine, a half hour away from Parker, Arizona.
The area is a wonderland of mineral collecting, with the BBC mine area boasting FINE crystals of Hematite, sometimes assosicated with Chrysocolla. Further to the North is the Planet area, filled with Barite, Malachite, Chrysocolla and all sorts of beautiful minerals. Fluorite, Gold and more copper minerals are found within 20 miles of this location, so beyond the oddball amphibole Cummingtonite, there are plenty of reasons to visit this area!

Map to Cummingtonite deposit
Map to Cummingtonite deposit
Open trench at cummingtonite deposit - Watch Your Step!
The location is a simple series of trenches, where you can find a very odd form of Lepidolite, normally known as being bright purple, here it is yellow. The hematite at the cummingtonite location is not nearly as nice as the hematite at the BBC mine. <---click to view photos on MinDat.org Cummingtonite on matrix from Arizona

The material from here is not even a tenth as nice as the crunchy material from Massachusetts, however, being able to collect your own specimen of this odd, uncommon material, is something to get excited about! 😉

If you would like a more “in-depth” view into this collecting location, let me advise you to check out the excellent Android App that will guide you to several locations around the Quartzsite/Parker area. Download this Android App for $4.99

We love you readers so much that we provided a google map pointing you to the locations.


View Cummingtonite and BBC Mine in a larger map

And I’m not completely innocent on the juvenile jokes…I am the proud owner of a Dickite specimen from Beaver Creek. 😉

Sideling Hill – A Cross Cut View of the Fossil Rich Shale in Maryland and Pennsylvania

Fossils are plentiful in the shale deposits all around the mid-Atlantic states. Without getting technical, shells of a variety of marine animals are found in the shale, readily accessible via road cuts and rock quarries around Western Maryland, central Pennsylvania and West Virginia.

Sideling Hill is a wonderful example of the typical construct of the rolling hills of the area.

Sideling Hill Roadcut

The tight bands of rock layers, along with the HUGENESS of the roadcut are fascinating. The layers of the mountain are very interesting, consisting of alternating bands of shale and big bands of alluvial conglomerate. The top layer of shale is also coal rich, which is thickest on the north side of the road cut. You can see the dark layer towards the very top of the hill.

Sideling Hill Roadcut front view

The rest area used to host a Geological Center, a fun place to check out, a place to stop and view this geological wonder and find out a little more about the earth around us.

Sideling Hill Rest Area

The Geological Center is closed now, but the exhibits have been moved to Hancock Maryland.

Sideling Hill Geological Center

A short distance away in Pennsylvania, we found several shale deposits on the side of back country roads.

Typical Shale Road Cut in Pennsylvania

Any place you can find loose shale, if you flip over a few pieces, often, fossils will be found.

Shale Debris With Fossils

The shale from this area breaks up into small bits. That makes big matrix specimens very uncommon!

Rockhammer and Shale Chips

Brachiopod specimens are very common through out the area, along with tightly wound trilobite specimens.

Fossils shells found in shale deposit

Packing the specimens is a delicate job, so a roll of toilet paper for wrapping is always handy!

packing up fossils found in pennsylvania

Bi-valve fossils, Gastropods and many others, all found swimming around in the soup of the Devonian era!

fossil shell found in shale

At this road cut, randomly, a vug of quartz was found, breaking up into oddly shaped crystals.

quartz crystals found in shale deposit

So, do not be afraid to stop and check out any exposed shale in the mid-Atlantic states! Often times, simply flipping over some loose shale chunks will reveal a trilobite, a gastropod or a cluch of Brachiopods!

shale deposit with fossils

Roxbury Connecticut Garnets at Green’s Farm – Now Closed to collecting!

A must visit site to collect big crystals of Almandine Garnet embedded in a matrix of mica schist is the classic Green’s Farm location, in the rural beauty of Western Connecticut. The location is just a short drive from several metropolitan areas and has served as a fee collecting location for decades. For a VERY reasonable price of $5.00 per car, you can go to Green’s Farm, park over towards the trees and begin your short trek into the woods to the large deposit of mica schist in the woods.

Here is one of the cleaned specimens of garnet and staurolite in schist matrix from the creator of Mindat.org, Jolyon Ralph’s personal collection.

Cleaned Garnet Cluster from Connecticut with Staurolite

UPDATE EDIT NOV 11th 2012, just a couple weeks after this post was written: I have omitted the directions to this location, but leave the map up. The location has been sold and there have been no trespassing signs posted. The new land owners are not welcoming people to contact them and permission to collect at this location has been revoked. A sad fact, this is now a historical document. Who knows, it could always be resold to someone who appreciates keeping legacy going.

Far Away look at the garnet deposit in Roxbury
Satellite map of Green's Farm Garnet Deposit

From the parking area it is just a quick walk through the woods…
Walking through the woods to the garnet deposit

To the “mine” which is a large area of mica schist filled with garnets and staurolite.
A photo of the mine surface at Green Farm Garnet Deposit

All over the area, garnets are simply sticking out everywhere you look.
a photo of garnets in the schist at the mine, waiting to be mined.

In the tailings, there are tons of garnets, like the piece in the photo below.
Loose Garnet Matrix from the Greens Farm Garnet Deposit

Chunks of matrix like this one are all over the place. These little garnets are not as nice as the one below.
small garnet crystals in schist matrix

This sample shows that it has larger, solid garnets in the mixture of mica schist matrix. If you have a sand blaster, the mica schist comes off easily. If you do not have a sand blaster, you can simply try your luck splitting the matrix, sometimes you’ll get lucky and have a single crystal like the one below!
Garnets embedded in schist matrix

This specimen just popped out of the matrix. It is not cleaned, it still has a lot of mica attached to the surface.
Single Garnet Crystal

The Green’s Farm Garnet location is a must visit site for anyone who loves minerals and is in the area!
We are EXTREMELY grateful to the owners for keeping a classic site like this open and accessible for all these years!

Collecting Chrysotile at the Phillips Asbestos Mine in Arizona

Near the city of Globe Arizona, the Salt River flows. In the canyons around this important waterway, there are several outcrops of serpentine with various stringers of fibrous Chrysotile, the safest variety of the fiber form minerals processed into asbestos materials. Alternating veins of calcite/aragonite, serpentine and chrysotile created a valuable ore to be mined for a period of time. The mines were so profitable that various buildings were erected to serve the miners of the salt river valley.

Following the directions in the excellent field guide, Minerals, Fossils and Florescents of Arizona, which we highly recommend owning, we had no problem finding the location.
Minerals, Fossils and Fluorescents of Arizona

It was easy to spot this location on the satellite map.

Map of the Phillips Mine Location

Arriving at the location, you find the entrance to the road starts at an abandoned campground. It must have been really nice back when it was in business, now it looks like it could be the setting for a freaky horror movie.
seneca lake permit sign
abandoned seneca lake campground

After driving through the campground, you cross a little stream and proceed down an easy to maneuver dirt/rock road toward the mine. On the South side of the road you’ll pass the old lake that must have been the jewel of the campground.
stream you cross at the start of phillips chrysotile mine road
seneca lake
gravel road leading to the chrysotile mine location

The drive is beautiful, with great vistas, steep canyons and amazing colors that the canyons of Arizona are famous for! Off in the distance, bright white mine dumps could be seen, making the prospect of finding mineral specimens imminent.
canyon walls while driving to rockhound
thin cliff road in arizona
Beautiful Scene from the drive in the canyons of arizona
Dumps of the Asbestos Mines from the Canyon Walls

Arriving at the mining area you are greeted by some very creepy abandoned buildings that make the campground take a second seat to a horror movie film set!
Abandoned Mining Town in Central Arizona
Abandoned Buildings at the Phillips Mine

Off in the distance the mine dumps could be seen. Getting to the dumps is a simple uphill walk up a dirt road.

Phillips Chrysotile Mine in the Distance

At the top of the road you find yourself at the foot of a massive pile of mine debris which is rich in Aragonite, serpentine and chrysotile.
Mine Dump at the top of Phillips Chrysotile Mine Road
Mine Dump at Phillips Chrysotile Mine

Great specimens could be found all over the dump, with banded Aragonite that glows bright green in UltraViolet Light and veins of Chrysotile, which makes for very beautiful display specimens.
Specimen of Serpentine, Chrysotile and Aragonite
Specimen of Chrysotile from Arizona

Going to the Phillips Chrysotile Mine in Central Arizona is a great trip for a beautiful view into a seldom seen part of Arizona mining history! Specimens are abundant and there is something for everyone!

Collecting Pink Halite in Trona California – Once a year, Second Weekend of October!

Once a year the wonderful community of Trona, California, and more appropriately, the men and women of Searles Lake, invite the public to come and participate in one of the most exciting mineral collecting trips in the United States.

People come from all over the world to experience the Trona-Gem-o-rama. Two days, three field trips, plus a rock show going on for both days.
There are several great local dealers who make the show a treat to visit, such as Tom and Steven Wolfe of TomWolfeMinerals.com and WolfeLapidary.com
If you like Petrified Wood and Petrified Tree Branches, Steven is the man to talk to! He gives lectures at local Southern California gem, mineral and fossil clubs.
Steven and Tom Wolfe of TomWolfeMinerals.com at the Trona Show
Saturday hosts two field trips, both two and half hours long. More about those in another post, this one is about the Sunday field trip, which is four and a half hours long, starting at 9am. The “Pink Halite” dig, where you are guided out to a large area to collect at, filled with brine pools with bright pink halite crystals growing on the underside of the ridges in the ground.

Typically, these tools are perfect for the extraction of the salt crystals. A short handled 10 pound sledge, a custom made spike (which I left behind! ARGH!), pick and crowbar. The stretcher is often a great tool because wheeled carts and wagons have a tough time in the sharp ridges popping up everywhere across the surface. This year, any sort of cart, dolly or wagon would have been perfect and we only made one trip with the stretcher.

tools needed for collecting halite on the salt deposit in Trona California

This year, 2012, the digging was very different than the last seven years. There were no brine pools, only a large flat white area of solid salt crust. That was quite a shocker compared to past years of getting wet in the brine pools and tearing your hands apart when the tools dry and salt crystallizes on them, creating a sand paper like surface on the tools.

Instead of getting wet in the brine pools, you simply had to go to a slightly protruding ridge, where white salt crystals are often visible on the surface, work with a pick or spike a perforated area a foot into the back of ridge, then, flip the broken chunks over to reveal the crystals on the underside.

Salt Ridge waiting to be flipped over
Salt Crystals revealed after flipping over the surface

People are scattered all over the lake bed, collecting their hearts out, trying to get the best material in the limited time you have on the salt flats.

Halite Digging at Trona!
Ridges flipped over, in search for pink halite

After digging the halite, you have to pack it up and carry it out. That takes a considerable amount of time!

Packing out your salt crystals

And then you have to get the salt home! A challenge in itself! You need lots of packing material and containers. This year we did not plan on being able to collect a lot of material, but we couldn’t fit another piece in the van and still had an hour left before the time was up!

salt crystals packed into the car

While we were there we saw Stan from Midwest Minerals, a large wholesale company in Tucson, Arizona, mining Halite crystals.
He has a great idea, placing the found specimens directly into a crate, no muss, no fuss. We might copy him next year!
Stan from Midwest Minerals collecting Halite
Prying halite crystals from the ground
A happy halite miner at Trona

Every second weekend in October, you can find thousands of rockhounds descending on Trona in search of pink salt crystals! We hope you can visit next year! Hotel rooms are available in Ridgecrest, just a half hour away from Trona, find a room for the event on Hotels.com

There is an app for android you can download, one is free and one is $4.99, but BOTH of them have a five page article about collecting in Trona.
Android App with Trona instructions

Buy the Paid Version for $4.99
OR
Download the Free Sample Version, it still has the Trona guide in it, for free.

Field Guide Review: Minerals, Fossils and Fluorescents of Arizona

Minerals, Fossils and Fluorescents of Arizona is a thick field guide to 90 locations across the state of Arizona, most still available for collecting in 2012!

Originally published in 2006, this book contains complete, easy to follow maps and directions to each location, along with colorful photos by Jeff Scovil.
For the absolute beginner, there is a nice chunk of informative reading in the front of the book, giving the basic information for several minerals, along with global mineral information like cleavage, hardness and luster. A bit of time is spent on rock formations and geologic conditions, which will help understand the basics behind why minerals are found where they are.

The copy we have has been used to travel to nearly half of the locations in the book. The book gives clear instructions for reaching a location, along with GPS directions, which are easy to punch into google maps while en-route to a location. In addition, each location pinpointed in the book has produced the material described and only once has there been claim markers up on a location showcased. We have collected Hematite crystals, UV minerals, Dendrites, Calcite, Selenite, and Serpentine. Several trips inspired by this book have resulted in fine specimens that are in our permanent collections.
Clicking the book cover will show you available copies for purchase on Amazon.
Book Cover of Minerals, Fossils and Fluorescents of Arizona by Neil R. Bearce
Check out eBay for copies of this book for sale and other minerals of Arizona

There are a lot of field guides to choose from, each with their own unique features. In addition to the easy to follow directions, colorful photos and the accuracy of the information presented, the book also does a great job covering the state, listing collecting spots all over the state, with close proximity to other states. For instance, the residents and visitors to Saint George Utah might be surprised to find that a deposit of Gypsum/Selenite is available in the hills stretching out into Arizona, available from the back roads connecting through Utah. More locations spill across into New Mexico and several of them are a perfect distance between Los Angeles and Phoenix.

Many field collecting guides are simply shelf filler, this book has a wide variety of information, collecting options and we can not recommend another mineral field collecting guide more.

Fossil shells replaced by calcite found in the roads of Central Texas

The Central Texas counties surrounding Limestone County are full of beautiful ancient marine shells replaced by calcite, both massive and crystallized. Luckily for the collectors of minerals and fossils, hundreds of miles of low traffic roads in Central Texas contain a wide variety of ancient sea life replaced by calcium carbonate. They are up on the surface of gravel and dirt roads, as snowy white gravel, stretching down the country lanes.
Calcite replaced marine shell
red, yellow and blue flowers along the countryside of central texas
This area of collecting is centrally located between Interstate 35 and 45. Those highways run through Texas, connecting San Antonio, Austin, Houston and Dallas. In between this area, vast deposits of limestone of a very high quality are found and mined for agricultural and industrial use. It is often found as crushed aggregate used to cover the stone roads of back country Texas. Spiraling out of the central texas area like a web connecting new developments with well maintained farm routes, the white roads of Texas are often found to contain calcite crystals and calcite replaced marine shell fossils. Clams, Brachiopods, Turritella, Ammonites and other interesting shells are found, often with cores and voids filled with crystals of calcite.
Fossil on matrix from central Texas replaced by calcite.
Getting to a collecting location is simple! Simply pull up Google Maps and take a look at a satellite view of Central Texas. As you get closer, look out for maintained county roads, which you will see, are bright white. This white color is caused by this limestone gravel. Make a note of these roads to inspect and take a trip to Marlin, Mart, Rosebud, Franklin, Calvert, Madisonville, and Crockett. Since there is ample loose gravel, do not DIG into the road or bother to take tools with you. Loose Gravel. Mostly made up of calcite replaced shells. What an amazing collecting experience. Simply opening your car door will result in you finding a loose fossil. With smartphones, androids and iphones, simply using google maps while navigating will be all you need for a spur of the moment collecting trip. This area is a little over 3 hours from San Antonio, a quick 2 hours from Austin, Houston and Dallas. It is a PERFECT field trip in all weather besides tornadoes and snow!
google satellite view of a typical white limestone gravel backroad in central Texas
a photo of the loose gravel limestone roads and the fossil containing gravel that is scattered across Texas

Maryland’s Chromite Deposits – A Mineralogical Monopoly

The Serpentine Barrens of Central Maryland produced an interesting landscape for a 19th century business monopoly on chromite ore, being the sole resource for world looking for new metal alloys. In addition to the facinating story of this legacy of chromite ore, the mines also produced a line of fine minerals, brucite, antigorite in fine crystals and the gem variety of serpentine known as “wiliamsite”.

Today, much of the serpentine deposits in Maryland and Pennsylvania serve as a wildlife sanctuary. The serpentine rocks and their serpentine soils were not fit for cultivation, providing a natural host for sparse grasses, scrub brushy oaks and acid loving pine trees. In addition, rare wildflowers are found only in these uncommon serpentine soils. Because these areas were never fit for cultivating, only nice flat farm land has been turned into housing developments, leaving these woodlands free from destruction. At one point in time, these areas of scrub oaks and rocky soil would have looked barren in comparison to the rich tree heavy forests surrounding that land. Now, in contrast to the houses and civilization popping up in every direction, the serpentine barrens are a rich forest

You can read this full article on this PDF, just click on the page below. This is an excerpt from the book reprint of The-Vug.com Quarterly Magazine, which contains all sixteen issues of the magazine. You can buy the book on The-Vug.com and it has dozens upon dozens of articles like this, written by a variety of world traveling mineral collectors. We highly suggest this book, it is a STEAL at $34.95

line pit chromite article free pdf link