The No-Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

This thread was created as a place to share specimens that would be considered unworthy and lacking in some way. Of course beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so we will never all agree on this concept, but we can have fun trying!
So bring on your dogs, degenerates, IBU’s (Interesting but ugly) and anything else that qualifies such as buttuglyite, fuglyite, or leaverite. No specimen too lowly to post here.

When I decided to start this thread the first specimen that immediately came to mind was this one. There are many rare uglies and I have a number, but the one that sticks in my mind the most is this specimen of rheniite. Since the metallic flakes (dandruff!) are so small and the matrix is unsightly, it was my first choice to get things going.

Rheniite
Kudriavy (Kudryavyi) volcano, Iturup Island, Kuril Islands, Sakhalinskaya Oblast', Far-Eastern Region, Russia
Approx 22 x 20mm






I thought I would add some colour to the mix. This one certainly qualifies as a reject on many levels, although I think it could find a new life as a projectile if John S. ever ventured this way. Then again, maybe a nasty baryte would be preferable for that job. Got several of those to spare!

Crocoite
Dundas mineral field, Zeehan district, Tasmania, Australia
Approx 9 x 8cm

Sometimes you can’t help mother nature. Wish I knew how to get the crud off this piece.
Even if I could, the aqua has a big craze.

Beryl var Aquamarine, Muscovite, Albite
Gilgit-Baltistan (Northern Areas), Pakistan
Approx 9 x 6 x 4 cm
Crystal approx 1.5 x 1.3 cm



This one will not be a poster child anytime soon. The emerald is wormlike and is surrounded by rusty pyrites. Rotten apples anyone?

Beryl var Emerald, Pyrite
Mun. de Muzo Mine, Mun. de Muzo, Vasquez-Yacopí Mining District, Boyacá Department, Colombia
Approx 8.5 x 6 cm,
Crystal approx 13mm

Cerussite sixling Tsumeb. More like sickling. Nuff said.

Cerussite
Tsumeb Mine (Tsumcorp Mine), Tsumeb, Otjikoto (Oshikoto) Region, Namibia
Approx 3.5 x 3 cm






Ok, now let's see some of yours!

Ahh, I must be strange as I've not seen an ugly specimen in this thread yet! I don't really collect for aesthetics though (still like a pretty piece in my collection from time to time though). Will have to find a piece of ugly brown muck in the collection to post up, most of my minerals are of great interest to me but ugly to most others.

Will be interesting to see what gets shown off in this thread.

I would not call that Rheniite ugly..

And here is one from me. Small chip (1.5 x 1 cm) of Kryptonite (a.k.a. Jadarite) from Jadar Valley, Serbia. At least, I hope, it provides some protection against superheroes.

VISIBLE RHENITE !!!!!!!

Way prettier than Angelina Jolie's puffy lips in my opinion.

Bart

Oh, good! I've been waiting for this thread!

Here is the evil eye, keeping a lookout for John Stolz...


A 3.0 cm broken nodule of fine-grained hematite is host to a 1.5 cm lump of dull grey uraninite with some minor shiny black magnetite. The nodule has been weathered out of a fluorite - calcite - fluorapatite vein exposed on the surface. Though by no means will this win any beauty contests, it is an unusual association not previously described from the Richardson (Fission) Mine, nor from the Bancroft area in general.

Ontario minerals will win the ugly mineral contest every single day :) At least assuming Langban stuff is not allowed in.

Langban allowed! I will post one later. I deliberately left out Ontario minerals as to not to seem biased And I knew that I could count on others to measure up to the task. Thanks Maggie, for a great eye-opener!

...ooops 'scuse me--wrong thread

Stephanie'
Great thread, I think you'll find you've sparked something.
I'll post soon, going to have friends take my pictures.
Rheniite was 'approved' in '04 but it is not in Fleischer's Glossary in '08. Anyone know why?
It is ugly, but I'm envious. I have no Re for my periodic table collection, I've subbed MoS, since that is where most Re comes from...

John, There's no excuse for you... here comes the flying lead (crocoite projectile)

Next time it will be a baryte, promise.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/26/2012 03:40PM by Stephanie Martin.

In the middle of a snowstorm above the J&M adit back in October of 1984 I found molybdenite in the G or H zone chromitite area. I thought I had found the PGM bonanza of all time until I got home. The basin high above the Stillwater Pd / Pt mine was once a productive chromite mining area during WW II. I think there was a name for the townsite.

I wish I had taken photos of my poor little Jeepster snow plowing through the two to three foot snow drifts. If you are really going to get somewhere under difficult conditions make sure that you have limited slip differentials in your 4X4. Otherwise you will discover that your "four wheel drive" vehicle is ZERO WHEEL DRIVE !!! at some point.

Ed Mathez of the American Museum used my Stillwater molybdenites for his research on rhenium back 1986.

I may trouble him to provide his publications on that stuff.

There is no one with more tons of ugly minerals than me. Unless it is Tony Nickisher.

Bart



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/26/2012 04:11PM by Bart Cannon.

My uncle, an avid outdoorsman, was once passing through an area in Ontario (name unknown but probably Parry Sound area) where they were doing blasting and as a result it was snowing molybdenum. That would have been cool to see.

Mike - there's a rheniite available on ebay right now for you, only $848.00 LOL.

~steph

An interesting thread, but surely you are all looking in the wrong place. Species like elaterite, destinezite, diadochite or ripidolite and even things like dickite, kaolinite and nacrite will surely provide true candidates. Forget the superlatives 'amazing', 'stunning', 'unbelievable', has anyone ever seen one of these which even approaches 'good' ? Does anyone want to admit to having one of these species on their living room mantelpiece?

Rhenite by comparison is streets ahead!

Perhaps there should be a 'beauty contest' for the world's worst (but true) ripidolite etc.....

I would like to present one of my "ugly" Specimen. However, it is one of my most valuable specimen (I'm a Erzgebirge local collector). The specimen consists of Akathite with a little bit Arsenum, size 13 x 10 cm. On the specimen are small silver curls and little crystalls of Jodargyrite. The best however, I have the exact location of this find: Schlema, shaft No. 250, adit "Freital", level 390 m.

Uwe Ludwig

This might qualify as an IBU: Neogene limonite slowly replacing springs, axles and engine block of a car that was crushed and burned by a basalt flow, now incorporated as an industrial fossil in the basalt:

See following explanatory article: [www.mindat.org]

And if that isn't sufficiently "mineralogical", how about another IBU:
- tiny pellets of glauconite with a dark shiny surface that looks "polished" under the microscope. Common mineral, but what else is there to see from the tiny republic of Malta?



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/26/2012 07:11PM by Alfredo Petrov.

What is Akathite? Is this a typo for acanthite?

Rock Currier
Crystals not pistols.

Peter,
Sometimes kaolinite included inside quartz crystals would rate as attractive. There were many quartz crystals from the the White Queen mine at Pala that were cut in half to show pretty inclusions of kaolinite? Probably some of the minerals you list might have incarnations as pretty pseudomorphs after?? Has anyone ever analysed those fabulous "talc" pseudomorphs from Göpfersgrün, Bavaria, Germany? Are they really talc?

Rock Currier
Crystals not pistols.

Here is my contribution, an ugly beryl on a piece of rusty quartz.