realrockhound
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Chucking leaverite at tweekers
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Post by realrockhound on Feb 5, 2022 19:12:20 GMT -5
As many of you are aware, I was essentially born into it. Hounding with my grandfather when I was just knee high to a grasshopper. But for those of you who weren’t raised into it, or even more, live in areas that that don’t have rocks and gems to hound, what got you into the hobby?
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brybry
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Post by brybry on Feb 5, 2022 19:35:43 GMT -5
I've always been into rocks. When I moved my wife from California to Georgia, I stopped to pee on every state and collected a rock at every stop. Our driveway now has those rocks in there somewhere.
Life got busy and I recently started poking around, looking at rocks and here I am.
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realrockhound
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Chucking leaverite at tweekers
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Post by realrockhound on Feb 5, 2022 20:12:34 GMT -5
I've always been into rocks. When I moved my wife from California to Georgia, I stopped to pee on every state and collected a rock at every stop. Our driveway now has those rocks in there somewhere. Life got busy and I recently started poking around, looking at rocks and here I am. I hounded all the way up until around 05 when my grandfather passed. Then I took a hiatus. Things got busy, I moved around. Then after a handful of years I got back into it. Started hitting it pretty hard and turning some new stuff up, with ultimate goal of finding the next big deposit everyone wants.
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brybry
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Post by brybry on Feb 5, 2022 20:23:03 GMT -5
My hiatus lasted 14 years. Between fighting for workman's comp for an and low paying jobs it was hard to even think about rocks much less pay for decent rocks and equipment. My other hobby pretty much ate up what time and funds I had to work with anyway. Now I feel like I'm playing catch up.
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Post by rockjunquie on Feb 5, 2022 20:32:06 GMT -5
I never had much interest in rocks until I began wire wrapping. I started to wrap my glass but got addicted to the cabs. The rest is history.
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Post by jasoninsd on Feb 5, 2022 20:34:56 GMT -5
I found a Fairburn Agate in the 13 tons of river rock I ordered for "landscape" rock around the house. When I found out I could potentially find them out in the wild, that started the journey...I'm still working on finding them! LOL
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Post by hummingbirdstones2 on Feb 5, 2022 21:32:31 GMT -5
I collected a few opals. My jeweler pal made rings and pendants for me. They started getting pricier. So - "Why don't I try to cut some myself?"
Started cutting, met Robin, then started learning about all the other rocks in the world.
Still learning - thanks to people like you who are willing to share so much good info.
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Sabre52
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Me and my gal, Rosie
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 5, 2022 23:06:07 GMT -5
We didn't have a lot of money when I was a kid, and my pop would always take us on cross country trips to visit relatives in Oklahoma. He did not like heat so we would often drive a northern route through the Dakotas where our piece of c**p old Chevy would regularly break down. Some times we were in the badlands of South Dakota and the spots we broke down were full of pet wood, jasper and agate which I happily collected while we waited for a tow or pop went into town for parts. I was instantly hooked and from that point on, I made him take the desert routes so I could collect rocks and even pretended to like deer hunting so I could collect rocks on trips. He even got a bit into rocks himself and bought one of those crude little Sears lapidary rigs. Later I was influenced by a great sixth grade teacher that was a rockhound and met the famed old timer, Buster Sledge (Of Berkeley Hills t-egg bed fame) and became a regular at his rock shop. On and off in the hobby ever since.
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realrockhound
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Post by realrockhound on Feb 5, 2022 23:28:44 GMT -5
We didn't have a lot of money when I was a kid, and my pop would always take us on cross country trips to visit relatives in Oklahoma. He did not like heat so we would often drive a northern route through the Dakotas where our piece of c**p old Chevy would regularly break down. Some times we were in the badlands of South Dakota and the spots we broke down were full of pet wood, jasper and agate which I happily collected while we waited for a tow or pop went into town for parts. I was instantly hooked and from that point on, I made him take the desert routes so I could collect rocks and even pretended to like deer hunting so I could collect rocks on trips. He even got a bit into rocks himself and bought one of those crude little Sears lapidary rigs. Later I was influenced by a great sixth grade teacher that was a rockhound and met the famed old timer, Buster Sledge (Of Berkeley Hills t-egg bed fame) and became a regular at his rock shop. On and off in the hobby ever since. I like this. A lot actually. Thanks for sharing.
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Post by Pat on Feb 6, 2022 0:11:54 GMT -5
I've never been out of rocks; I've always liked them. As a kid, I had two metal buckets almost full. Kept them in the garage. Every day I dumped water on them, admired them, studied them as much as a 6 year old could study rocks.
One morning I couldn't find my rocks. Panic. Mother said she gave them all to the garbage man because they messed up the garage!!! I ran to the curb. All gone. Broke my heart for several reasons. Off rocks for a long time.
When I met my husband, (1963) he gave me a big cut and polished geode. Looked like a ship at sea. Then and there, I knew he was the ONE! Still is.
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Post by stardiamond on Feb 6, 2022 0:50:50 GMT -5
My wife was interested in new age things, Reiki, meditation, crystals. Crystals led to the metaphysical properties of minerals. That led to collecting crystals, minerals and eventually cabs, slabs and rough.
I told my wife that I could make cabs. My hobby was woodworking which also involves cutting, sanding and polishing. My initial investment was under $400 for equipment and I already some slabs from her collection.
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Post by fernwood on Feb 6, 2022 6:11:08 GMT -5
When I was a young child we had some snowbird neighbors. They spent Summers on the Northern WI lake and Winters in AZ. I would often ride my bicycle to their place. Always admired the many rocks/fossils/crystals they had on display. I would ask what they were, where they were from, etc. I would hold them in awe, as I had never seen anything so beautiful.
One Christmas, they sent me a present of a half geode (which I still have), some Apache Tears, some in the host rocks, crystal formations and fossils. I still have one of the fossil coral pieces they sent and a large Amethyst point. I was hooked on rocks/fossils after that.
One day she took me to their huge garage. Two of the bays were devoted to rocks and fossils. They were in boxes. Sitting on shelves. There were some what she called inspection lamps and magnifiers there. She told me that was her happy place. That I was welcome to go there anytime. She even showed me where the keys were kept for the “Rock Garages”, as she called them. I spent many hours there.
Received my first rock tumbler the next Christmas. I still have and use that tumbler.
That was over 50 years ago.
I often wonder what happened to all of those rocks. She passed away in the 1990’s. Her Husband sold the large cabin on the lake. He passed away around 2003. I spoke with him about a year before he passed away. He asked if I still loved rocks. He was happy to learn that I did. We talked for over an hour, via phone. He said he would be sending me some of their collection, but I never received anything. At the time the local PO would sometimes leave packages next to the mailbox. My mailbox was at the end of a long driveway.
I feel very fortunate that my path crossed theirs.
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Post by RickB on Feb 6, 2022 8:52:24 GMT -5
My father used to take us fishing and hunting. Wherever we went to do this it became evident that early man had done so too as we would find arrowheads and pottery at these locations. This got me looking for rocks and trying to figure out what type of material the Native Americans were using for their stone tools. Around here it was mainly quartz/quartzite with some rhyolite and chert in the mix. This combined with a small rock shop opening in the neighborhood a few years later got me interested. Owners of the rock shop encouraged me to attend a meeting at the recently formed Columbia Gem & Mineral club. I attended a meeting and joined the first year of the club's existence. Missed being a charter member by a month and a half. Been rock hounding, tumbling, flint knapping, artifact hunting since the early sixties. I've taken breaks between these activities but have always come back.
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Fossilman
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Post by Fossilman on Feb 6, 2022 13:24:17 GMT -5
I'm a second generation rockhounder, Had three uncles that put me under their wings and teach me about agates, gold, silver, gems and fossils.. I was seven years old in 1962 and watching one of my uncles cutting Montana moss agate in his basement, he had three saws going, I was hooked after that.. My two brothers and I would pick up Montana moss agate and jasper off the railroad track areas and sell the material to tourists for a nickel per rock.. (Remember in the 1960's, you could buy a candy bar for a nickel, a Coke for ten cents..).. Being raised in Montana the hounding was easy and plentiful...Been going ever since, was off and on in ND, till I moved to Oregon, than I just hit it hard again..
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Post by Starguy on Feb 6, 2022 13:32:29 GMT -5
My grandfather had several tumblers, an 18” saw, a cabber and a faceter plus tons of rock. When he passed, my grandmother gave it all to me. I’m still working on the rocks 40 years later.
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realrockhound
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Chucking leaverite at tweekers
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Post by realrockhound on Feb 6, 2022 14:36:32 GMT -5
My grandfather had several tumblers, an 18” saw, a cabber and a faceter plus tons of rock. When he passed, my grandmother gave it all to me. I’m still working on the rocks 40 years later. Very similar in many regards to how I got into it. I was fortunate and blessed to have have so much equipment and material passed down to me.
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Post by HankRocks on Feb 6, 2022 14:49:19 GMT -5
I suppose my earliest motivation was growing up next to a Railroad tracks(wrong side of course!!) that had all of the nice gravel around the crossties. This was way before they started using the slag looking rocks. When we weren't engaged in a target practice on old whiskey/beer bottles, plenty targets from the local beer joints and thrown away by the local street people, with the rocks or throwing them at kids we didn't like or at the junk cars at the lot across the tracks, we managed to collect a few for ourselves. Been collecting ever since.
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Post by Rockindad on Feb 6, 2022 15:23:06 GMT -5
Some really great stories so far!
I got into this completely by accident. Trying to think of Christmas ideas for our son, my wife suggests "what about the rock tumbler (A National Geographic) I put in the Amazon shopping cart?" After some hemming and hawing I realized I didn't have a better idea so I pulled the trigger on it and a couple packages of mixed rocks. After reading the instructions it was apparent that I would have to assist a bit. We started our first batch December 26, 2018 and have been going ever since. I never had any intention of getting into the hobby but after we opened up the barrel for the first clean-out and seeing the transformation of the rocks A.J. and I were hooked.
Wanting to be able to do something with rocks during the week while waiting on our one barrel we ordered our Thumler's AR-2.....awesome- now we have three barrels.....Started investigating vibes, and along comes the UV-10. Whoa, this thing is a beast.......better get a Model B......Really start refining our game and running everything in coarse grind for as long as needed, better add a QT-66.....After selling a lot of pendants at the first craft show he participated in, we get a combo trim saw/wet grinder.......Wanting to run more larger rocks add on a second Model B.......A byproduct of running larger rocks is that small and medium rocks go through the coarse stage quicker, add a Lot-O to take care of these.............and here we are, not to mention the tile saws, workbenches, storage, rock gardens, etc.
While we are now taking a "we'll get to the rocks when we can" approach we still enjoy it. The rational part of me knows that A.J. will step away at some point (probably soon) to focus more on his other interests and I'll be doing it by myself. I'd like to think some day he finds the equipment/rocks and gets back into it, maybe with his own kid.
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Post by rmf on Feb 6, 2022 15:38:06 GMT -5
When I was first or 2nd grade I found a Lake Superior Agate in our driveway of mine tailings limestone. Did not know what it was but it was "my precious".
Then in 5th grade I had a great aunt and uncle come and visit and they took me hunting for LSA and I had learned what they were. Then 8th grade science class. Then I discovered high school chemistry. I had my own lab. The teacher let me test for different minerals. Junior in HS and i purchased a Lortone LU6X. Been grinding ever since. Senior in HS I took wood shop and built a tumbler.
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hypodactylus
spending too much on rocks
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Post by hypodactylus on Feb 6, 2022 16:34:07 GMT -5
While on a walk/hike with family in Central Utah, the kids and I found some interesting rocks and took them home. I decided to buy a tumbler for the holidays as a fun activity to do with the kids (at least, that was my excuse 😉). The whole process ended up being a little too slow for my young children, but I have kept it going as my own hobby. They still show interest in the rocks and have little collections of their own.
I had a small rock collection when I was a kid. I seem to recall my parents buying a tumbler, but I don't think we ever got around to using it. Also, I found out later that my grandpa liked to tumble rocks. He passed away before I ever knew; would have been fun to talk to him about rock tumbling, etc.
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