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Powerful and Violent Forces Create Brecciated Material

Powerful and Violent Forces Create Brecciated Material

By /February 12, 2023 /6 comments /Geology

My last posting, “Cryptic Message Leads to Brecciated Pierced Earrings!,” featured brecciated material from The Carver Agate Field. The posting promised more geological information. And, here it is. Brecciated agates or other materials are ‘pieces held together with quartz,’ citing Gemstones of The World, by Walter Schumann, page 134. Sometimes the quartz that holds together the shards of broken rock can form agate between the shards. Rock #4867 In this photo of Rock # 4867, there is a small fortification agate which can be seen between the shards. There is also a lava shard at the top of the photo. Rock #4868 Rock #4868 displays jasper (dark brown horizontal strip near top) and agate shards (lower bottom right) as well as a brown lava shard (lower middle) Rock #4833 Photo 4833 shows yellow/orange jasper shards cemented together by quartz which is mostly not visible except as a bluish material (lower […]

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Cryptic Message Leads to Brecciated Agate Pierced Earrings!

Cryptic Message Leads to Brecciated Agate Pierced Earrings!

By /February 9, 2023 /6 comments /Jewelry

I recently opened another box of rocks I had packed in Alpine, Texas, and brought with me back to Islesboro, Maine. I had put a slip of paper in the box which said: “Rt. 67/90 dog pound N of water tank on right before a deep draw on ranch road” The small box contained the material you see in this posting. While cutting one of the ugly looking pieces, I hit something I really liked! The oval cab photo (#4992) and freeform cab photo (#4995) were cut from the same piece. The pierced earrings came from a fracture in the rough stone being cut. As I cut #4992 and #4995, two small shards broke off during the cutting in the saw. Rock # 4992 Rock #4995 So! It appeared that I had two cut-able stones and two worthless broken shards–but not so fast! I liked the coloration and pattern of […]

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Brecciated Lava Agate

Brecciated Lava Agate

By /January 15, 2022 /0 comments /Geology

This stone was cut as a geological oddity, rather than as a gemstone. I doubt it will ever be set as part of a piece of jewelry. First, you notice three jagged shards or pieces on the left side of the rainbow shaped stone. These shards are from hardened lava that was broken and fell into a crack in the lava surrounding the shards. The lava, which was initially molten and then hardened, was at some later point in time broken by tectonic forces or by volcanic explosion or lifted by rising magma. The crack and the shards were later (How much later, you ask? How the hell would I know?!!) filled in by a silica solution or silica gel that subsequently crystallized and formed the brown material surrounding the three shards. The surrounding material is chalcedony (a micro-crystalline quartz structure). Chalcedony is a common material in many agates and […]

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