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Post by woodman on Mar 3, 2015 11:00:34 GMT -5
It is not often that one finds anything at Stinking water these day, so I was very pleased when i found a section oak limb. It is 6 inches across the face. Double hearted to boot. Very rare to find small pieces of limbs or small trees. I think most of them got burnt up in the process of being covered with the lava flow, at least that is my theory.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
Member since January 1970
Posts: 0
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Post by Deleted on Mar 3, 2015 11:29:27 GMT -5
Looks like the crotch at which two limbs cast off from the main trunk. Very cool. Quite beautiful!
My theory of your oak pieces, because of color true to the natural wood, is that the trees were not flooded by lava. Instead of lava, I suggest they were encased in ash. A very pure ash that contains very pure silica. Then ground water (or rain) flooded, dissolving the ash/silica and petrifying the wood. My theory states that the actual wood from the original tree is still there, in all it's glory, every single cell preserved forever in agate. Cellulose still present.
This same theory also explains why coprolites smell like poop when cut with water. Because the poop is still there, again preserved in agate.
Currently, I have no way to prove this theory. Heating a chip may turn the suspected cellulose to ash, turning the fine oak color and all the details black. This decomp may also likely crack the agate structure from the gases created.
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jamesp
Cave Dweller
Member since October 2012
Posts: 36,564
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Post by jamesp on Mar 3, 2015 11:42:08 GMT -5
That looks like a slab right off the ole Georgia white oak. same yellow color, grain/growth rings. And as Scott said, a fork that is often discarded in the field because it is so difficult to split. Man could I have fun with that when out cutting firewood w/the neighbor.
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Post by woodman on Mar 3, 2015 14:41:21 GMT -5
Looks like the crotch at which two limbs cast off from the main trunk. Very cool. Quite beautiful! My theory of your oak pieces, because of color true to the natural wood, is that the trees were not flooded by lava. Instead of lava, I suggest they were encased in ash. A very pure ash that contains very pure silica. Then ground water (or rain) flooded, dissolving the ash/silica and petrifying the wood. My theory states that the actual wood from the original tree is still there, in all it's glory, every single cell preserved forever in agate. Cellulose still present. This same theory also explains why coprolites smell like poop when cut with water. Because the poop is still there, again preserved in agate. Currently, I have no way to prove this theory. Heating a chip may turn the suspected cellulose to ash, turning the fine oak color and all the details black. This decomp may also likely crack the agate structure from the gases created. There is a wide variety of color from stinking water. Some of it is jet black on the inside, some golden. I have broken apart a lot of basalt in getting the wood out. I could show you trees that are completely encased with basalt, so much so that it is still there! LOL. Actually these are holes that someone in the past got the easy stuff out and left the rest. This is more of a oak root ball. Part of the root wad was this color and part of it black with a lot of inbetween colors. I have read of studies of weighting samples of petrified wood and then burning it and reweighing. they found a slight different indicating some wood cells were left. I wish I knew all the correct terms when talking about volcanic flows, where the small slab was it looked like pure basalt flow and the root wad it looked more like a flow that was pushed ahead of the basalt flow. I have seen some pure ash flows in the stinking water area also, just have not dug in any of them. Too much to do and so little time to do it, and getting older is not helping matters any!
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Post by snowmom on Mar 3, 2015 17:13:32 GMT -5
those are breath taking. Hard to realize they are stone from the photos.
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Post by woodman on Mar 3, 2015 22:14:35 GMT -5
One more piece from stinking water to show the wide colors one can find. I need to do more work on this one as far as polish goes, just wanted to show the black and white color.
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Post by rockjunquie on Mar 3, 2015 22:16:54 GMT -5
Absolutely beautiful...
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Post by woodman on Mar 4, 2015 10:03:37 GMT -5
Looks like the crotch at which two limbs cast off from the main trunk. Very cool. Quite beautiful! My theory of your oak pieces, because of color true to the natural wood, is that the trees were not flooded by lava. Instead of lava, I suggest they were encased in ash. A very pure ash that contains very pure silica. Then ground water (or rain) flooded, dissolving the ash/silica and petrifying the wood. My theory states that the actual wood from the original tree is still there, in all it's glory, every single cell preserved forever in agate. Cellulose still present. This same theory also explains why coprolites smell like poop when cut with water. Because the poop is still there, again preserved in agate. Currently, I have no way to prove this theory. Heating a chip may turn the suspected cellulose to ash, turning the fine oak color and all the details black. This decomp may also likely crack the agate structure from the gases created. I did a bit research and find that Stinking Water area is a combination of welded ash tuff and basalt. That welded tuff is slightly softer that the basalt. The tuff material is more yellow than anything which could account for some of the colors. Chunks of basalt is intermixed with the tuff making digging very difficult to say the least. My theory is that all the wood was turned to charcoal by the intense heat and lack of oxygen and then the minerals did the rest. Don't think I would have wanted to have been there during all the action.
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Fossilman
Cave Dweller
Member since January 2009
Posts: 20,711
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Post by Fossilman on Mar 6, 2015 18:35:10 GMT -5
HOLY SMOKES!!!
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