I have been interested in mines and minerals from an early age and started collecting minerals at around 10 years of age.

Since my mid teens I have also made a concerted effort at photographically recording mine site in Cornwall as well as collecting historic photographs of the mines.

Starting from the early 1980's I have visited almost every mine site in Cornwall where visible remains are to be found.

I had a break from collecting shortly after graduating from the Camborne School of Mines in 1993 as a mining geologist, but, since 2004 I decided to get back into the hobby.

Since graduating I work as a mining consultant in Cornwall, mainly dealing with the physical legacy of past mining activity relating to development, as well as the petrographic analysis of local concretes to check for the presence of potentially deleterious aggregates such as mining waste in their composition.

Following returning to the hobby, the major difference is that I now specialise in collecting tin and tungsten mineralisation principally from Cornwall and Devon - although I am adding a sub collection of specimens from the Rooiberg Tin District in South Africa as I frequently visit friends who live about an hours drive from this locality, and if examples of this type of mineralisation from other localities interest me I will add them as well.

This specialisation gives scope for a considerable collection showing variations in mineralisation styles from different localities, as well as some interesting associations with other minerals.

Having said that, if I happen across other minerals of interest while collecting, then it will come home as well.

I am steadily uploading photographs of a number of specimens from my collection.

Not all of the specimens shown are of stunning beauty, however, my objective is to show examples of Cassiterite and Wolframite (and some other minerals as well) from a number of Cornish localities and, in the instances where specimens are self collected, illustrate to the newer generation of collectors the sort of specimens they can realistically expect to collect currently in Cornwall.

Of course the occasional truly excellent specimen will turn up, but for the most part the material is representative of locality, but no less interesting for that.