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Content image: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots
Album: Shinkolobwe & Bronze Boots

The Shinkolobwe radium mine, 1922. The Belgian mining engineer above is sitting on a 7 ton boulder of pitchblende. An immense quantity of gamma-rays is irradiating his gonads. Safety equipment, a tie and a pith helmet.

Content image: Bakewell Show 2018

Here I am back in the office on a wet and dull Monday morning after the 2018 Bakewell Show. Having spent a “full on” weekend in the bosom of the UK mineral collecting scene I am feeling a little bit tired.

As usual George and I drove up to Bakewell from TV Towers on Friday afternoon to ensure we were there fresh and early for the Saturday start, plus indulge in the local (Chinese) cuisine the evening before!

Content image: The Spread of Steverustite

Steverustite is a secondary mineral of copper and lead with an interesting and rarely occuring (in nature) thiosulphate anion (S2O3) within its structure.

Named after UK mineralogist and collector Steve Rust the mineral was first discovered at the Frongoch Mine, Ceredigion in Wales in 2008.

Steverustite is a supergene mineral formed through the oxidation of combined lead and copper sulphide ores. 

Content image: Dinomore! - Alvarez Hypothesis

 

Some interesting additions made to the e-Rocks catalogue from new seller Marco Frigerio of Classic Rocks and Gems, for both Iridium Chalk and Iridium Clay: these are examples of an iridium rich sediment found localised in unique layers in deposits spanning a certain age.

Content image: It is Bakewell Show Time Again!

How the days and months seem to fly by, and now summer has passed we are into the autumn season of mineral shows. We start our outings as usual by visiting Bakewell show next week end.

Arguably Bakewell (Rock Exchange) is the UK's largest show for mineral collectors, it is the only one currently that is held over 2 days.

It is a great opportunity for mineral people to get together and we are again very much looking forward to it.

Here below are some details as given by the organisers - the PLMS.

Content image: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial
Album: Palladium Nuggets; Natural & Artificial

In 1985 I had acquired some palladium metal, as a by-product of some illicit platinum reclamation I was undertaking. I made the above quarter-ounce "nugget" with it, drilled to be worn as a pendant.

Natural Pd specimens below, from the type locality, Bom Sucesso Creek, Serro, Minas Gerais, Brazil

Content image: Love Them & Never Miss Another

We have just unveiled a new app for e-Rocks - we hope you will like it.

We have called it My List

My List is a feature available to all logged in users of e-Rocks, and it allows anyone to store specific minerals or mineral variations from our database into a list of bookmarks for that mineral.

When viewed in My List you are able to see a count of available items featuring that mineral, with links to view all, newly added items, also personalised views of items being bid/watched and items purchased.
 

Content image: September's Story
Sapphire - September's Birthstone
Sapphire - Zazafotsy, Ihosy, Madagascar - 16mm, sold in September 2018

 

We have not written a "numbers" blog for nearly a year; we figure most people are here for the minerals but sometimes it might help to find out you are not alone!

Content image: Last 24 Hours Feature Goes Live

For those who regularly use our Search feature to find minerals listed on e-Rocks, we have just launched a new feature to help get to the latest items.

We have created a new filter in your relevant search results that will allow you to view any minerals added in the Last 24 hours only.

The filter will dynamically become available if your results contain any minerals; when available just click and submit.

The page will refresh showing just the new minerals added.

To reverse either click the filter and submit again, or start a new search.

Content image: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup
Album: Mineral Makeup

Crystals to cosmetics, this post is about various minerals which have been used, without chemical alteration, as makeup.

OCHRE

Evidence of the use of minerals to adorn human skin has been gathered back to around 7000 years ago, although there is little doubt that the use of ochre could reach back to early paleolithic times.

Content image: Andyrobertsite under a Purple Sky!

Andyrobertsite and calcioandyrobertsite are two fascinating mineral species present in a single very famous specimen from Tsumeb.  This superb specimen was featured in the cover of the Mineralogical Record vol.30, num. 3, May-June 1999, jointly with the original article describing these new minerals in the same issue (p.181-186).

Content image: As Rare As Rocking Horse.....

 

Poudretteite, pronounced “poo-dret-tay-ite” is a rare borosilicate mineral first discovered in the 1960s but not formally recognised as a mineral until 1986 (IMA1986-028).

Named after the Poudrette family, original owners of the Poudrette Quarry where the mineral was first discovered. 

Content image: The Bull Run Continues!

Friday 24th August saw the addition of item #670000 to our listing database, marking another 10,000 specimens uploaded. This time the specimen was provided by TVM Auctions, a specimen of Strengite & Phosphosiderite from Bull Moose Mine in South Dakota, USA.

The latest 10,000 items arrived in 64 days averaging 156 minerals per day, achieved during the (Northern Hemisphere) summer when things are generally a bit quieter in the world of minerals.

Content image: The Greatest Curiosity in Mineralogy - The Woodwardian Collection Connection
Album: The Greatest Curiosity in Mineralogy - The Woodwardian Collection Connection
Album: The Greatest Curiosity in Mineralogy - The Woodwardian Collection Connection
Album: The Greatest Curiosity in Mineralogy - The Woodwardian Collection Connection
Album: The Greatest Curiosity in Mineralogy - The Woodwardian Collection Connection
Album: The Greatest Curiosity in Mineralogy - The Woodwardian Collection Connection
Album: The Greatest Curiosity in Mineralogy - The Woodwardian Collection Connection
Album: The Greatest Curiosity in Mineralogy - The Woodwardian Collection Connection
Album: The Greatest Curiosity in Mineralogy - The Woodwardian Collection Connection
Album: The Greatest Curiosity in Mineralogy - The Woodwardian Collection Connection
Album: The Greatest Curiosity in Mineralogy - The Woodwardian Collection Connection
Album: The Greatest Curiosity in Mineralogy - The Woodwardian Collection Connection
Album: The Greatest Curiosity in Mineralogy - The Woodwardian Collection Connection
Album: The Greatest Curiosity in Mineralogy - The Woodwardian Collection Connection

Mineralogy’s greatest curiosity was not how Dr. John Woodward (1665 - 1728, above) obtained a pallasite meteorite for his collection, decades before the meteorite was actually discovered in Siberia….

Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection
Album: Bruno Cerato (1944-2013) and his mineral collection

Plinius Earth Treasures has started its official channel here on e-Rocks since December 2017, and one of the constants of the inventory was the listing of specimens from the Bruno Cerato collection and stock. Frequent e-Rocks customers will remember the specimens because of their rarity and aesthetics. It is time to pay a tribute to this Italian collector.

Bruno Cerato was a passionate field and mineral collector since his young age. He started collecting quartz in Margone (Val di Viù), tourmaline in the schists of Sant’Ignazio (Lanzo) and garnet in Val d’Ala.

Content image: Becquerel's Phosphoroscope

 

Content image: Geo-Trader Minerals- Welcome Back

 

After a short break we welcome back e-Rocks dealer – Jaroslaw Skupiewski, from Poland.

Under the banner Geo-Trader Minerals Jaroslaw has been establishing himself as an European show dealer for the last 12 years, but he has also been busy online.

Content image: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar
Album: Daylight Fluorescence of Weardale Green Fluorspar

 

Content image: Another 2 Mineral Firsts

Two more mineral firsts are on show on e-Rocks at the moment.

Our first specimen of fuettererite is due to close on Joy Desor's auction this evening.

Fuettererite

 

Album: A Parallel Universe?
Album: A Parallel Universe?
Album: A Parallel Universe?
Album: A Parallel Universe?
Album: A Parallel Universe?
Album: A Parallel Universe?
Album: A Parallel Universe?
Album: A Parallel Universe?
Album: A Parallel Universe?
Album: A Parallel Universe?
Album: A Parallel Universe?
Album: A Parallel Universe?
Album: A Parallel Universe?
Album: A Parallel Universe?

For those who don't already know I have been an avid collector of antique bottles for nearly as long as I have been interested in minerals.

Time permitting I like to keep my interests alive by visiting the various "bottle shows" that run here in the UK.

Album: Montroydite Benders, Count Alberti’s Imprisonment & Scattered Diamonds
Album: Montroydite Benders, Count Alberti’s Imprisonment & Scattered Diamonds
Album: Montroydite Benders, Count Alberti’s Imprisonment & Scattered Diamonds
Album: Montroydite Benders, Count Alberti’s Imprisonment & Scattered Diamonds
Album: Montroydite Benders, Count Alberti’s Imprisonment & Scattered Diamonds
Album: Montroydite Benders, Count Alberti’s Imprisonment & Scattered Diamonds
Album: Montroydite Benders, Count Alberti’s Imprisonment & Scattered Diamonds
Album: Montroydite Benders, Count Alberti’s Imprisonment & Scattered Diamonds
Album: Montroydite Benders, Count Alberti’s Imprisonment & Scattered Diamonds
Album: Montroydite Benders, Count Alberti’s Imprisonment & Scattered Diamonds
Album: Montroydite Benders, Count Alberti’s Imprisonment & Scattered Diamonds
Album: Montroydite Benders, Count Alberti’s Imprisonment & Scattered Diamonds
Album: Montroydite Benders, Count Alberti’s Imprisonment & Scattered Diamonds

Terlingua 1936

Content image: Larderello Boron Minerals & the Birth of Geothermal Power
Album: Larderello Boron Minerals & the Birth of Geothermal Power
Album: Larderello Boron Minerals & the Birth of Geothermal Power
Album: Larderello Boron Minerals & the Birth of Geothermal Power
Album: Larderello Boron Minerals & the Birth of Geothermal Power
Album: Larderello Boron Minerals & the Birth of Geothermal Power
Album: Larderello Boron Minerals & the Birth of Geothermal Power
Album: Larderello Boron Minerals & the Birth of Geothermal Power
Album: Larderello Boron Minerals & the Birth of Geothermal Power
Album: Larderello Boron Minerals & the Birth of Geothermal Power
Album: Larderello Boron Minerals & the Birth of Geothermal Power
Album: Larderello Boron Minerals & the Birth of Geothermal Power
Album: Larderello Boron Minerals & the Birth of Geothermal Power

The Italian town of Larderello was created to exploit the mineral riches of boraciferous fumaroles. Its chemical production was soon eclipsed by geothermal power generation. The minerals found around the area (33 in total) include six rare borates, which were first described there - the type locality.

Content image: Coldberry Gutter Does Millerite

 

Coldberry Gutter is a prominent scar in the hills high above the Weardale and Teesdale valleys at the head of Bow Lee and Hudeshope valleys, within County Durham, UK.

Album: Californian Gold from Sutters Mill
Album: Californian Gold from Sutters Mill
Album: Californian Gold from Sutters Mill
Album: Californian Gold from Sutters Mill
Album: Californian Gold from Sutters Mill
Album: Californian Gold from Sutters Mill
Album: Californian Gold from Sutters Mill
Album: Californian Gold from Sutters Mill
Album: Californian Gold from Sutters Mill
Album: Californian Gold from Sutters Mill
Album: Californian Gold from Sutters Mill
Album: Californian Gold from Sutters Mill
Album: Californian Gold from Sutters Mill

A small flake of Californian gold from Coloma, the location of Marshall's '48 discovery.

Sutter's Mill was a sawmill, owned by 19th-century pioneer John Sutter, where west-coast gold was first found in significant quantities, setting off the California Gold Rush. It was located on the bank of the South Fork American River in Coloma, California. Gold was discovered on January 24, 1848, by James Wilson Marshall, a carpenter originally from New Jersey.

Content image: Kaiyuhite

Here is another odd mineral featured in Armin Scholer's current auction.

Kaiyuhite was first proposed as a new mineral back in the 1980s by young mining geologist Tony Dunn, who had noticed and collected this silver-grey metallic material whilst collecting at the Perseverance Mine, Kaiyuh District, in Alaska.

It appears that Tony was certain this was a new mineral type and specimens were circulated as "Kaiyuhite" but somehow never formally investigated, published or discredited as a new mineral.

Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018
Album: Weardale Show 14-15 July 2018

 

Last weekend was the 2nd Weardale Show, and I made the 250 mile journey north to St Johns Chapel in the heart of Weardale to catch up and see what was new in the world of UK mineral collecting.

Content image: North Pennines Sulphides & Venusian Hoar Frost
Album: North Pennines Sulphides & Venusian Hoar Frost
Album: North Pennines Sulphides & Venusian Hoar Frost
Album: North Pennines Sulphides & Venusian Hoar Frost
Album: North Pennines Sulphides & Venusian Hoar Frost
Album: North Pennines Sulphides & Venusian Hoar Frost
Album: North Pennines Sulphides & Venusian Hoar Frost

Venus’ rolling uplands in 1982, with Venera 13 in foreground. Well below the sublimation altitude

Content image: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey
Album: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey
Album: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey
Album: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey
Album: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey
Album: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey
Album: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey
Album: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey
Album: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey
Album: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey
Album: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey
Album: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey
Album: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey
Album: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey
Album: The Highs and Lows of Mineral Identification at the Sterling-Franklin Orebody, New Jersey

1730: The first prospectors in the the Franklin Mining District, Dutch miners from the Hudson Valley, unfortunately called the area "the copper tract." Although copper minerals do occur in the orebody - 38 of them, including a rare copper hydroxyl nitrate, Rouaite (TL), none of the minerals are in sufficient quantity to be mined for the metal. Zinc is king at Franklin.

 

Content image: Gold Specimens: Artisanally Mined in Liberia, Africa

Above, a 1.58 gram nugget of gold, resembling a lizard-like creature, with adherent quartz matrix, Zwedru, Liberia.

In the early 1980's a couple of good mates of mine were living in Monrovia, Liberia. While there, Linda & Simon visited an artisanal mining operation where they bought a few ounces of freshly mined native gold. 

Content image: Another Van der Mineral

Just approved and pending publication here is news of yet another vanadate mineral, and this time by coincidence it has a "van" in the name.

Vandermeerscheite is a new mineral chemically similar to carnotite.

 

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