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Click here to view Best Minerals and here for Tourmaline group minerals, here for Chromium-dravite, here for Chromo-alumino-povondraite, here for Dravite, here for Elbaite, Afghanistan to Nigeria, here for Elbaite, Pakistan to Zambia here for Feruvite, here for Fluor Buergerite here for Fluor-dravite, here for Fluor-elbaite, here for Fluor-feruvite, here for Fluor-liddicoatite, here for Fluor-schorl, here for Foitite, here for Liddicoatite, here for Luinaite-(OH), here for Magnesiofoitite, here for Olenite, here for Oxy-dravite, here for Oxy-rossmanite, here for Oxy-schorl, here for Povondraite, here for Rossmanite, here for Schorl, here for Tsilaisite and here for Vanadium-dravite. Click here for Best Minerals T and here for Best Minerals A to Z and here for Fast Navigation of completed Best Minerals articles.



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Vanadium-dravite: Synonym of Oxy-vanadium-dravite.
Na(Mg,Fe²⁺)₃(V³⁺,Cr³⁺,Al)₆(Si₆O₁₈)(BO₃)₃
(OH)₃(OH)

Vanadium-dravite, FOV 2.5mm	© 2008, JGW

Click here to view Best Minerals and here for Tourmaline group minerals, here for Chromium-dravite, here for Chromo-alumino-povondraite, here for Dravite, here for Elbaite, Afghanistan to Nigeria, here for Elbaite, Pakistan to Zambia here for Feruvite, here for Fluor Buergerite here for Fluor-dravite, here for Fluor-elbaite, here for Fluor-feruvite, here for Fluor-liddicoatite, here for Fluor-schorl, here for Foitite, here for Liddicoatite, here for Luinaite-(OH), here for Magnesiofoitite, here for Olenite, here for Oxy-dravite, here for Oxy-rossmanite, here for Oxy-schorl, here for Povondraite, here for Rossmanite, here for Schorl, here for Tsilaisite and here for Vanadium-dravite. Click here for Best Minerals T and here for Best Minerals A to Z and here for Fast Navigation of completed Best Minerals articles.]]> Rock Currier Best Minerals V Fri, 14 Dec 2012 12:03:32 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,88,134382,134382#msg-134382 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,88,134382,134382#msg-134382 Best Minerals V and here for Best Minerals A to Z and here for Fast Navigation of completed Best Minerals articles.


Can you help make this a better article? What good localities have we missed? Can you supply pictures of better specimens than those we show here? Can you give us more and better information about the specimens from these localities? Can you supply better geological or historical information on these localities?

Vantasselite
Al₄[OH|PO₄]₃-9H₂O Orthorhombic

Vantasselite from the Type Locality, Bihain Belgium, FOV 0,8cm	© Harjo

Vantasselite has been described in 1986. In the late seventies on the dumps of an abandoned coticule mine near the small village of Bihain, white micaceous crystals where found that were at first sight identified by collectors as Wavellite. Lateron they were recognised as a new species, and Vantasselite was described by A.-M. Fransolet.
Vantasselite is orthorhombic, and the structure is related to that of Vashegyite and Matulaite. It occurs as fine radiating lamellae up to 8 mm, and as spherical aggregates of free-standing terminated crystals up to 3 mm in diameter (this form is extremely rare !) on metamorphosed argillaceous rocks containing so-called Coticule.
The name of this mineral is in honour or Professor Dr. R. VAN TASSEL, an eminent Belgian mineralogist. He is still an active member of the mineral club from Antwerp (Mineralogische Kring Antwerpen)
[Rik Dillen]


Vantasselite
Belgium
Luxembourg Province, Stavelot Massif, Vielsalm, Bihain

FOV 0,6cm	© Harjo

FOV 0,2cm	©

Many good specimens have been collected over the years, especially the specimens where Vantasselite is sitting alongside nice light yellow-green Variscite spheres are very nice. Sometimes large plates can be found covered with flat rosettes of Vantasselite. Apart from Vantasselite Wavelite is especially abundant on the dumps. Opportunities for finding good specimens of Vantasselite on the dumps near Bihain are still quite good today and Bihain remains the best locality delivering the best examples of Vantasselite worldwide.
[Harjo Neutkens]


Vantasselite
Belgium
Luxembourg Province, Stavelot Massif, Vielsalm, Ottré

Can anyone help us with information and photographs of specimens from this locality?


Vantasselite
Germany
Hesse, Wetzlar, Weilburg, Esserhausen, Mark Mine

A small abandoned iron mine.
Located near Essershausen, about 5 km SE of Weilburg/Lahn.

Can anyone help us with information and photographs of specimens from this locality?


Vantasselite
Germany
North Rhine-Westphalia, Sauerland, Meschede, Bestwig, Föckinghausen Quarry

Can anyone help us with information and photographs of specimens from this locality?


Vantasselite
Japan
Honshu Island, Kinki region, Mie Prefecture, Iseji

Can anyone help us with information and photographs of specimens from this locality?


[Harjo Neutkens 2009]



Click here to view Best Minerals V and here for Best Minerals A to Z and here for Fast Navigation of completed Best Minerals articles.]]> Harjo Neutkens Best Minerals V Mon, 23 Apr 2012 02:40:08 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,88,129415,129415#msg-129415 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,88,129415,129415#msg-129415
Ideally what we want to know about each significant mineral from each locality is:

1. What is the largest crystal of the mineral that the locality has produced?
2. What do the best specimens from this locality look like and where can one be seen?
3. Does the locality produce a variety of different kinds of specimens of this species, and what do the best of each type look like and how many of them were found etc.
4. What are the associated minerals found with this species and what is its geological setting?
5. How abundant are these specimens and when were they found? A type locality? In other words, how rare are they.
6. How do they compare to other specimens of the same mineral from other localities?
7. How much is it worth. This should probably be optional, but in cases where specimens are worth thousands of dollars we should probably say something of the value of these things.
8. What kind of care and feeding do these specimens require? Are they delicate, radioactive, unstable, color changeable etc.?
9. Are the specimens commonly faked, and if so, how to tell if they are?
10. Are there any interesting stories relating to the collecting of these specimens or their discovery as a new mineral?

Of course this is in reality impractical, but if we keep these questions in mind, we will do a lot better job when writing about them.]]> Rock Currier Best Minerals V Fri, 06 Mar 2009 11:29:19 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,88,116227,116227#msg-116227 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,88,116227,116227#msg-116227 Best Minerals V and here for Best Minerals A to Z and here for Fast Navigation of completed Best Minerals articles.


Can you help make this a better article? What good localities have we missed? Can you supply pictures of better specimens than those we show here? Can you give us more and better information about the specimens from these localities? Can you supply better geological or historical information on these localities?


Vlasovite
Na₂ZrSi₄O₁₁ monoclinic & triclinic
Canada
Quebec, Temiscamingue, Villedieu Township, Sheffield Lake, Kipawa Complex.

Vlasovite, Eudialyte 2cm high	© 2001 John H. Betts

Vlasovite in Eudialyte 3.5cm tall	© 2001 John H. Betts

Vlasovite is a rare fluorescent mineral which makes it of interest to collectors. The largest specimens contain crystals (lenses of pure material) up to 15 cm but fractured and cracked. These crystals are found in a matrix of potash feldspar and eudialite. In large crystals vlasovite is pale brown, but the smaller crystals always appear silvery owing to internal reflection from the excellent {010} cleavage planes.₁They came from a place called the vlasovite pit which was collected by the Canadian National Museum. Another pit was called the eudialyte pit and here the best specimens rich in eudialyte associated with vlasovite eyes, rimed with gittinsite which is the type locality for that mineral. The largest “eyes” measure up to about 2x3 inches but are more commonly about a half inch in diameter. It fluoresces a butter yellow under short-wave ultraviolet light. The pit is about 10x30 feet and about eight feet deep. The material appears to have been worked out. The material is a honey yellow color. About 400 lbs. of specimens (about 40 flats) were collected by Derryl MacFarlane . In the Kola peninsula it occurs only as tiny grains of material.₂

The mineral was found in surface workings. Discovered in 1955 by a Canadian government airborne radiometric survey. It was originally thought to be a uranium deposit but it turned out to be only rich in thorium. Unical company, a subsidiary of US Moly Corp, the company that mines Mountain Pass, California was interested in it for the zirconium and yttrium. It turned out not to be rich enough to make a mine. They cleared out about five acres on the shore of the lake for a camp. They used a skidder to clear an approximate 3 km strip along the outcrop of the complex and striped down to bedrock every 250 meters and washed the surface clean. Sampling and drilling indicated it was not worthwhile to mine, but they spent about a million dollars on development. This gave them the mineral rights for 65 years. There were over fifty claims on the complex. Derryl MacFarlane got involved in working the deposit for specimens in 1991 and concentrated in working a rich eudialyte pegmatite in the complex. The associated minerals are eudialyte, agrellite, vlasovite, gittinsite, mosandrite (rinkite”), calcite richterite, white feldspar, fluorite, thorite, and galena. The only access to the deposit is by boat or helicopter.₁ The type locality is the Lovozero alkalic massif, Kola Peninsula, Russia where it occurs as irregular grains up to about 15 mm in diameter.
1. Canadian Mineralogist, Vol.12, P.211 The Occurrence of Vlasovite in Canada, J. Gittins, Elvira L. Gasparrini & S. G. Fleet.
2. Personal communication Darryl MacFarlane ~2005.
[Rock Currier 10 November 2008]



Click here to view Best Minerals V and here for Best Minerals A to Z and here for Fast Navigation of completed Best Minerals articles.]]> Rock Currier Best Minerals V Tue, 11 Nov 2008 12:02:43 +0000 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,88,116223,116223#msg-116223 http://www.mindat.org/forum.php?read,88,116223,116223#msg-116223 Best Minerals V and here for Best Minerals A to Z and here for Fast Navigation of completed Best Minerals articles.


Can you help make this a better article? What good localities have we missed? Can you supply pictures of better specimens than those we show here? Can you give us more and better information about the specimens from these localities? Can you supply better geological or historical information on these localities?


Vikingite
Ag₅Pb₈Bi₁₃S₃₀ monoclinic
Greenland, Ivigtut

Massive vikingite, 3 cm across.	© Knut Eldjarn

"Lamellar with an average grain size of 0.5mm. Twinning: On {010}; twin lamellae parallel to [001] often observed in polished section.₁ The mineral has been found at about a half dozen localities but was first found at Ivigtut and apparently most of them are little micro blebs in rocks.
1. Handbook of Mineralogy, Volume 1, Anthony, Bideaux, Bladh, Nichols, p557


Vikingite
United States
Washington, King County, Middle Fork of the Snoqualmie River, Pedro Claim.
A few rough, somewhat altered or coated crystals up to about 7x1x0.8 cm. exist in the collection of Lew Landers of Seattle Washington. He holds the claim on the place, which produces mostly quartz crystals which are his main interest. Occasionally some of the quartz pockets are associated with unusual metallic sulfide minerals. Mineral identification was by Bart Cannon on the microprobe. I got a small piece when I visited him, and we cut it in half at Bart’s house, took it down stairs and put it on his probe to identify it. Vikingite was the closest match. The piece I have has a small 1cm size crystal? on it. I would feel better if there was some more work done on these specimens to make their identity more certain.
[Rock Currier 10 November 2008]



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Vesuvianite idocrase
Ca₁₉(Al,Mg,Fe)₁₃Si₁₈O₆₈(O,OH,F)₁₀ tetragonal
There are a great many good localities for this mineral that need descriptions and we need a vesuvianite expert to step in here and help with general comments about the mineral and descriptions of the specimens from various localities. Dr. Joel Arem of Harvard and the Smithsonian, before fell into the flesh pots of commerce made a nice long list of Vesuvianite localities in his doctoral thesis.


Vesuvianite
USA
Maine, York Co. Sanford, Goodall Quarry

Vesuvianite, 2.8 cm across.	© Rob Lavinsky

Line drawings from this old locality have been used to illustrate many mineralogical texts and specimens from this locality are classics even though specimens from this locality have been surpassed by more impressive specimens from other localities. “Dark brownish green square prismatic crystals to 1”, in groups in calcite… .”₁ This means that the crystals are not freestanding and for display purposes the calcite must be removed, usually with dilute hydrochloric acid solution. At this deposit is a massive form of vesuvianite called egeran after Eger, Norway. “Egeran has frequently been reserved for massive material which can have a crudely columnar texture, usually with a radial texture. Due to the relatively low value of massive vesuvianite, you don’t see much even in ofd reference collections. …The dump has chunks of vesuvianite up to a 30 cm thick with no intergrown minerals. The massive stuff is usually featureless, although the masses can have crystal faces lining the vugs. I Have seen crystals 20 cm x 7 cm x 5 cm in clusters with other crystals. The color is a dark olive. Crystals are the same color. The contact zone is not very thick, perhaps only 3-4 m.”₃ “The…deposit, located off lower School Street (eastern end) in the Town of Sanford, Maine, is a classic example of the mineralized cal-silicates commonly encountered in northern New England. Variously known as the Goodall quarry, Goodall Farm mine, and Webster quarry.”₂ A Stephen Goodale a mineral enthusiast and college professor, also did a lot of work at the locality in the mid 1800s and his name is also associated with the locality and it is sometimes given that spelling. “The deposit consists of one primary and two smaller shallow pits. This locality has been a producer of collector-quality specimens for almost 150 years. It still offers promise to diligent collectors today. …The Sanford deposit is essentially a calc-silicate granofels with minor marble…bounded on all sides by the Lyman Pluton, an acidic non-foliated biotite granite.”₂ “There are three principal pits. The Webster prospect is named for John White Webster who first blasted at the locality sometime in the 1840’s. John White Webster was Irving Professor of Chemistry at Harvard University. In 1849, Webster was arrested for the murder of Francis Parkman to whom Webster was indebted to the level of one or two years equivalent of a professors salary. It is generally believed that Webster used some of this loan money to finance his mining in Sanford. Webster’s object was to acquire what was then some of the world’s finest, if not largest, terminated vesuvianite crystals. By the 1850’s crystallographers everywhere were illustrating their systematic mineralogy works with Sanford vesuvianite. As part of the suite of minerals there were andesine crystals…world-class clinozoisite (then identified as epidote)…and meionite (then called scapolite crystals. The dyke strikes to the Northwest toward a gravel pit. There are two other pits (the 200 meter prospect and the 600 meter prospect) along the strike which have produced good specimens and a variety of minerals including very nice low-iron titanite crystals. The names relate to how far from the Webster prospect the other prospects are. Currently, the most productive area is the 600 meter pit.₃ The locality is not much more than a few mostly filled in trenches in the woods although a newly opened site has been producing some specimens if you are willing to work long and hard for them.
1 Mineralogy for Amateurs, Sinkankas,1964 p 517
2 Mineralogical Record, Vol. 24, 1993, p 359-64.
3 Vandal King gösipmeister without equal and we love him dearly, personal communication 2002 .
[Rock Currier 10 November 2008]



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Vajdakite
(MoO₂)₂(H₂O)₂As₂³⁺O₅●H₂O monoclinic
Czech Republic

Vajdakite FOV 0.1cm	© 2008, JGW

Vajdakite FOV 0.7mm	© 2008, JGW

Vajdakite FOV 1cm	© Thomas Witzke

The city of Jáchymov (St. Joachimsthal) is located on the southern slope of the, Krušné hory Mountains (Erzgebirge) NW Bohemia, Czech Republic, central Europe. “Vajdakite forms minute acicular crystals or continuous crusts, which form the border of a strongly corroded veinlet. The crystals are translucent and may be easily overlooked. There color varies from gray-green, and aggregates of yellow-green crystals were observed in some cases. Crystals are lath shaped, and their size varies from 0.1 to 0.5 mm. Their termination is highly irregular with needle-like features. Rarely, crystal aggregates cover areas of several square centimeters. Laterally, the vajdakite gives way to gray-green scorodite in spherical and botryoidal aggregates. …Vajdakite is slightly soluble in water. …Vajdakite, one of the rarest secondary minerals at Jáchymov, has been found in only one place-on fractures in proximity to a vein approximately 5 cm thick. Vajdakite occurs with a strongly weathered, intimately intergrown mixture of pyrite, marcasite, nickelskutterduite, löllingite, and native As in the Geschieber vein, on the 12th level of the Svornost shaft. The mixture has partly to completely altered to a mixture of compact, gray-black scorodite (with metallic luster) and arsenolite. Other associated secondary minerals are parascorodite, kaňkiite, annabergite and köttigite. …Vajdakite is formed in an environment of concentrated sulfuric acid, in the presence of As₂O₃ in significant concentrations.”₁
The best specimen was a 4x5 cm with crystals of vajdakite up to 2 mm with a coverage of vajdakite covering about 1x1cm. There were about three such specimens. Crusts of closely packed smaller crystals were more common. The find consisted of about 20 specimens from the size of a thumbnail to about 4x5 cm. The original find was in a tunnel with granite walls and the portion of the tunnel where the vajdakite was found has collapsed and it is very unlikely that more material will be produced.₂ The matrix is unstable due perhaps to its acidic nature or moisture in the atmosphere. It tends to crumble. If you have a specimen of this material you should keep it in a well sealed glass bottle. At Jáchymov “Mining of silver ores started in 1516 and the first rich discoveries (the largest recorded piece of native Ag was 280 kg) were followed by a strong silver fever. Jáchymov was rapidly developing and its population reached 18,200 in 1534. Over the centuries, mining of Ag was followed by mining of Co, Ni, Pb, As, and Bi, and later by mining of U and Ra. Mining activities continued with interruptions until 1962 when the last mines were closed.₁
1. American Mineralogist., Vol.87, 2002, p983-4.
2. Joseph Vajdak, personal communication 2002.
[Rock Currier 10 November 08]



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Can you help make this a better article? A good description of the best Bolivian locality is badly needed.
Can you help make this a better article? What good localities have we missed? Can you supply pictures of better specimens than those we show here? Can you give us more and better information about the specimens from these localities? Can you supply better geological or historical information on these localities?


Valentinite
Sb₂O₃ orthorhombic
Here will go a general description of Valentinite specimens.


Valentinite
Luxembourg
Goesdorf commune, Goesdorf, Antimony mine

Valentinte FOV 0,2cm	© Harjo

Valentinite FOV 0,2cm	© JDehove

Old Sb mine, started in the 14th century (or even Roman times), closed in 1938 (1944 according to Filella et al., 2009).
Located 1 km east of the Village of Goesdorf on a hill called Weissenstein ('white stone').
Since June 2006 an excavation is underway at Goesdorf as part of an archaeological-mineralogical project of the National Natural History Museum of Luxembourg, it is not allowed to look for minerals there any more.


Valentinite
Canada
Newfoundland, Glenwood, Beverbrook Mine

“The valentinite crystals were all micros about 2-3mm. They occurred in vugs of quartz, also micro crystals. The biggest vug was about 2-3 cm. No other minerals as far as I can remember were associated with it. Not much was collected despite the fact there were about 25 collectors at the site. I think the problem was we were unaware of where to find the specimens. We concentrated on the massive stibnite in hope of finding crystals of that mineral. …As far as the amount of valentinite that was collected, maybe 1/5 if a flat. Not much but I suspect that it is more abundant than that but not necessarily common.₁ All the material was collected from surface outcrops. The Beverbrook mine was a modern, efficient mine operated for about six months before cheap antimony from China caused it to close. It was a very rich mine and the mining encountered masses of stibnite forty feet thick according to Erich. Crystals of stibnite were found but apparently none were save. At some time in the future this mine will certainly produce some interesting specimens.
1. Erich Grundel, Arlington Virginia, personal communication 2003.
[Rock Currier 10 November 2008]



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