Hi Michael,
Thank you for writing and for sharing your photographs of your specimens. I've collected at the BVQ for years and wrote (with Rudy Tschernich) the paper on the BVQ cited in the Micro Probe, the newsletter of the Northwest Micro Mineral Study Group NWMMSG). This is a neat little locality and of all its collectable species, calcite (I don't really count exceedingly common clinochlore as a collectable species, though some specimens with their fuzzy black bumps and fingers are really quite neat) is the most common and among the most spectacular and varied of the treasures one can find. Of all those specimens you've offered, the one large appearing plate of yellow calcites on black clinochlore to my eye is the most spectacular. This of all the calcite generations is the most desirable (again to my eye) from the BVQ and when Hot-Pee yellow (not a technical term!), they are the best of the best. The hottest colored specimens will be close in hue to your specimen, but will be much brighter and will be in narrower, smaller crystals as compared to the monsters on your piece.
Other calcites from BVQ are less desirable if from no other perspective than color. Often in colors varying from clear to translucent whites, these are much more commonly encountered. The largest calcites from the BVQ go about an inch and are most often flattened simple rhombs.
Since your question is about value, the prices for these will not be much, a couple of bucks at best (though the yellows would demand a higher premium, though one still of minor monetary gain). For the valuable mineral at the BVQ, you want to focus on the copper!
Doug Merson has a fine photographic representation of the species the quarry produces entered into Mindat at this page... [
www.mindat.org]
Doug shows several coppers there and as can be seen, they can be quite showy and at times, even spectacular!!!! But... they are most often micro sized specimens (and thus also offer only limited financial gains). Copper can be found associated with clinochlore, calcite, stilbite and quartz.
Of all the specimens I've personally collected there, I have a chalcocite associated with stilbite that is just the very best... Yummy in a Rock!!!
As a PREMIUM tip for collecting at BVQ, my best is to simply NOT GO if the sun is NOT shining. The copper is almost 100% invisible on an overcast day and all those little vesicles that appear empty under less than optimum lighting conditions may actually harbor treasures galore that are being missed!
The Crescent formation is our local treasure house for those things crystalline (I live on the Olympic Peninsula) and where it is being cut and or exploited, there is the potential of specimen acquisition and production.
I hope this helps and that you continue to find more goodies at the BVQ, after all, who knows what the next swing of the hammer will produce!!!
All the very best Michael. Take care,
John
