 |
| A spray of goethite on quartz from the August dig |
I decided to dig in an area I had dug before. I had found fluorite, amazonite and goethite on prior digs to this spot. There was a rather intimidatingly large white quartz blow in the middle of this area, so I decided to attack this quartz. With my digging partner's help and a crowbar, I managed to move some rather large chunks of quartz. There was a lot of microcline on the top of the formation with white quartz underneath. The microcline was a faint blue, but it was all frozen together with no single crystals. I had decided to pull out the quartz and see what might be there. I found that on the edge of the white quartz, bordering the microcline there was sandy areas with pieces of goethite. While most of the quartz was white, the goethite grew off of grey shards of quartz. Every time I found some small shards of smoky quartz, I would find sprays of goethite clinging to the smoky/grey quartz. After 3 separate visits to this spot it seemed the access to the goethite just became too difficult. My shoulders were also beginning to bother me even on days when I wasn't moving 200lb boulders of quartz. Time to end this dig and see what else I can find.
 |
| Another flat of goethite clinging to quartz. Only a couple smoky quartz crystals were found |
A bit of prospecting in another area led me to a promising spot of amazonite. The amazonite near the surface under a cap rock was of fair color, but I dug for better. Heat from surface fires reduces the vibrance and dulls the color of amazonite. Since fires have gone through this area, sometimes amazonite further under the ground can be protected from the heat and exhibits better color. There was a soft spot under the cap rock, so I decided to follow this feature downward. Once again, I had to deal with a lot of white quartz. Teaser pieces of fairly good colored amazonite greeted me as I dug down, but no full crystals were found. I continued to dig down and into the hill with some small rewards. Mother Nature does not give up her amazonite easily. I finally reached the bottom of the dig by hitting bedrock. I dug along the top of this rock following a softer seam above it.
Occasionally I was rewarded with an amazonite or two though most were heavily fractured and subhedral. Slowly the seam began to pinch off and I started seeing some smoky quartz shards. The seam finally pinched off and I took some of the quartz shards home for further examination. I could some little secondary crystals on the quartz shards and hoped for some onegite. Sure enough after a bit of cleaning and further examination I determined I had found some onegite (quartz infused with goethite needles).
 |
| More amazonite getting neutralized after an acid cleaning bath |
So ended August. Got a few things, but nothing to report to the Denver Museum of Science. Haha.
The next months post covers the Denver Show and a trip to Ouray, Colorado
No comments:
Post a Comment