Some unusual specimens from the Oujda area, specifically from Touissit. These are aggregates of sphalerite crystals, of an intense brown color, with reddish transparencies, good luster, which are dotted with small chalcopyrite and pyrite crystals, disposed on a dolomite matrix, with an aesthetic contrast. Just arrived (March 2020) after our trip through Moroccan lands.

Size: 5.5 x 5.4 x 3 cm.
Main crystal: 1.2 cm.
Found in 02/2020

Some unusual specimens from the Oujda area, specifically from Touissit. These are aggregates of sphalerite crystals, of an intense brown color, with reddish transparencies, good luster, which are dotted with small chalcopyrite and pyrite crystals, disposed on a dolomite matrix, with an aesthetic contrast. Just arrived (March 2020) after our trip through Moroccan lands.

Size: 6.2 x 5 x 4.8 cm.
Main crystal: 2.5 cm.
Found in 02/2020

Old specimen of native arsenic, forming botryoidal aggregates, with an intense gray color slightly bronze. These specimens were known locally as "scherbenkobalt" (pieces of cobalt). Note that this mine is the Type Locality of the annabergite. A difficult German mineral classic to find from this locality, an old silver and cobalt mine, worked from around 1650 until 1852 and reworked between 1856 and 1859.

Size: 4.5 x 4 x 2.8 cm.

Group of rhodochrosite crystals with a uniform pink color, with well-defined rhombohedron echeloned and scalenohedron forms. Good gemmy transparence. They are accompanied by other smaller rhodo crystals. On a solid matrix with quartz crystals with inclusions and manganese oxides.

Size: 6.5 x 3.5 x 3.4 cm.
Main crystal: 6 mm.

Group of rhodochrosite crystals with a uniform pink color, with well-defined rhombohedron echeloned and scalenohedron forms. Good gemmy transparence. They are accompanied by other smaller rhodo crystals. On a solid matrix with quartz crystals with inclusions and manganese oxides.

Size: 4.8 x 3.2 x 3.2 cm.
Main crystal: 5 mm.

Botryoidal aggregates of coronadite, with greasy luster and color between deep dark gray to almost black. It is a very old specimen from this Moroccan locality. Not easy to find samples from this mine in the market. With the Montal typed label.

Size: 7.5 x 7.2 x 6 cm.
Found in 1997.

Col. M. Marí & A. García, #0.095

Hidalgoite specimen from this classic Spanish mine. It appears as olive-green coatings, forming aggregates of tiny crystals. Collected in 1999 by M. Marí and A. García. The Estrella mine is located in the Majadillas hill, in the extreme south of the municipality of Pardos, in Guadalajara. It is an old copper and silver mine whose exploitation dates back to the 17th century, with its maximum activity being in the mid-19th century coinciding with the splendor of the nearby Hiendelaencina mines.

Size: 6.7 x 3.8 x 2 cm.
Found in 1999.

Col. M. Marí & A. García, #0.131
Classic locality

Bolivarite is a very rare aluminium phosphate, related to evansite. In this specimen white bolivarite is filling vugs of a limonite matrix. This mineral was found as crusts and as a filling of cracks in some granitic rocks a few km from Pontevedra (Spain), on the road to Campo Lameiro. Its discoverers, Fernandez Navarro and Castro Barea, named it as a tribute to the eminent Spanish entomologist, exiled in Mexico after the Spanish Civil War, Ignacio Bolivar y Urrutia.

Size: 3.3 x 2.2 x 2.1 cm.

Rich group of prismatic pyromorphite crystals, of an intense green color and forming radial aggregates. This specimen comes from this not well-known mine, one of the most remote in central Wales. The first works date from 1854, and continued to be exploited intermittently until 1896. Total registered production is 3271 tons of lead ore. Sphalerite and marcasite are relatively common species, while pyromorphite is rare. The specimen comes from the former Joan Astor collection and was purchased from Montal in 1977. With old labels.

Size: 5 x 4 x 2.8 cm.
Main crystal: 5 mm.
Found in 1970's.

Col. Joan Astor.

Group of prismatic baryte crystals, doubly terminated and well defined, with good luster and transparency. They are disposed very aerially on the matrix. The history of the Silius mines begins in the first decades of the 20th century, particularly in 1916, when the first research permits were registered for the galena. It was in the early 1950s that the focus was on major fluorite outcrops and in 1953 the first company to obtain the mining concession for the exploitation of the rich fluors of fluorite and galena was created, the Mineraria Silius SpA, active until 2006.

Size: 6.5 x 5.5 x 4.5 cm.
Main crystal: 20 mm.

Very aesthetic and good sized specimen of hollandite, with stalactitic botryoidal structures, velvety and intense almost black gray. A quality piece from this classic Moroccan mine.

Size: 10 x 6 x 5.5 cm.
Found in 2019.

Group of cubic fluorite crystals, between translucent and transparent, with a deep green color with delicate dichroism under sunlight. The crystals are interpenetrated and showing geometric color and inclusions zoning. Very fluorescent under LW-UV and SW-UV. New locality/area for fluorite from Madagascar.

Size: 10 x 4.6 x 3.4 cm.
Main crystal: 2.3 cm.
Found in 2018.

Fluorescent under LW-UV and SW-UV lights

Group of cubic fluorite crystals, between translucent and transparent, with a deep green color with delicate dichroism under sunlight. The crystals are interpenetrated and showing geometric color and inclusions zoning. Very fluorescent under LW-UV and SW-UV. New locality/area for fluorite from Madagascar.

Size: 8.6 x 6.9 x 5.2 cm.
Main crystal: 3 cm.
Found in 2018.

Fluorescent under LW-UV and SW-UV lights

Group of cubic fluorite crystals, between translucent and transparent, with a deep green color with delicate dichroism under sunlight. The crystals are interpenetrated and showing geometric color and inclusions zoning. Very fluorescent under LW-UV and SW-UV. New locality/area for fluorite from Madagascar.

Size: 6.8 x 6.8 x 5.6 cm.
Main crystal: 2.4 cm.
Found in 2018.

Fluorescent under LW-UV and SW-UV lights

As M. Calvo indicates in his work (Minas y mInerales de España), in the area of Bedures hill (or Vidures), in the municipality of Vegadeo, there are several mining works, some of them very ancient, in which various lead mineral species have been described and among them, pyromorphite stands out. This piece we propose, found by chance in a mineral show far from the mine that saw it born, shows a matrix of milky quartz, with iron oxides and a black layer of coronadite in one side. We can observe also several crystals of green pyromorphite on the surface. Some form divergent aggregates, others isolated, but with an intense green color, with zoning in some of them. They show hexagonal prisms truncated by pinacoidal faces and parallel growth aggregates. A very rare specimen for this Spanish locality.

Size: 5.5 x 4.8 x 4 cm.

As M. Calvo indicates in his work (Minas y mInerales de España), in the area of Bedures hill (or Vidures), in the municipality of Vegadeo, there are several mining works, some of them very ancient, in which various lead mineral species have been described and among them, pyromorphite stands out. This piece we propose, found by chance in a mineral show far from the mine that saw it born, shows a matrix of milky quartz, with iron oxides and, on it, a black layer of coronadite. We can observe also several crystals of green pyromorphite dot its surface. Some form divergent aggregates, others isolated, but with an intense green color, with zoning in some of them. They show hexagonal prisms truncated by pinacoidal faces and parallel growth aggregates. A high quality and very rare specimen for the locality.

Size: 12.0 x 9.7 x 6.6 cm.
Main crystal: 3 mm.

Very aesthetic group of deep green epidote fan-shaped aggregates on matrix. Epidotes have a good luster and intense green colour. There are some gemmy quartz crystals emerging from the epidote. The original label we will send to the buyer indicates that those crystals are clinozoisite, but recent studies show that all the analyzed specimens are epidote (Calvo, M., Subías, I. (2017): Epidote (not clinozoisite) and andradite garnet from Los Serranos quarry, Cabezo Negro, Albatera, Alicante. Mineral Up, 4:44-47).

 

Size: 6.8 x 6.2 x 4.3 cm.
Main crystal: 1 cm. aggr.
Found in 2012.

An unusual specimen of aragonite "flos ferri", found in 1996 at the Gloria mines, in Córdoba. Stalactitic recurved forms, brilliant and with a snowy white color to slightly green-bluish in the internal parts of the specimen. They are disposed on a matrix with colourless fluorite and traces of malachite. Not easy to see samples like this from this mine.

Size: 9.3 x 6.6 x 4.8 cm.
Found in 1996.

Classic locality

A classic old-time pyromorphite specimen, showing acute hexagonal prisms of beige colour to colorless, brilliant and satin-wet look, forming aesthetic rosettes on the quartz matrix. This specimen is from the famous Rosenberg mine, in Bad Ems, Germany, closed since 1963. It is accompanied by a typed label by Juan Montal, a well-known Catalan mineral dealer from Vilafranca del Penedés (Barcelona), who was active in the middle of the s. XX until the 1980s. The piece is very good for the locality and the label full of history. An European classic.

Size: 7.4 x 3.6 x 3.4 cm.
Main crystal: 3 mm.

Excol. Lluís Daunis & Maria Ruscalleda (Barcelona). Ex. Juan Montal (Vilafranca del Penedés).
Classic locality

Colorful specimen of arsenatian vanadinite crystals, in aggregates of hexagonal prismatic crystals, with hopper cavities on the pinacoidal faces. Intense shine, orange to brown, with zoning, transparent to translucent crystals. They stand out on a white matrix of calcite. An excellent specimen of this Mexican mine.

Size: 6.5 x 5.3 x 4.8 cm.
Main crystal: 6 mm.
Found in ±1989.

Classic locality

Many specimens of aragonite are seen, as "pinecone" shape, also isolated, but this specimen has an "I don't know what" that makes it different for me. An elliptical "pinecone" of prismatic, divergent aragonite crystals, which are grouped around a central axis, with more developed crystals. Different and very aesthetic. A classic from Spanish mineralogy.

Size: 8.4 x 5.0 x 4.8 cm.
Found in 2012.

Fluorescent under long wave UV

Excellent, sculptural, two-sided baryte "rose" from Oklahoma. Oxidized sand grains are included in the baryte crystal structure with colorful effect. Essentially a floater. The hole adds much aesthetics. Baryte was precipitated in interconnected voids in the rock, probably from barium-rich marine waters that covered the Permian Garber Sandstone during or shortly after its deposition about 250 million years ago. The rose-like concretions incorporated the iron-stained quartz sand grains and thus acquired the red color of the host Garber Sandstone (online). These are the official Oklahoma State Rock.
Very interesting article in Mineralogical Record July-August 2008.

Size: 6.2 x 4.6 x 4.2 cm.

Col. Arguijo (Barcelona).
Classic locality

Excellent, sculptural, two-sided baryte "rose" from Oklahoma. Oxidized sand grains are included in the baryte crystal structure with colorful effect. Essentially a floater. The hole adds much aesthetics. Baryte was precipitated in interconnected voids in the rock, probably from barium-rich marine waters that covered the Permian Garber Sandstone during or shortly after its deposition about 250 million years ago. The rose-like concretions incorporated the iron-stained quartz sand grains and thus acquired the red color of the host Garber Sandstone (online). These are the official Oklahoma State Rock.
Very interesting article in Mineralogical Record July-August 2008.

Size: 5.8 x 5.5 x 3.2 cm.

Col. Arguijo (Barcelona).

Hydromagnesite specimens from "Pedreres de l'Àngel" (Angel quarries), in Gualba (Barcelona), are a classic for the Catalan mineralogy. In this specimen we can observe some aggregates formed by radiated crystals, some of them of good size (more than 2 cm.), others smaller (up to 8 mm), very brilliant. Nowadays impossible to be found... This mines are a skarn due to contact metamorphism of Hercynian granodiorite and biotite granite into Cambrian marbles.

Size: 9.4 x 6.5 x 3.5 cm.
Found in 1980's.

Col. Arguijo (Barcelona).
Fluorescent under long wave UV

This good sized specimen from the late 80s belongs from the Arguijo collection, and it was mined in this famous "onubense" mine. It is a sulphide matrix partially covered by brilliant covellite microcrystals, very defined and visible. It has an intense metallic blue iridescence and this very characteristic color. It is accompanied by numerous crystals of native sulphur with curved faces, brilliance, translucent and showing a delicate yellow tone. It was mined from a sporadic finding in the Corta Atalaya, Minas de Riotinto. A unique occasion to obtain one of these "old" specimens.

Size: 8.5 x 7.7 x 4.6 cm.
Found in 1980's.

Col. Arguijo (Barcelona).
Classic locality