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Sure Its Quartz But With A Twist


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Hey all :)

I know quartz and quartz crystals are among the most common things one finds while out prospecting.  Thing is you never know when you'll get an added treat for bending down and picking up that interesting shiny.  I found this last season down under after a good 3 km romp thru the bush.  I'd come into an area with a lot of faceted milky quartz and picked up my first lump thinking it'd be a good example of the area.  It got heavy so I put it down and decided I'd find a smaller bit.   A few dozen meters away a smaller quartzy plate flashed and caught my eye.  The clear quartz is very uncommon in the heavy mineral mixes that I was prospecting so into the back pack it went.  My booby prize if I didn't hit any gold for the day :)  Well I did poke around for a few minutes but didn't find anything else of interest, either detecting or specking, and thought to myself I could find the spot again and maybe give it a better go the next day.  I'd not found any gold yet and it was later in the day back near camp *of course* that I finally got a small reward for the walk.  So my shiny was now not the booby prize for the day. But little did I know till  the next morning when I pulled it out again and gave it a good gander.

 

Looking into the depths I saw that many of the crystals showed Phantoms inside.  Phantom crystals are crystals that form twice with the original crystal being covered by the second growth.  That had me pretty happy as I've only ever found one other example.  While rotating it in the light of morning I caught a flash of Gold!  Well I broke out the 10x magnifier and yep, on top of a very small Phantom crystal a small gold crystal had begun to form and over that the second layer of clear quartz.  Small stuff, sure, but a fine find for me.   Well a long story short~ nope I could not find the spot again after two goes.  But hey Quartz with a twist definitely made my day.

Thanks for reading

Phantom crystals 2.jpg

Phantom crystals.jpg

Phantom crystals 3.jpg

Gold in quartz.jpg

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Thanks :)

Actually Lipca when I noticed the phantoms I started looking harder for the best ones when the morning sun hit that bit and stopped me.  I know exactly were its at on that plate though. Hahh!  And you can see the bit off to the upper left in the close shots of the plate. ;)

I still have not even cleaned it and when I do decide to I'll be looking for more.  No dolly pot for that if I do.  My 7000 didn't register anything and come to think on it I never tried the 2300 I had on hand at the time.  Though I did drag both the detectors back around where I thought I picked it up hoping to find more..... sigh.   My mistake for not way pointing it.

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I think that's a beautiful find DDancer, we don't see that much quartz in my areas. Thanks for a real nice story and the detailed information about it. And of course... congratulations... definitely a keeper!!! :cool:

Jim.

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Thanks again :)

Jim after reading your adventures I had wondered if you'd found calcite's of interest among the silver in your regions.

Fred I'm pretty sure that those spots of interest are still there myself however I'm "geographically challenged" out bush but there is nothing to say an angry wood chuck or goanna might not have moved things around from time to time. Hahh!

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  • 2 weeks later...

Very cool find! 

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