The Best from Down Under

Hi all,

This is the first time I've read this thread. I think I've been able to pick up what I missed out on by reading the others comments.

Anyway, here is a picture of gold found last week. The size of the specimen is 40 x 30mm. It is one of several similar sized specimens plus many small bits that came from a lump of quartz. The quartz was about the size of a Baseball and found north of Bathurst. Unfortunately not found by me, again.





Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 07/09/2011 11:49AM by Mark Rheinberger.

It's really great to see so many good shots from collectors outside of Australia.

Toby - thanks for providing the info for Stephanie. When we (finally) move over, you and I need to go out collecting! We are planning to live in Ballarat so won't be too far away from you.

Regards
Steve

Moving to Ballarat hey! We are only about 40km south and I work in Ballarat a couple of days a week. It would be great to catch up for a dig, so many areas to look around here. I have met a fair few prospectors here but only one mineral man so far, most gold folk don't understand the need to stop and inspect every tiny, ugly bleb of non-gold that turns up digging

You would be more than welcome to join me in my somewhat obsessive search for gold crystals too (been here since February, crystals recovered so far=one specimen). Also as you would know there is plenty of interesting volcanics and basalt plains to the south and granite intrusions in all directions so great potential for all sorts of interesting minerals.

Hi Steve

Coming to the big island huh. !!

I thought you had just finished your new home - so now you won't get to enjoy it .. or was it that fence across the road !!

I'll be in Launceston in a couple of weeks for three days but unfortunately not enough time to make it further South.


Cheers

Stephanie

Yes that Silver certainly looks as if its from Elura.

You will find that that form is very fragile and will probably loose a few bits on the edges over time.

Cheers



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/26/2011 11:00AM by Keith Compton.

Beautiful specimens everyone! Mark R, thanks for sharing that show stopping gold in quartz!

Keith - thanks for the confirm. Much appreciated.

regards,
stephanie

It may not be the best from down under but it is the 'freshest' specimen in my collection, this little piece came off one of our paddocks yesterday evening while I had a brief metal detect before dark. It is small but shows crystal growth so I'm very happy with it. I've got fat fingers too so it is a little bigger than it look here!

Berringa, Victoria Australia.

Hey Toby

Nice to be able to find gold in your back paddock

Cheers



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/27/2011 01:17PM by Keith Compton.

Hi all,

Thanks for shearing your nice specimens. Congrats to all.

Here's my only down under specimen. Size about 70 mm.

Zenjoy.

Take care and best regards.

Paul.

Hi Everyone, I've just got back from a holiday overseas - Britain and Europe - and I see that all hell broke loose on this thread. The main idea was to highlight the minerals from my part of the world, Australia and hopefully see what other collectors around the world had in their collections. Over the past 230 years a lot of good quality samples have left our shores to museums abroad. This I definitely know as I have just seen the collection on show at the Natural History Museum in London and I did note that there are a number of very nice Australian pieces there (and they claim to only have 10% of the collection on show). My home town is Broken Hill, and at the moment we are in the process of raising the funds to purchase the Milton Lavers collection so that it can be retained in the city. It is true that not much new material is coming out of Australia and this is primarily due to the mining methods used. Here in Broken Hill, which is famous for the quality and variety of mineral available, we do not see much at all. The only times when minerals are preserved are during developmental works where the mining is at a smaller scale and the miners are able to extract them. This does not happen very often, and the mining company does not approve of this action either. Time is money. I have tried to encourage the companies to preserve the minerals, however deaf ears are usually the response. There is some hope as CBH with their Rasp Mine soon to open, may be employing a person to salvage the mineral samples on behalf of the company. This sort-of happened during the open cut era of the 1980's when the chief geologist was also a collector and had the power to redirect the mining and spend some time retrieving minerals. Hopefully the company will follow through and have a person on board. Just imagine if they hit another zone with world class Raspite and Stolzite. Anyway, lets focus on what Australian minerals people have in their collections and share them with the rest of the mindat community.

PS: Just in case Samuel is suspicious of my credentials - not only am I educated, but I educate and hopefully inspire others. I am a high school geology teacher, with 20 years experience, and the president of the Broken Hill Mineral Club. I started collecting minerals when I was a child and my hobby is now my obsession. My collection covers localities from all over the world and I know from what I've seen that Australian material holds it's own against other countries. We have a lot of unexplored country and a small population, so who knows what is yet to be found. Hopefully the powers that be will see that the mineral specimen heritage is as important as the mineral dollar and the samples will be protected.

Back to the Australian minerals, here are a couple from Whim Creek in Western Australia. A cluster of malachite pseudomorphs with some small wulfenites scattered through and a nice sample of wulfenite on goethite.

I'm posting this one here and in Gail's Faves thread, it is just so cute...

This specimen was labelled simply wulfenite on calcite from Avondale mine in the Flinders Ranges, South Australia, and has three or four small but well-formed wulfenite crystals here and there. It was only when I looked closely that I saw the colourless fluorite cube perched on the tip of one of the wulfies. Very cute. Photo width 2mm. ex Joan Lamond Micro Collection. Collected personally by Joan on a Minsoc field trip in 1993.


Regards
Steve

A nice little diamond from the Bingara-Copeton area of New South Wales. You don't see these very often. This crystal is about 4mm across.


Regards
Steve

Hi All,
I have also just had time to look at all the fabulous images of minerals from "Down under". Thanks for posting ! Australian minerals are among my favourites after having visited the country a few times and traded with generous collectors. The continent has a great mineral heritage both for aesthetic minerals and rarities. I will just include a few pictures of specimens in my collection showing minerals not highlighted so far.

The first is a 5 cm specimen of glubular Quartz xl aggregates on Stellerite from Coonabarabran, NSW. Common minerals but an unusual and very aesthetic combination. Usually you see Zeolites formed on top of Quartz - and not the other way around !

I also include a photo of a 7x7 cm specimen with deep red xls of Variscite on iron ore from the famous Iron Monarch mine and a closeup of a xl from the specimen.

Lastly I include photos of 2 Australian rarities I am proud of having in the collection. The first is a 1 mm xl-group of Ulrichite xls with globular Turquoise from Lake Boga and the last is a 3 mm xl-group of Morinite on a specimen from Mnt. Cleveland, Tasmania that also hosts colourless, pseudooctahedral xls of Coulsellite - named after one of the very friendly Australian collectors I have had the pleasure to know - the late Ruth Coulsell of Melbourne.


Keep posting photos of specimens from "down under" !

Knut



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/13/2011 09:34PM by Knut Eldjarn.

Today's contribution is a Wulfenite from Whim Creek. Lustrous, yellowish-orange dipyramidal Wulfenite crystals to 5 mm are scattered on rusty botryoidal Hematite matrix. 85.0 x 31.0 x 17.0 mm overall.

G'day All, Am posting a few photos of an excellent gold specimen. It was found by my son on our lease18 months ago. We think there is 20 plus ozs of gold in it . At the moment it is to big to do a S.G.
I have seen a lot of dendritic/crystaline gold over the years, this has to be the best. it size is 15cms.x10cms.
It gave me a pleasent feeling to remind him, that we are partners.
regards,
fred.

Three more photos of the same piece.
f.

A piece from a very seldom collected area in Western australia, The Donnybrook goldfield in the south-west of W.A. Its measurements are 2cms.x1cm. This type of gold can only be won by panning and it has to be done gently. If your luck is in you could get a dendrite of gold var. electrum. Only seen two and they were spectacular. The photo is not the best as it is a copy of a photo (pre. digital).

These two crystalline nuggets were joined, but come apart as we dug them up. The big one 12 ozs. and the smaller one 6 ozs.
They were found at Southern Cross, or the yilgarn goldfield. We tried to sell them to collectors for 6 months @ $AU600.00 an ounce, And no takers. So the perth mint got them. Again copies from a non digital photo.

Something different, 3 glendonites from the gascoyne river, Carnarvon. They range in size 15cms. to 10 cms round.