Post by Ryan on Aug 21, 2010 4:55:29 GMT -5
Hey guys and gurls! Just wanted to post up some finds from my adventure last week. It begins like so:
I had been reading up on some rockhoundlounge.com adventures by MAGMA members Scott and Arappaho; and lo and behold, my boss sends me to Raleigh for 3 days to work a trade show downtown. The expo ended Sat. and through PM on this site, I hooked up with Arappaho who was going diggin with Scott that Sunday and they were kind enough to not only lead me to their spot, but lead me to an AWESOME spot.
If you have read any of their adventures, you may remember one where some amazing hematite phantoms were discovered. Well, that is the spot they were generous enough to show me and lead me about like tour guides, If you two are reading this, Thanks guys! I had a blast.
Ok, The very large construction site we visited was criss-crossed with stringer veins that intersected larger bull qtz dikes that were visable right on the surface without any digging. After surface collecting in a slightly grassy field, we went to dig. I found a few points and Joe and Scott gifted me with a few points to whet my appetite. Note the one top left is covered in a hematite crust and the well formed one in the center has flecks of hematite inclusions.
Once into a bull qtz vein, we would find they went a few feet deep, but the smaller stringers sometimes were only inches deep.
Joe worked slowly and methodically with his trowl extracting crystals while Scott and I gave it a whack with our shovels. Here I must reiterate a rockhound safety rule. WHEN DIGGING QUARTZ, ALWAYS WEAR GLOVES & EYE PROTECTION, QTZ CAN BE VERY SHARP.
Over the course of half an hour, I cut myself three separate times on broken qtz. The one was deep enough to draw a decent amount of blood from my right hand. I walked back and forth dripping for a minute and thinking to myself, “HOLY CRAP, how many times am I gonna’ do this!” before my EMS training popped back in my head. “Hold your hand over your head , dummy!” Well, I did, and it stopped, but not before painting a big rock red with my own blood! I packed my cut with clay and put my gloves on. The vein I was in began to produce some clusters.
This handsome fellow just loved crystallizing, the larger points on the top are complete and undamaged for the most part, the bottom of the same piece has a nice little crust of drusy qtz. Its very pretty
These guys are just bizarre, When I got home and washed them off, I just stared at them for a while. They look like alien crystals. Stuff shooting out every which way in thin strandy groups. I named them the weirdoes.
This next guy is my fav. Though heavily damaged, It has a lot going on. There are some absolutely water clear sections, a small crystal on the bottom with hematite inclusions, and a qtz “bridge” where one crystal tried growing into another, intersected at about a 70 deg. angle and was stunted. It grew a flat termination that looks really cool under a 10x loupe.
This crystal was in two pieces laying about a foot apart under the clay. I can only imaging what species of dinosaur was walking about when this thing broke. Now here I sit millions of years later and the two halves are joined again. This is one of those rockhound moments where you just gatta smile ;D
These two little guys here are awesome. I don’t know why but I love these two. Just some really clean, nice looking little pieces. The smaller one (2nd pic) also has some kind of neat property where the crystal growth forms a natural prism or something. When slowly turned in the sun, it produces a rainbow in the largest crystal. Absolutly AWESOME
Unfortunatly, I cant reproduce this effect with the camera.
After diggin on these veins for a while, we went over to where the sweet phantoms were found months ago. Within a few minutes I found this guy.
Look carefully. See the little hematite phantoms? Here’s a close-up
The phantoms are made up from really small but REALLY shiny flakes of hematite (that’s our best guess anyhow). They won’t photograph how they really appear. The flakes are highly metallic and give off a purplish blue tint. Its really stunning in person. Even a mediocre specimen of this stuff will keep one entertained if they have their 10x loupe handy. Here’s some more, broken, but showing the same inclusions:
Then I found some more weird stuff. A large chunk of qtz looked promising inside so I whacked it with my hammer trying to split open the vug I could see. To my surprise, there were little cavities all through this thing from which oxide or hematite dust literally poured out. Never saw that happen before. Here’s the little vug:
Later in the day, Joe and Scott’s friend Dave showed up and hooked me up with this little guy he found nearby. I love this piece. The phantom action on this one is really cool despite some minor damage to the crystal itself. Thanks Dave!
Now, by this point, I was dehydrated and exhausted. We had some lunch at McD’s and then drove back to the site where some other minerals were found. First I collected some Limonite after pyrite.
In the far back of the site, Scott pulled out a sweet boulder (about 15 lbs. Id assume) with some shiny deposits of (what I think was) Ilmenite on it. Scott didn’t keep the piece. Those guys are spoiled ;-)
I wish I would have taken it, I really liked it but already was weighed down with tools and a few specimens and was sooooo hot and tired I started to feel a bit sick. My face felt weird and I got a little tummy-rumble so we left it out there. Looking back I should have manned up and taken one for the team. I could kick myself. Anyways, I grabbed a few tiny chunks of the same material lying around. I hadn’t even heard of Ilmenite before this instance so maybe one of you expert hounds can confirm these for me.
I want to say thanks again to Joe, Scott and Dave for their patience and generosity during this outing. I hope to get up with y’all again to collect real soon. I got another work assignment near Greensboro and possibly a day out towards Wautaga co. for a sales call coming up in the near future . Ill PM you guys. Thanks
I had been reading up on some rockhoundlounge.com adventures by MAGMA members Scott and Arappaho; and lo and behold, my boss sends me to Raleigh for 3 days to work a trade show downtown. The expo ended Sat. and through PM on this site, I hooked up with Arappaho who was going diggin with Scott that Sunday and they were kind enough to not only lead me to their spot, but lead me to an AWESOME spot.
If you have read any of their adventures, you may remember one where some amazing hematite phantoms were discovered. Well, that is the spot they were generous enough to show me and lead me about like tour guides, If you two are reading this, Thanks guys! I had a blast.
Ok, The very large construction site we visited was criss-crossed with stringer veins that intersected larger bull qtz dikes that were visable right on the surface without any digging. After surface collecting in a slightly grassy field, we went to dig. I found a few points and Joe and Scott gifted me with a few points to whet my appetite. Note the one top left is covered in a hematite crust and the well formed one in the center has flecks of hematite inclusions.
Once into a bull qtz vein, we would find they went a few feet deep, but the smaller stringers sometimes were only inches deep.
Joe worked slowly and methodically with his trowl extracting crystals while Scott and I gave it a whack with our shovels. Here I must reiterate a rockhound safety rule. WHEN DIGGING QUARTZ, ALWAYS WEAR GLOVES & EYE PROTECTION, QTZ CAN BE VERY SHARP.
Over the course of half an hour, I cut myself three separate times on broken qtz. The one was deep enough to draw a decent amount of blood from my right hand. I walked back and forth dripping for a minute and thinking to myself, “HOLY CRAP, how many times am I gonna’ do this!” before my EMS training popped back in my head. “Hold your hand over your head , dummy!” Well, I did, and it stopped, but not before painting a big rock red with my own blood! I packed my cut with clay and put my gloves on. The vein I was in began to produce some clusters.This handsome fellow just loved crystallizing, the larger points on the top are complete and undamaged for the most part, the bottom of the same piece has a nice little crust of drusy qtz. Its very pretty
These guys are just bizarre, When I got home and washed them off, I just stared at them for a while. They look like alien crystals. Stuff shooting out every which way in thin strandy groups. I named them the weirdoes.
This next guy is my fav. Though heavily damaged, It has a lot going on. There are some absolutely water clear sections, a small crystal on the bottom with hematite inclusions, and a qtz “bridge” where one crystal tried growing into another, intersected at about a 70 deg. angle and was stunted. It grew a flat termination that looks really cool under a 10x loupe.
This crystal was in two pieces laying about a foot apart under the clay. I can only imaging what species of dinosaur was walking about when this thing broke. Now here I sit millions of years later and the two halves are joined again. This is one of those rockhound moments where you just gatta smile ;D
These two little guys here are awesome. I don’t know why but I love these two. Just some really clean, nice looking little pieces. The smaller one (2nd pic) also has some kind of neat property where the crystal growth forms a natural prism or something. When slowly turned in the sun, it produces a rainbow in the largest crystal. Absolutly AWESOME
Unfortunatly, I cant reproduce this effect with the camera.
After diggin on these veins for a while, we went over to where the sweet phantoms were found months ago. Within a few minutes I found this guy.
Look carefully. See the little hematite phantoms?
Here’s a close-up
The phantoms are made up from really small but REALLY shiny flakes of hematite (that’s our best guess anyhow). They won’t photograph how they really appear. The flakes are highly metallic and give off a purplish blue tint. Its really stunning in person. Even a mediocre specimen of this stuff will keep one entertained if they have their 10x loupe handy. Here’s some more, broken, but showing the same inclusions:
Then I found some more weird stuff. A large chunk of qtz looked promising inside so I whacked it with my hammer trying to split open the vug I could see. To my surprise, there were little cavities all through this thing from which oxide or hematite dust literally poured out. Never saw that happen before. Here’s the little vug:
Later in the day, Joe and Scott’s friend Dave showed up and hooked me up with this little guy he found nearby. I love this piece. The phantom action on this one is really cool despite some minor damage to the crystal itself. Thanks Dave!
Now, by this point, I was dehydrated and exhausted. We had some lunch at McD’s and then drove back to the site where some other minerals were found. First I collected some Limonite after pyrite.
In the far back of the site, Scott pulled out a sweet boulder (about 15 lbs. Id assume) with some shiny deposits of (what I think was) Ilmenite on it. Scott didn’t keep the piece. Those guys are spoiled ;-)
I wish I would have taken it, I really liked it but already was weighed down with tools and a few specimens and was sooooo hot and tired I started to feel a bit sick. My face felt weird and I got a little tummy-rumble so we left it out there. Looking back I should have manned up and taken one for the team. I could kick myself. Anyways, I grabbed a few tiny chunks of the same material lying around. I hadn’t even heard of Ilmenite before this instance so maybe one of you expert hounds can confirm these for me.
I want to say thanks again to Joe, Scott and Dave for their patience and generosity during this outing. I hope to get up with y’all again to collect real soon. I got another work assignment near Greensboro and possibly a day out towards Wautaga co. for a sales call coming up in the near future . Ill PM you guys. Thanks
-- actually I can't really talk considering the number of times I've bled out like that. Hope you can come visit again in the future and find even better stuff. We'll take you to another great spot next time you come down. Oh, and btw I will need to get a couple of those shovels from you local Walmart, our Walmart doesn't even carry those small shovels. Let me know how much I owe you and I'll send you the cash. Thanks a ton Ryan!
