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?
Meyerhofferite
Ca2(H3B3O7)2· 4H2O triclinic
Of the various kinds of Meyerhofferite specimens found thus far it would appear that the ones collectors most favor are the pseudomorphs after Inyoite (picture #1). I may be biased in my view because early in my youth I helped dig a wonderful pocket of these specimens in the Mt. Blanco mine in Death Valley. This mine also produced specimens of the other common type of Meyerhofferite, or primary Meyerhofferite as we call it. This is the cross hatched/reticulated almost honey comb variety that is exampled in picture 3 from Turkey below. I think that Turkey has produced the best of these specimens. Specimens containing crystals of this kind of Meyerhofferite up to 4 cm are said to be known.
1
1.Handbook of Mineralogy, Anthony, Bideaux, Bladh and Nichols Vol V. p450.
[Rock Currier 2009]
Meyerhofferite
Argentina
Salta, Sijes, Monte Azul deposit
All the specimens I have seen of Meyerhofferite I have seen from this locality are slightly altered crystals of Inyoite where enough of the Inyoite has been replaced by tiny white prismatic crystals of Meyerhofferite to render their usual transparent white/translucent nature mostly white. But in reality the bulk of the specimen is still Inyoite. Some of these specimens are very handsome and some people may feel that these are the most desirable kind of Meyerhofferite specimens to have. The one shown here, picture #2 is about as good as they get. Some very few specimens show both the unaltered and partially altered crystals on the same specimen. A very few others show transparent unaltered Inyoite with little sparkling whitish primary Meyerhofferite crystals growing in their interiors (picture 2.5) This deposit is is a little surface working where some heavy equipment has gone in and made some trenches and mined out some tons of material for processing into borate products. Several lots of Inyoite specimens were collected by various people, mostly visiting American geologists that worked for the company that was exploiting the deposits for industrial use. Probably the best material collected was done by Joe Siefke who was working for US Borax at the time. Probably less than 500 specimens total were collected before the pocket area was mined out. But at least a few specimens were saved from the mill and these will be with the collecting fraternity, probably for hundreds of years, long after this little barren patch of the Altiplano is long forgotten.
[Rock Currier 2009]
Meyerhofferite
Turkey
Marmara Region, Balikesir Province, Bigadiç
It would appear that many wonderful borate specimens have been produced at Bigadiç, one of the oldest known Turkish borate localities. They certainly appear to have produced the best specimens of the crosshatched/reticulated varieties. We need someone to tell us about the Meyerhofferite specimens from this locality.
Meyerhofferite
USA
California, Inyo Co., Death Valley, Furnace Creek District, Black Mts, Mount Blanco mine
This locality is barely a mine, probably more accurately it should be called a prospect. It has a short little tunnel, less than 100 feet long with a couple of little crosscuts that branch to the right. It was in these little cross cuts, probably not more than 10 feet long that produced the wonderful specimens of Meyerhofferite pseudomorphs after Inyoite as well as a few specimens of the reticulated variety. The pockets of pseudomorphs that were encountered, probably no more than two or three pockets of less than a meter in extent produced all of the known specimens of this type. Probably less than 500 specimens all total, though one of them, a fine specimens measured perhaps ~50cm in diameter. The specimens from the tops of the pocket showed specimens of chalk white nature, pictures #5, 6, & 7, while those from the bottom had a more sparkling nature, picture #1 due to the present of tiny crystals well crystallized Meyerhofferite growing on the pseudomorphed crystals. Perhaps the largest of the pseudomorphed Inyoite crystals measured ~12 cm across.
[Rock Currier 2009]
Rock Currier
Crystals not pistols.
Edited 7 time(s). Last edit at 07/05/2009 12:24PM by Rock Currier.
