Home / crystals

Tag: crystals

Season's Greetings with a Red Ribboned Geode!

Season’s Greetings with a Red Ribboned Geode!

By /December 16, 2022 /1 comment /Cut Rocks

A striking new geode and cab is cut as The Carver Gallery and Shop reopens after a two and a half month hiatus during home renovations! Well, that explains why you have not heard from me in a while. Now back in business, the geode and the cab cut from the geode display brilliant red ribbons around the crystal lined geode pocket. If that is not cool enough, how about the sky blue between the dual red ribbons! Red ribbons wrap the “Christmas geode’s” sky blue center surrounding the crystal lined pocket Seems “Merry Christmasy” and a harbinger for a Happy New Year for me and, hopefully, you all as well.

Crystal Oddity Encapsulated in a Blue Fortification Agate

Crystal Oddity Encapsulated in a Blue Fortification Agate

By /October 7, 2022 /1 comment /Cut Rocks

This is a cross section of a blue agate nodule from The Carver Agate Field. Rock #4914 The small nodule, approximately 2 inches across, was initially cut and lightly shaped to capture the fortification agate in the center of the stone, as well as the ‘white eye’ on the left-hand side of the stone. And for even more interest, there was a contrasting brown spot on the upper right-hand part of the stone. That explains why I was cutting this stone in the way it was cut. Rock #4914 magnified Well, once cut and polished and subjected to modest magnification, the brown spot suddenly and unexpectedly became the highlight of the stone and the subject of this blog. Magnification, as shown above, produced a highly angular brown crystalline structure and not shards of broken or fragmented stone encased later in the agate. When this agate nodule formed inside of a […]

Read More

Mystery Crystals Appear AGAIN: New information from new specimen

Mystery Crystals Appear AGAIN: New information from new specimen

By /September 18, 2022 /4 comments /Cut Rocks

My June 2021 blog posting identified long petite black mineral crystals which had not been seen by me before in over 14 years of cutting thousands of ‘Carver agate field’ geodes. The June 2021 find was the only exemplar I had seen–until now! The new specimen photos below offer better views of the crystals. Interestingly, the crystals in both specimens appear to have grown out of and through an otherwise perfectly formed clear crystal lined geode center. The crystals, while appearing very fragile, are actually quite robust, being resistant to damage from washing the stone (after being cut open) to remove cutting oil, and from polishing on a bull wheel grinder. There is tremendous vibration generated from using the bull wheel, which turns very high RPMs and utilizes a 100 grit belt as part of the process. So, the crystals are not fragile or water soluble, but are very rare […]

Read More

Carver Geode with New Mystery

Carver Geode with New Mystery

By /June 17, 2021 /8 comments /Geology

What are the tiny long black crystals inside the small white geode center? Baffles me! I have cut open and looked at literally thousands of The Carver agate field nodules and geodes, but I have never seen this before. I am hoping to find someone to identify what this is. The fact the tiny fragile crystals survived cutting and washing is amazing to me. I hope some of my West Texas rocker friends can help solve this mystery.