I'm back from my rock show! This year I was on the lookout for fine jaspers, the type that make "egg" formations. But I also got a bunch of other neat pieces!
First is the obligatory Ethiopian opal! Every year I get one from this show. This year's opal is a large milky white stone with impressive play-of-color that refuses to be photographed.
A nicely textured slab of pastelite! This jasper/chert mix comes from Arizona. This piece is cool because it has many cracks where the stone broke and then healed back together. I chatted with the vendor for a while about his adventures in rockhounding it.
A rainbow iris agate from Montana! This piece has a brilliant rainbow stripe, but its colors are very difficult to photograph.
A very unusual cluster of calcite crystals! This piece began as a large dogtooth calcite crystal. Then, a layer of little nailhead calcite crystals grew on top of it! On one side of the cluster the nailhead crystals are rich with iron, giving them a deep orange color.
A big yellow garnet in matrix! It is a grossular/andradite garnet from Mali. This piece shows off the nice dodecahedral shape typical of garnets.
Naturally iridescent pyrite crystals growing on a cluster of quartz! Probably the prettiest specimen I came home with.
A twinned pair of quartz crystals, with a twinned pair of sparkly hematite phantoms inside of them! When the crystals were much younger and smaller, a dusting of glittery red hematite grew on their surfaces. As the quartz continued to grow, it trapped that layer of hematite inside of it, preserving a record of its shape from when it was young!
Sometimes called "Fairy Stones," this cool calcite formation comes from Quebec. One theory of how these stones formed was that the calcite was left behind by colonies of bacteria and microorganisms. Each blobby shape was a colony, which smushed together as they grew and expanded.
Not a rock, but a piece of tumbled uranium glass that glows brightly under UV light! Despite its uranium content, I have tested it with my geiger counter and it is only very slightly radioactive.
A pretty piece of poppy jasper. Hailing from California, this is an orbicular jasper that displays red and yellow flower-like patterns.
A big slab of Mookaite, from Mooka Creek Australia! Mookaite is a type of radiolarite, a stone made from the fossilzed, silica-rich shells of microscopic plankton called radiolarians. It's easily recognizable thanks to its deep reds and bright yellows, which to me look like ketchup and mustard. I already had some Mookaite in my collection, but this piece was sooooo pretty.
But enough of that! Let me regale you with the tale of my egg hunt! I was looking for fine jaspers this year, but I didn't want just any old specimens. I wanted "egg" formations!
The first "eggs" I spotted at the show were the somewhat lopsided looking ones in these slabs. Is their shape nice enough to call them true "eggs?" The seller wasn't sure of their exact locale, but could confirm they were from Mexico. Not the prettiest specimens, but they were only the first on my hunt!
I spotted some pale pink circles that might be "eggs" in this chunk of Noreena jasper from Australia. And look! You can see where minerals seeped through cracks in the rock to create its vibrant colors!
There!! Those overlapping circles! It's small, but that's an "egg!" It's Whiskey Creek Jasper from Idaho, a locale known for producing them.
Now we're talking! Another variety from Idaho, Bruneau jasper, with an amazing "egg" formation!
And finally, the best and coolest fine jasper of all, this phenomenal nodule of Royal Imperial from Guadalajara, Mexico!! I already own some Royal Imperial, but I couldn't resist this piece. Look at the colors! The layers! The brecciation! The EGGS!!
That's all I got! A successful rock show once again!
