An Accidental Discovery Opened Up Mining in the Canadian Shield.
The Canadian Shield is the original heart, or core, of the North American continent. The rocks date to the earliest millennia of the planet.
Today, scores of mines operate in and around the Shield, extracting a vast variety of useful metals and minerals. The region has given up everything from gold to silver, nickel and diamond and shows no signs of running out of useful minerals. This was not always the case; just over 100 years ago, little mining was going on for a number of reasons. The area was vast, remote and inhospitable. Heavy snows and bitter cold during the long winters, and wild animals, voracious mosquitoes, and black flies during the warm months discouraged all but the brave or foolhardy. Even in the 1970s, when I ventured 100 miles north of Montreal in early June in search of fluorescent minerals, I found myself in the midst of the black fly season. I itched for the rest of that summer. Imagine what it must have been like prospecting the region in the 1800s!
Then in 1903, something happened that changed mining and prospecting in the Canadian Shield forever. Silver was accidentally discovered 300 miles north of Toronto. In a few short years, massive silver production—exceeded only by that of Mexico and the United States—financed the search for and discovery of countless valuable mineral deposits across northern Canada, where mining is still ongoing today. How did all this happen?
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة March 2017 من Rock&Gem Magazine.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 8500 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك ? تسجيل الدخول
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة March 2017 من Rock&Gem Magazine.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 8500 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
MORGAN HILL POPPY JASPER
In California, there are very few places to collect semi-precious stones. Many locations from the past have been either exhausted of the material or the land has been developed.
THE ACORN
The briolette gemstone has the same design attributes of a regular gemstone, however, the pavilion is elongated and the crown is usually domed. This is perfect for an elegant pendant, earrings or a pendulum.
HOW TO PUT A PROTECTIVE CAP ON A CAB
To protect a specimen cab, often a cap is needed. In my case, I had a slab with the because of the color of the background and the pattern. This background had a more silicified consistency than most sandstones. It had no graininess like most sandstone, so I'm inclined to compare it to a jasper. The pattern was typical of a dendrite.
The Resilient Revival of Anne Brontë & Her Stones
For the first time, the Anne Brontë rock collection underwent complete description and identification, and along with Professor Hazel Hutchison of Leeds University and Dr. Enrique Lozano Diz at ELODIZ (a company specializing in spectroscopy analysis), an analysis of that collaboration, Anne Brontë and Geology: A Study of her Collection of Stones, was published in April 2022 in Volume 47, Issue 2 of the peer-reviewed journal, Brontë Studies & Gazette.\"
Amazing Women with Rock-Solid Careers
Explorers, Geologists, Educators & Jewelry Makers...
The Case of the Bleeding Glacier
It's a gory sight called Blood Falls. Ever since British geologist Thomas Griffith Taylor first noted it in 1911, it has been a mystery.
Asteroid Samples Are Said to Hold Invaluable Secrets
If Only Scientists Can Pop the Lid!
Paleontologists Embrace a New Method for Seeing Fossils within Rock
Fossil bone can be delicate. Attempts to remove it from a hard rock matrix by picking and scratching or etching with acids can be time-consuming and/or may end up obliterating that which you hope to study.
Need a Map of the Ocean Floor?
Call in the Seals!
A Step Closer to Hydrogen, the "Climate-Friendly Fuel"
As I reported last June, the world is racing to find sustainably renewable, nonpolluting sources of energy to replace our carbon-based reserves of coal, oil and gas.