Arsenatian Vanadinite - Nova Scotia, Canada

The images 383686 and 383684 are listed as Arsenatian Vanadinite from Nova Scotia. To my knowledge, vanadinite of any kind has not been reported from Nova Scotia before, and I have spent considerable time searching the literature for new minerals from this province. On top of that, the locality is only vaguely listed as Nova Scotia.

If better locality info cannot be provided, I find it a stretch to include a photo of an otherwise unreported mineral. Is there a way to request further info or retract the images?

Messages sent.

I checked the ref for Arsenatian Vanadinite and it is not on pg 895 of Vol 2 Dana 7 as posted here. I have never heard of Arsenatian any thing, but then I forget the recent IMA nomenclature changes. Arsenian Vanadinite or Endlichite are what I'm used to. These photos look more like mimetite than endlichite.

A Wilson Minerals is selling vanadinite on E-bay, and "item location" is listed as Lower Sackville, Nova Scotia. I wonder whether someone mistook "item location" as the "locality"?

Ronnie,
You are listed as an expert on Nova Scotia minerals with Mindat and have the authority to send complaint letters to the people who upload Nova Scotia images and to edit Nova Scotia images that are already in the database. Just click on the image and in the menu bar below the big image click on the Complain button and in the little box provided you can ask for the information you want. If you get no response you can consign the images to their user only gallery.

Rock Currier
Crystals not pistols.

Your kind silence encouraged me to google arsenatian: [en.wiktionary.org]. Live and learn. Arsenian indicates Arsenic presence and Arsenatian refers to presence of Arsenate! .

I absolutely dislike adjectival modifiers in the context of distinguishing mineral specimens and in my opinion they are meaningless. In my experience a lot this is BS and not based on analytical evidence. IMA recommended not using these modifiers (Bayliss et al. 2005 Can. Min. 43, 1429) and I do not think they have much useful purpose in MINDAT. It may have some merit in technical papers where the author(s) wants to emphasize that the mineral is x-bearing or x-rich. If somebody wants to use modifiers we should go along with the IMA rules and accept x-bearing or x-rich (in mineral descriptions) instead of old style adjectival modifiers.

Tend to agree with Lazlo. Lots of cases we should remove them.

I agree too. Unless the cut-off quantity is specified, names like "cuprian...", "arsenatian...", etc, are meaningless, as we don't know whether they are talking about the adjectival element being present as tens of weight percent or just ppm. The worst offenders are "auriferous..." and "palladian...", where the level of the element is not even detectable by microprobe at all.

The arsenatian vanadinites seem to have come about by making endlichite (which according to an old Dana should be arsenian vannadinite) a synonym. The As:V ration in endlichites tend to be around 1:1, so the arsenic content is fairly significant and it has a measurable effect on properties such as refractive index

If As:V tends to be around 1:1, then without a really good analysis we can't know whether it's As-rich vanadinite or V-rich mimetite. So probably best to delink the synonym attribution for endlichite and just keep it as an independent page, part of the apatite group.

Alfredo, surely you mean a vanadatian mimetite. I agree with Les. The IMA did the right thing discouraging this nonsense.

Hey everybody, it's me that posted this picture.

When I buy this specimen the label indicate that the sample came from of the Nova Scotia, but I think that comes from nevada in the USA , however I can't prove that.

good day.

Sebastien,

Given that the locality information is uncertain, I think the safest course of action would be to keep the photos in your personal gallery only.

I think that is a good idea, but how I can do it ?

Thanks Sebatian, I'll do it but I'll mention this thread in the caption with the comment that it is not from Nova Scotia. I'll also put your "allanite" there. I can't exactly tell if it is from a limestone stone quarry, but the minerals posted for it and your site photo suggest it. It is very doubtful that that is allanite and I'll put in the captioned that it is "unanalysed".

Sebatian, Check out the Chalk Mountain Mine: [www.mindat.org]

Sebastien,

The pictures you posted look very much like the Vanadinite and Descloizite found at the AO Prospect, (near) Barstow, San Bernardino Co., California, USA. See photos here: AO Prospect Pictures

I've collected this locality and was struck with the apparent similarity of the specimens in your photos to the material I found there.

Fred

Thank you very much for your answers.

This ''allanite'' come from gneiss quarry, but the specimen was find in calcite vein and was probably create by hydrothermal as the calcite matrix...

What do you think that it could be?

Where we can find allanite, what is its geological context. Thank you very much.

Sébastien

Hi Sébastien, Gneiss would be the country rock and seldom contains interesting crystallized specimens. You were right to check the veins cutting it. It is hard to say what your xl is. It does look like an amphibole, but it could be many things. Structurally Allanite is a rare earth epidote, so you may find it only where rare earth elements occur, like the calcite vein dyke occences in the Grenville province.