Sabre52
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Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 13, 2022 12:15:28 GMT -5
Very,very nice cuts! Remind me of some of the AZ agates from the Gila Bend region. With fine banding like that who cares if the colors are pastels.
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Sabre52
Cave Dweller
Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,487
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 13, 2022 12:10:14 GMT -5
Wowser! Terrific shine on those. Your Polish flint example is very like the rootbeer flint I find here on our ranch but ours usually does not have such a complex pattern. Neuces River material has much better contrast than our local stuff.
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Sabre52
Cave Dweller
Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,487
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 12, 2022 21:36:21 GMT -5
Just a bit of info. A lot of rhodonite that has sat out in a rock yard oxidizes black on the exterior due to manganese content. If it has sat out it should be chipped or windowed to see the interior which might be much nicer than you think.
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Sabre52
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Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,487
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 12, 2022 14:47:19 GMT -5
First picture looks to be either Wildhorse or Cripple Creek picture jasper. Second looks to me to be Rainbow Ridge (aka Rainbow Ledge) jasper from California. My knowledge of prices is old so no help there. I'd check E-bay for those.
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Sabre52
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Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,487
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 11, 2022 22:10:46 GMT -5
Yep, dead on for the Bear Canyon Agate. That one traveled a ways. Odd looking wood too. Very neat finds.
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Sabre52
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Member since August 2005
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 11, 2022 17:29:13 GMT -5
Yeah, the red brecciated form is found often at Creston and near Coalinga. Gem club at the latter place used to have field trips for the red material. Named after a ranch where it is found but danged if I can remember the name of the place. Good red brecciaed jasper is also found in the Franciscan Formation at Pope Valley and a dead ringer for Stone Canyon has been found near the marina at East Palo Alto. Big Sandy has some of the best Stone Canyon type jasper I've ever seen.
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Sabre52
Cave Dweller
Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,487
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 11, 2022 17:14:35 GMT -5
Wow, the Dryhead is really something nice! Cherry Creek is so frustrating. All those fine patterns and like Indian Paint Rock from our Mojave, the shine is so difficult to obtain.
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Sabre52
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Member since August 2005
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 11, 2022 8:19:23 GMT -5
Yup, I'd go with stone Canyon too. Always hard to tell though, as Stone Canyon type jasper occurs elsewhere in the Franciscan Formation. The Big Sandy Creek location and Creston locations both haver identical material and of course, it also shows up on a lot of beaches from Monterey County to Ventura County.
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Sabre52
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Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,487
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 6, 2022 23:20:45 GMT -5
Yeah, goldstone is synthetic aventurine glass. Developed in Italy in 17th century. Looked it up on Wikipedia and they say there are examples in jewelry from Persia going back 400 years earlier than that.
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Sabre52
Cave Dweller
Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,487
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 6, 2022 14:15:00 GMT -5
You know, when I first started hounding in the 50's I visited a rockshop with a grand selection of goldstone. They had green, blue, that bronze in a couple of shades, even seem to remember a very dark blue, almost black form. Recently it seems I don't see it nearly as much and when I do, it's mostly the bronze/gold stuff. I know it was developed in Italy but I wonder who manufactures it now days and if there is some reason it is less commonly seen? May be synthetics are less popular now?
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Sabre52
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Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,487
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 6, 2022 8:12:28 GMT -5
First two appear to be Zebra Lace (also called Day and Night Lace) out of Mexico. Beautiful cabs and great examples. Zebra Lace can be pretty vuggy and fractured.
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Sabre52
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Member since August 2005
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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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Sabre52
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Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,487
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 5, 2022 22:49:15 GMT -5
I should have added, Hill Country chert is hard and tumbles very well. In some areas it's very colorful and can contain nice fossils too.
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Sabre52
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Member since August 2005
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 5, 2022 22:34:37 GMT -5
We're in Gillespie County and we do rarely find a piece of petrified wood in our ranch creeks. Most the stuff that looks like wood though, is actually banded chert of various sorts. Pedernales Chert is very wood looking. Your material looks like chert to me. Kind of depends on where in the hill county you are. I was on one ranch where the whole hill was pet wood but it was not good quality but I've had folks show me some beautiful agatized limb sections too. Now four hours southeast of here, near George West, gem quality wood is all over the place.
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Sabre52
Cave Dweller
Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,487
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 5, 2022 22:21:49 GMT -5
Beautiful! So many times, a preform will show a great pattern that disappears when one grinds the crown. Flat tops, as you've stated and illustrated, go a long way towards solving that problem. Would have been a crime to grind away those incredible designs.
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Sabre52
Cave Dweller
Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,487
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 5, 2022 13:14:31 GMT -5
There are three main watersheds in Ventura County, the Ventura River, Santa Clara River and Calleguas Creek. Of the three Calleguas creek drains some good agate areas and the mainly dry tributary that drains Moorpark is good too as there are nodule beds in the canyons just north of the 118 and west of Moorpark. Calleguas creek proper drains areas with agate, sagenite, and marcasite (base of Conejo grade) and petrified wood by the graveyard up above the old Adore Dairy near Camarillo. Wood I've had was calcified and not very good though. Santa Clara River has fossils but I've really never found much there as most the bed is all sand. I think longshore drift is responsible for e lot of the stuff at the Ventura River mouth as the beaches north of Ventura and up towards Gaviota seem more rich in whalebone and jasper. That being said I've collected big hunks of whalebone and jasper at the Ventura site. Don't know the area east of Malibu much but I've seen good agate from there and of course the coquina from the rocky shores south of pt. Mugu is really nice.
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Sabre52
Cave Dweller
Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,487
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 5, 2022 7:57:27 GMT -5
Incredible! Don't remember ever seeing a solid agate cab from that material. Truly beautiful! How big is the cab? Another question. Is Mojave Blue the agate from T-eggs? It's not the same as the rare Needles Blue Agate correct?
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Sabre52
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Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 4, 2022 22:13:00 GMT -5
Best materials to watch for on the beaches near the river mouth are agatized whalebone, brecciated jasper similar to Stone Canyon, and this really odd agatized sinter that has all kinds of weird banded or fish scale like patterns.
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Sabre52
Cave Dweller
Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,487
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 4, 2022 17:41:54 GMT -5
Movie fan so this is hard.
Cannery Row Ballad of Josie Wales Braveheart One Flew Over the cuckoo's Nest Silverado
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Sabre52
Cave Dweller
Me and my gal, Rosie
Member since August 2005
Posts: 20,487
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 4, 2022 17:37:15 GMT -5
There is a Dalmation Stone folks call a jasper, though it is softer. Think it's out of Mexico. As a pervious poster said, your examples look to be granite with biotite and muscovite mica. Mica is soft and will not tumble.
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