Lifestyle TMMAC Rockhounds/geologists

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Grateful Dude

Grateful Dude

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May 30, 2016
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Collected these today. This is commonly referred to as “cave popcorn”. It’s a different type of speleothem formation than stalactites/stalagmites,forms a little differently but chemically the same type of mineral deposit.
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sparkuri

sparkuri

Pulse On The Finger Of The Community
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Grateful Dude said:
Collected these today. This is commonly referred to as “cave popcorn”. It’s a different type of speleothem formation than stalactites/stalagmites,forms a little differently but chemically the same type of mineral deposit.
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Great pieces.

I went to the Oregon coast to hike around the sandstone pillars. This was a great location for metamorphic, igneous & sedimentary conglomerates.
A bit like Mars in some ways I imagine.


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Filthy

Filthy

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Jun 28, 2016
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Shang Tsong2 said:
Just north of where I worked was a town called quartzite. Guess what they had lots of? Also it was very strange, the town sign had camel's on it. But there's a story to that. Apparently many years ago the army purchased a bunch of camels to use as an alternative to horses. But then they decided they were shite and sent all the camel's down to live in the Arizona desert until they all died happily ever after.
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there's still wild camels in AZ.

I drive through Quartzite all the time. Date shakes, bro.
 
Filthy

Filthy

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Leigh

Leigh

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My 7 year old likes stones and collects them but they're pretty much just pebbles. He has found a couple of small fossils.

He's asked me to get him a tumbler, which I'll buy him for Christmas.
 
Grateful Dude

Grateful Dude

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T-City Minister of Truth said:
can you recommend a rock
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For the most part, geodes will be filled with various types of quartz. Amethyst (which is just a purple variety of quartz) is common, but also aesthetically pleasing to most. I'm sure there are a bunch of places to buy geodes online for not too much, but for the love of god please do not buy the stained/colored ones! I don't know why that is such a thing, but people will stain geodes to weird colors like bright pink, teal, or blue, etc. It drives me nuts, they're cool enough on their own! :)

I know they sell kits with multiple geodes, and then the kids get to break them open. They're usually not very big in these kits, but that can be fine for the kids. A year or so ago I bought a 12 pack for my son and he had a blast breaking them open. Some were cooler than others, but that's part of the fun - finally discovering the good one.
 
Filthy

Filthy

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Grateful Dude said:
For the most part, geodes will be filled with various types of quartz. Amethyst (which is just a purple variety of quartz) is common, but also aesthetically pleasing to most. I'm sure there are a bunch of places to buy geodes online for not too much, but for the love of god please do not buy the stained/colored ones! I don't know why that is such a thing, but people will stain geodes to weird colors like bright pink, teal, or blue, etc. It drives me nuts, they're cool enough on their own! :)

I know they sell kits with multiple geodes, and then the kids get to break them open. They're usually not very big in these kits, but that can be fine for the kids. A year or so ago I bought a 12 pack for my son and he had a blast breaking them open. Some were cooler than others, but that's part of the fun - finally discovering the good one.
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she's been buying the little ones from the craft store and cracking them open, but she said she likes the crystal more than the surprise.
 
Grateful Dude

Grateful Dude

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T-City Minister of Truth said:
she said she likes the crystal more than the surprise
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Fair enough, I can't really argue with that! Sound like you should buy one that's already been cracked so you know what you're getting.

I bet you could look around and find one that has some colors she likes, or something. Amethyst will probably be really common when you look around though.
 
Grateful Dude

Grateful Dude

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Leigh said:
My 7 year old likes stones and collects them but they're pretty much just pebbles. He has found a couple of small fossils.

He's asked me to get him a tumbler, which I'll buy him for Christmas.
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My boy is about the same age, and also likes collecting rocks. And I also bring him stuff home from work all the time too (most of which he wants to smash with a hammer haha).

I'll share this just because I thought it was a cool activity, and your son is the same age as when we did this:
Last year while we were homeschooling/remote learning during the first shutdown, one of the activities his teacher assigned was for each child to go collect 15-20 rocks, minerals, or fossils. And then each child had to pick a constellation, and then draw it in chalk on the driveway/sidewalk placing the collected specimens as the stars. And then they all go to show off their collection and constellation to the other kids on Zoom. It was pretty cool because most of the kids were super excited about specific rocks/minerals they had found. Anyway, just thought that was a fun activity. It allowed me to discuss different minerals and fossils with my son, plus a little astronomy mixed in!
 
Filthy

Filthy

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Grateful Dude said:
My boy is about the same age, and also likes collecting rocks. And I also bring him stuff home from work all the time too (most of which he wants to smash with a hammer haha).

I'll share this just because I thought it was a cool activity, and your son is the same age as when we did this:
Last year while we were homeschooling/remote learning during the first shutdown, one of the activities his teacher assigned was for each child to go collect 15-20 rocks, minerals, or fossils. And then each child had to pick a constellation, and then draw it in chalk on the driveway/sidewalk placing the collected specimens as the stars. And then they all go to show off their collection and constellation to the other kids on Zoom. It was pretty cool because most of the kids were super excited about specific rocks/minerals they had found. Anyway, just thought that was a fun activity. It allowed me to discuss different minerals and fossils with my son, plus a little astronomy mixed in!
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mine is the same age-ish. Now I'm thinking about doing the "Earth is a peppercorn" exercise with her, but using different size rocks/fossils for the planets...

hmmm....
 
Grateful Dude

Grateful Dude

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I was cleaning out a drawer the other day and found some of the artifacts I've collected over the years at work. I had honestly forgot about a few of these. I don't know the names all that well, but I think the notched one is what they call a Castroville point.
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More in the display table at the office.
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Rambo John J

Rambo John J

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I have an perfectly formed amber crystal inside a 1 inch long snail shell

Found it on a road cut that exposed millions of fossils in a private science class for nerd dork kids back when I was 8-10 give or take

The teacher begged me to let her have it, I said no...Let me find it and take a photo to share
 
Ministry of Silly Walks

Ministry of Silly Walks

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Neat thread. I liked looking through this one.
I used to find Petoskey stones in my youth. Completely forgot about them, to be honest. Bit of a time trip. Lol
 
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