Rocks and fossils

Cheers Sam, i did find an ammonite just outside filey but it was only half there so chucked it back, found jet and agate, but like @aldensallsorts i wouldn’t know a rough diamond if it bit me :slight_smile:
@aldensallsorts you are welcome :laughing: best place for Whitby jet is just at the far side of whitby, but you can find jet all around there.

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Hi Alan, I haven’t used the lapis for anything, I just have it sitting in my cabinet looking pretty, I have quite a few pieces. Yes I took the pic myself :slight_smile:

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It does turn up down here,eight out of ten times the streak is black,coal,but now and again it is brown.

Off up there is a few weeks time so i’ll be walking the beeches.

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Have a great time when you do and return home safely with loads of goodies.

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Water worn tooth fragments are easy to mount.The rock, I don’t know what it is,it has very large opaque chrystals and may be pegmatite/granite,perhaps you or Sasha will know.
Last, Neptunia contraria, the left handed whelk

and glycermeris from the red crag and pyritised wood from the London clay ( just what I need in a sea of pyritised wood).

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Hope you don’t mind me tagging along on this conversation. I am Geoscientist by day and I make fossil and gemstone jewellery by night (and day depending on the weather ;)). Hopefully I may be able to contribute.

Becky :slight_smile:

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Welcome aboard Becky, I am certain that you can contribute to a whole lot of things I haven’t a clue about,like a piece of stone I have just cut,very dark blue,some white inclusions,cuts with the speed and ease of calcite,stains the coolant blue and has a strange odour when cutting and a vitrous lustre.

Been to your shop,lovely work but just how many hours a week do you spend drilling?

Can we have a picture and could you define ‘strange’ for the odour? Eggy, metalic, rotten, rusty…
The previous rock looks a bit like bird’s eye rhyolite based on having bought cabs of it (but how many similar looking rocks never get cut so I don’t see them) I’m not much cop at identifying these things from rough slabs, I tend to go with ‘pretty’ and then find out specifics later if possible.

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I would say remotely eggy, the last time I cut something that smelled like it there was arsenic involved so if I cab it, very wet I think.
The other rock has a fine line between what I thought it was and you think it is,I just googled both and they are simular.It would have come in from Norway,a lot of boulders from there are being used as sea defences.
We had a saying when I was younger “if you can’t blind them with brilliance then baffle them with bull” so if I cab any I shall describe it as a “gorgeous birds eye rhyomatite”.

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Love these-I was going to say the sharks teeth can be mounted like cabochons using fine silver strip or gallery. I’ve seen this done, The most difficult part is working out the length of wire you need to measure. Makes a much nicer pendant than wire wrapping.

Sam x

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Gallery,thats worth a thought.What’s your verdict on gallery for claw settings ? I have the collet plate to taper them but they take forever to make and gallery would be easier but would they look o.k?

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I said remotely eggy but perhaps garlicky would be nearer.

I like the blue. Best guess (again based on cabs I’ve looked at buying) is Vivianite or one of that family - some of which contain arsenic which would fit with what you are saying about the smell (arsine smells of garlic). Apparently the colour changes on exposure to sunlight ending up at an almost black blue which is why I haven’t bought any yet - I wouldn’t want someone to buy a piece of jewellery from me and they have it change colour over time.

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Thanks for that Sasha, I shall google vivianite and see if they have some pictures of rough and I shall leave a piece in the sun (if we ever get any) for a while and see what happens.It’s nice to identify a stone as it makes a better description than an oval cut thingamajig.

Just looked on e-bay and it seems you are spot on, I found it at Walton on the Naze, I doubt it would be an erratic from elsewhere in the U.K and may have come in with ballast from the sailing ships given the countries of origin are Bolivia and Australia on e-bay.

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I wish I lived near the sea so I could gemstone/ ammonite hunting on the beach. The "Marston marble " is gorgeous it almost looks like enamelling from the photo. I’m more into gemstones than fossils, most of which I’ve got from various shows. I’ve got a lovely piece of Citrine, a Mookaite egg and a lovely carved piece of Fluorite than looks like the top of a Mr Whippy ice cream. I’ve also got a large Selenite pillar which is at the back of the display cabinet as it flakes really easily. Becky, you have the job I would love to have it… shame I didn’t know what I wanted to do when I left school at 16 :frowning:

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Perhaps some form of Schist?

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It doesn’t have to be a beach,I have had some nice bits from ploughed fields and gravel workings (watch the water at the bottom though),anywhere there is an exposure, road side banks. At the end of the day if the sea was to erode that far inland then the goodies on the beach would be what you where picking up there,anywhere there is a devolopment and earth is being moved but don’t get hit by a digger and the people in charge do like to be asked first.