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Post by Jurrasic Jonje on Feb 8, 2007 20:41:35 GMT -5
My parents will be going to Alaska this summer. They are gonna take a flat rate box with them to find me some rock. What I need to know is what rock is native to Alaska?
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blarneystone
spending too much on rocks
Rocks in my head
Member since March 2010
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Post by blarneystone on Feb 8, 2007 20:46:28 GMT -5
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Post by deb193 on Feb 8, 2007 21:45:06 GMT -5
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snowdog
fully equipped rock polisher
RIP David Fildes, aka: snowdog
Member since January 2005
Posts: 1,527
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Post by snowdog on Feb 8, 2007 22:02:41 GMT -5
certain areas have some nice jade -- if it isn't fractured from the freezing and earthquakes ------ don't know what area but I do have a small piece that came from up there ------
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spacegold
has rocks in the head
Member since September 2006
Posts: 732
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Post by spacegold on Feb 9, 2007 1:38:43 GMT -5
Jeremy, the jade comes from way up in the interior where there are not roads. If the folks come into Anchorage they should stop at Stewart's Photo Shop on Fifth Avenue and ask the proprietor there about alaska jade. He used to own, and maybe still does, the biggest jade claim in Alaska. He mined it for years and sold and displayed the material in the shop. He had a 24" saw in the back room of the shop, and a flat lap, too, I believe. As I recall, he told me he broke the large boulders with hammer and wedges, and then flew 20 to 50 pound chunks out to his saw.
I don't know where to suggest they look for agates, but there is lots of attractive granite, as Blarney suggests. Quartz is abundant, and some of it has gold or pyrhite flecks Most of the rivers have lots of both materials, so they can stop at any bridge or river campground and go rockhunting, except in National Parks.
Common jasper is also abundant in most streams, and as on most of the Pacific coast, it will be found on all tidal beaches, on the sloping gravel portion below high water. There is a wide variety of color from ocher to reddish to purple to chocolate. Well rounded quartz will also be found on the beaches. Many people mistake it for agate, but agate is a scarcer material here. I find an occasional piece on the beach, but it is always small and a distinctive lemon peel yellow color. I have not tried to find out where in Alaska there might be found agate deposits, if any.
The granite has a wide variety of color, with pinks and yellows quite common. When I tumble polish it, it comes out of the rough tumbler with a sort of golfball texture, that then will polish pretty well, but I never get a mirror shine on it. The quartz crystals in it are quite prominent and they are the high spots as the feldspar is a bit softer.
There is also a pea green varigated material with a hardness around 5.5 that is attractive, but wont polish with quartz and jasper. I don't know what it is.
I will be happy to accompany them if they come to the Kenai Peninsula and have not yet filled up their box. I am sure we can finish filling it in a couple hours on the beaches around my area.
Besides, Ninilchik is a good place to pick up a halbut charter, and they shouldn't miss that if they are fishermen at all. Late June is the best time for that.
Offhand I would guess they will have the box full by the time they are twenty miles into Alaska.
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rollingstone
starting to spend too much on rocks
Member since July 2009
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Post by rollingstone on Feb 9, 2007 2:46:12 GMT -5
There used to be a guy on here from Alaska who found some of the most amazing snow-white milky quartz locally. I don't recall seeing any posts by him in about a year, and I don't recall his board name. But pure-white quartz might be something to keep an eye out for. I think KD tumbled up some quartz from him to perfection. -Don
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spacegold
has rocks in the head
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Post by spacegold on Feb 9, 2007 4:13:18 GMT -5
Milk quartz is so common on the Ninilchik beaches that I don't even pick it up. And the jewelry maker is not interested, because it is not colorful enough. I carry a polished milk quartz worry stone in my pocket. Like all the quartz in Alaska, and maybe anywhere, fracture is the prevalent problem. And anyone who has tumbled quartz is familiar with the problem of polish getting into the fractures and highlighting them. If you want milk quartz, I can send your folks home with a box of it. But there is quite a bit of prettier quartz to be collected.
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stefan
Cave Dweller
Member since January 2005
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Post by stefan on Feb 9, 2007 10:00:07 GMT -5
Don- 69beeper was the guy I think. Alaska has some pretty cool stuff- but Lapidary material is not one of the highlights- but as spacegold pointed out- there is some stuff!! there is also a lot of gold in the rivergravels- might be fun for S&G's to get a flatrater of river gravel to pan through!
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Sabre52
Cave Dweller
Me and my gal, Rosie
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Post by Sabre52 on Feb 9, 2007 10:24:31 GMT -5
I've met a couple pf gentlemen who had beautiful polishable fossil coral that was black and white. Some was supposedly from the north side of the Brooks Range and the other was from one of the Alaskan Islands. Not sure about exact locations but I'm sure some local rock collectors would know about it....mel
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spacegold
has rocks in the head
Member since September 2006
Posts: 732
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Post by spacegold on Feb 9, 2007 12:16:40 GMT -5
I have not heard of that, Sabre, but it is quite possibly so. The north side of the Brooks range is pretty barren and gently sloping for mountains, and so rockhounding would be fairly straightforward for the intrepid. The road is open all the way to the Arctic Ocean now, so adventurous rockhounds have about 400 miles of gravel, wilderness road they can explore from. They ought to be able to cover a five mile strip on both sides of it in five or six lifetimes.
When the oil pipeline was being built, I worked on a concrete making project on the south side of the Brooks. We were using gravel dredged from the Deitrich River, screened to 2" minus. I was not into rocks at the time, but I can recall seeing a lot of quartz in the gravel, just as in most Alaska streams.
And Stephan, I would say there is some gold in some Alaska streams, but not really "a lot". There are less than two dozen what I would call commercial gold operations (using any heavy equiment at all). And while panning for a couple of hours in some of the streams will often turn up a little "color", not many people will take as much as an ounce in a steady summer of weekend panning. A few people with portable dredges and wet suits get a few ounces over a summer of working steady at it in a few streams. I almost never find gold or pyrhite infused (I can't tell the difference) quartz on the beaches and other locations where I collect. But in past years I have found it in some it in some stream beds.
Jade is the only "lapidary" material that I know of in Alaska, unless one is willing to count the bloodstone.
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Post by Jurrasic Jonje on Feb 9, 2007 21:18:23 GMT -5
Thanks for all the info. Guess I should have mentioned that my parents are going on a cruise. They have a few stops planned in Alaska.
Space you can send me Alaskan quartz anytime!!!
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spacegold
has rocks in the head
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Post by spacegold on Feb 10, 2007 1:07:04 GMT -5
When we do the trade this spring, you'll get lots of quartz, and I'll throw in some of the white if you want, but I also want to send you some of the jasper because it is colorful and polishes well. The bloodstone is jasper too, but I don't find a lot of it. There'll be a couple of pieces of that, along with a few granite nodules. Most of it you can tumble right out of the box, but I'll include a few pieces for the saw.
If your folks are going to take the cruise, their rockhounding activity will be severely restricted. At ports of call, they drop the ramp and everyone swarms off the ship to hit the souvenier shops. Four to six hours later the ship's horn blows as it pulls away from the dock. So they are going to be hard pressed to find an accessible beach and do any rockpicking as well as any tourist activities that they might wish to do. They'll be lucky if they get a cruise that overnights in port. I hope they are able to do it, but very often even the weather works against outdoor activities along the cruise routes. It is a gorgeous trip though. Especially if they get any decent weather at all.
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goofie1
starting to spend too much on rocks
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Post by goofie1 on Feb 10, 2007 1:57:15 GMT -5
your all so smart, i thought the iceburg was the native rock in alaska lol
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spacegold
has rocks in the head
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Post by spacegold on Feb 10, 2007 15:30:35 GMT -5
Is that a blond joke? ;D
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dtcmor
freely admits to licking rocks
Back to lickin' rocks again!
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Post by dtcmor on Feb 11, 2007 1:47:43 GMT -5
I've met a couple pf gentlemen who had beautiful polishable fossil coral that was black and white. Mel - did that fossil coral look like this? I got this on a trade with Yeahda1, and he mentioned it was from Alaska - the same makeup as Petoskey Stone. Very vivid pattern.
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