Have you ever seen..........

[arappaho]

one of these before?

I found this rolling around in the bottom of a box from an old
collection I was going through. No idea where it came from but
alot of the other rock in the box was from Maine or New England
pegmatites.
It's a whole undamaged quartz crystal incased in a layer of what
appears to be Botryoidal Hematite. The point to the crystal is at
the bottom hidden in the layer of hematite and the top end is
healed in a "wavy" pattern that I have heard some call "melted".



The crystal may be slightly smokey, but I think most of the color
is coming from the reflection off the hematite. There is a negative
impression of a crystal on this piece also. The negative has a thin
glassy ruby-red layer lining the interior, and some small pieces
of this ruby-red layer can be seen on the outside of the crystal.





So let me know what you think.
Have you ever seen one of these before?



Thanks for looking,
Joe

[Ryan]

WOW! No I have not seen that before. If I did I would have kept it though because its AWSOME. Nice rock, Joe!

[lauriesrocks]

That is sooo cool Joe! Obviously there were two completely depositional environments. I would guess that the hematite would have been deposited long after (perhaps millions of years) the quartz crystal was formed. I suspect the red is oxidized hematite.

[JohnD]

Joe, you're one of the only people I know that could take pieces of various minerals and glue them together into a fabulous unidentificial speciman.

[arappaho]

Dang it, John! I thought I had all the epoxy cleaned up!

[romare]

Man, I don't care if that one is homemade (or joemade). It's just freakin' cool.

Mark

[rayjeri]

Here's one that was given to me when I bought my 24 inch diamond saw.
Ray

[writerman2255]

Wow! Crystals are so cool. Thanks for posting. T.

[arappaho]

Very nice, Ray. Buy a 24" rocksaw and get a cluster of crystals
covered with hot fudge for free! Can't beat that deal!

Looks like a real nice phantom in that front crystal. Any idea where
that cluster came from?

BTW Ray, those blue digging sticks work great!
Thanks, Joe.

[rayjeri]

Joe: All the guy knew was it came from out west. The crystal in front is split down the middle. It is covered with hematite.

Ray