This green geode is notable because green is a fairly rare color for nodules and geodes found in West Texas. The salmon/orange-colored geode below has an unusual rind surrounding the crystal-filled hollow center of the stone. While these finds are not ‘spectacular,’ they are geologically interesting to serious rock collectors and discovering them would make any collector’s day!
This pink and white banded agate looks like a bacon slice and so that is the name I gave it. The upper edge of the ‘baconite’ contains petite quartz crystals–technically euhedral quartz crystals–that formed in the center of a geode of which this is a part. The outer rind of the geode is seen at the bottom edge of the ‘baconite’ specimen.
The Carver has produced red and yellow jaspers, sometimes mixed with green. Yellow and red are seen in this photo. After the jasper had initially formed, volcanic forces cracked/fractured the jasper into angular shards. Eventually a silica solution in either a liquid or semi-liquid state filled the fractured shards and then hardened, cementing the jasper back together. These shards that are cemented back together are called brecciated. Since some of the silica filling in the areas between the shards took on a banding (see particularly the upper left corner of the stone), we see a fortification agate which has formed within the brecciated jasper. For this reason, this specimen can be described as jasp/agate (part jasper, part agate) which is brecciated.
This is the Carver agate field jasper “Grotto.” This jasper has beautiful coloration and pattern and more. It has a totally unique and unexpected crystal-filled grotto which is shown enlarged in the photo above. Be sure to visit the Shop to see the designer gem stones now available for sale!
Pictured above is a free form designer cabochon, or cab, from ‘The Carver’. Free-form means that I have shaped and polished the pictured stone to maximize its natural beauty. The stone is not cut and polished to a specific shape–oval, square or round–or to a specific size. Most cabs are of a uniform shape (oval or round and sometimes rectangular or square) and usually these are cut to a size predetermined to fit easily and exactly into a mass-produced stock jewelry setting for a ring, bracelet, pendant, belt buckle, or whatever. These stock settings are machine made, inexpensive, and widely used to make jewelry designed to take a single specifically shaped and sized cab. The free-form designer cab is a stone cut without a specific standardized shape or size and it requires a metal setting, usually silver or gold, that is individually designed and constructed to fit the specific size […]
Wow! Three months collecting rocks on ‘The Carver’ in the fall of 2018 and January 2019 has yielded amazingly varied and beautiful geodes, agates, and jaspers. I have selected 108 specimens that I believe show the extraordinary variability of color, banding, and sagenitic inclusions (those neat weird shape things you can see hidden in each rock specimen). There are 5 galleries in this set 2019 Diversity Gallery #1 2019 Diversity Gallery #2 2019 Diversity Gallery #3 2019 Diversity Gallery #4 2019 Diversity Gallery #5 If you have questions or comments about any specimen, I would like to hear from you. ‘The Carver’ agate field is all about geological diversity. I hope you enjoy viewing these new galleries.
A deep excavation on The Carver has produced a small pocket/area filled with amethyst and smoky quartz crystal-filled geodes and blue agate nodules. Some unique mineral specimens were also uncovered. This deep pocket was approximately 10 to 15 feet down in the excavation and involved a productive area approximately 30 by 50 feet in size. This pocket, thus far, is a unique and never before seen geological formation on The Carver agate field. Fall 2018 produced an unexpected treasure trove of rock specimens. The photos speak for themselves, so click here to see examples in the Gallery.
A small but rich pocket, recently uncovered on ‘the Carver’, is yielding an amazing number of geodes and nodules. The nodules contain banded blue and gray agates and many contain amethyst and smoky quartz crystals found within geodes (hollows) within the nodules. One large geode has a spectacular void with a sparkly druzey cavity. This pocket, which is still being explored, has yielded hundreds of nodules and geodes, some as small as a finger nail, some exceeding 17 pounds in weight. On one particular hunting foray, the pocket yielded blue, gray, and white banded agate nodules of the following weights: 17.6 pounds, two at 13 pounds each, 8.2 pounds, two at 3.4 pounds each, and 2.7 pounds. On another rocking foray, an astounding quantity of medium-sized nodules was recovered. I am in the process of cutting and polishing many of these nodules, although with the number involved the task will […]
A 16+ pound amethyst agate geode found on ‘the Carver’ has recently been cut into 3 pieces, and polished. The geode rind is purple amethyst and approximately 1 1/2″ thick in most places. This thick amethyst rind encircles an approximately 5 1/2″ x 2″ crystal-filled hollow center. The amethyst crystals in the geode center are covered with a secondary surface mineral crystallization of a yellow/beige color. Even more interesting, the yellow/beige mineralization layer coating the amethyst is, in places, coated with a gray/black crystallization layer apparently involving a third type of mineral (I am seeking expert assistance to identify the mineralization involved). The gray/black mineralization layer appears to have intruded into the geode through the rind of the geode, into its center. This intrusion is visible on the photos shown. Amethyst Agate Geode Slice A Amethyst Agate Geode Slice B This specimen is geologically significant because it was […]
As promised, here is the article, just published in the August 2018 edition of Rock and Gem Magazine, entitled “The Unicorn Scepter and Yellow Agates.” Click on the magazine scans below to check it out!
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