COPROLITE

[agatewhisperer]

RWA3006 - yeah it's picking up some reflections from the sky. It's wet with oil in that pic, fresh off the saw!

[agatewhisperer]

I was really looking forward to cutting this open since the outside is so unique.  

[RWA3006]

May 19, 2023 15:12:47 GMT -5 agatewhisperer said:

I was really looking forward to cutting this open since the outside is so unique.  

I wouldn't be surprised if the curious pock marks at six o'clock on the exterior are bug portals. The dark streak at 11 o'clock sure looks like a tunnel to me.

It sure is hard to know what's inside these till they get cut open.

[agatewhisperer]

RWA3006 check this out.  This one was pretty nondescript from the outside and I was coming off cutting a few bland ones.  Plus it was too big for my saw so I decided to slab this one.  Anyway, after a weekend of slabbing here is the remaining chunk.   Is that a ghost limb at 6 o'clock??  

[RWA3006]

May 21, 2023 19:39:07 GMT -5 agatewhisperer said:

RWA3006 check this out.  This one was pretty nondescript from the outside and I was coming off cutting a few bland ones.  Plus it was too big for my saw so I decided to slab this one.  Anyway, after a weekend of slabbing here is the remaining chunk.   Is that a ghost limb at 6 o'clock??  

Yes it is, and so is the starburst shape at nine o'clock. There's also a decent smattering of pellets all through the turd, so what it was like when fresh was a couple of sticks stuck in a mass of congealed moist pellets.

I remember my boyhood friends and myself deriving great satisfaction beating fresh cow turds with sticks to splash each other. Your coprolite brought that fond memory back. Thanks

[RWA3006]

May 21, 2023 19:39:07 GMT -5 agatewhisperer said:

RWA3006 check this out.  This one was pretty nondescript from the outside and I was coming off cutting a few bland ones.  Plus it was too big for my saw so I decided to slab this one.  Anyway, after a weekend of slabbing here is the remaining chunk.   Is that a ghost limb at 6 o'clock??  

Here's a specimen that clearly shows the starburst ghost limb pattern combined with the growth rings. I'm not sure why many have the starburst pattern but it manifests commonly enough to establish a relationship with limbs.

[agatewhisperer]

RWA3006

Sahweeet!!! To be honest this was one had the least interesting exterior so I decided to slab it. I'll need to go back and look to see if anything interesting shows up after cleaning off the slabs. And now I need to debate going any further in to this one as well!! Had to remove it from the saw but still has a good size chunk left.
And that cow pie memory is pretty funny.

[RWA3006]

TURD TUESDAY

Here's a slice of turd I cut a few years back and it's an uncommon color. It also has a little streak of marcasite in it at about 9 or 10 o'clock of center.

[RWA3006]

On my last field trip I found iron concretions, locally called Moqui Marbles. These guys were within the Brushy Basin member of the Morrison Formation. It's interesting to note that these concretions can be found in many horizons spanning many millions of years.
1dave has found some fascinating thoughts about them.

[1dave]

May 27, 2023 8:48:19 GMT -5 RWA3006 said:

On my last field trip I found iron concretions, locally called Moqui Marbles. These guys were within the Brushy Basin member of the Morrison Formation. It's interesting to note that these concretions can be found in many horizons spanning many millions of years.
1dave has found some fascinating thoughts about them.

Randy, you caught me in the middle of writing a new book about them.




Jurassic Time ended about 100 million years ago with a series of terrific blows that RUMPLED UTAH at least a hundred miles toward the southeast.



Before that time the Dolores River connected to the San Juan river south of Four Corners. Afterwards it now connects to the Colorado River above Moab!

The blow that landed around the Great Salt Lake sent shockwaves radiating out, waving sandstone layers that made possible the formation of our over 6,000 natural arches.



Those same shockwaves created the Moqui Marbles!

[1dave]

It has taken me over 30 years to figure out what happened.



S waves move up and down, so they are slower than the P waves that move forward and back.



The rock particles are shoved closer together, then move back to their normal spacing as the wave passes.

P waves moving forward and back, S waves moving up and down, Love waves moving from side to side, Raleigh waves rolling like ocean waves, but counter clockwise across the countryside. ALL at different speeds through different materials that speeds up or slows down the particular waves that pass through them, moving them in and out of phase with the companion waves around them.



A closer look at our 4 billion years of accumulated sandstone. Every Day earth receives over 100 million tons of space dust and meteorites, mostly silicon and iron.

A layer of sand, a layer of space dust. another layer of each, day by day for billions of years.

Sandstone mountains are good water aquifers. Water absorbs iron and converts it to yellow limonite.

Back when those shockwaves struck Big Spencer Flat, there were thousands of feet of sandstone above where I stood in 1988. those sand crystals were moving at one speed, the iron at another, the water at a third, but liquids refuse to be compressed. That is why Hydraulic Jacks and Pumps work.

Did you ever see a hydraulic hose break? They spray!

Those waves arriving at over a thousand times each second, each wave dancing it's specialty, water drops, like pneumatic drill bits, found the easiest paths through the sandstone, coating it's back and forth pathways through the sandstone, leaving "Liesegang Layers."



When the water found a wide joint, that became a raceway! When a nearby exit from the mountain appeared, the water broke through creating pipes.



Over time, yellow limonite dried to red hematite, then to black goethite.

But the Marbles? That was the tough one to figure out!

[RWA3006]

Here's some coprolite slabs with lovely green hues.

[hummingbirdstones]

Cool slabs, Randy!  Don't see green in poop very often.  

[rockpickerforever]

May 29, 2023 11:19:46 GMT -5 hummingbirdstones said:

Cool slabs, Randy!  Don't see green in poop very often.  

Must've been something he ate

[RWA3006]

May 29, 2023 11:44:45 GMT -5 rockpickerforever said:

May 29, 2023 11:19:46 GMT -5 hummingbirdstones said:

Cool slabs, Randy!  Don't see green in poop very often.  

Must've been something he ate

I didn't know they had black licorice back then.

[1dave]

The Secret to the Iron Concretions is in the sand.

[RWA3006]

TURD TUESDAY

[agatewhisperer]

RWA3006 here's one I'm working on slabbing.  




The outside

[RWA3006]

Jun 1, 2023 19:21:23 GMT -5 agatewhisperer said:

RWA3006 here's one I'm working on slabbing.  




The outside

Cool, on the top photo by your index finger is a pattern typical of a mass of pellets stuck together. I can't quite tell if they have blue, green or gray hues on my screen.

[agatewhisperer]

RWA3006 yeah I was wondering that too since my lighting wasn't very good. Here's the next slice with good light. Looks bluish gray to me.