Have you made it up to Mt Ida in Arkansas to rockhound for Quartz yet? There are numerous Pay-to-Dig mines up in the area around Hot Springs where you pay a reasonable day fee & collect all the quartz you can carry home with you! It’s a fun and educational activity for the whole family!
Thank You to our member Auston F. for sharing some of the fantastic Quartz Crystals he collected during his most recent trip to Arkansas! Hope these pics inspire you to go try it out!
Do you have any pics of your favorite Rockhounding trip? Let us know!
Hey there everybody! Just here with a few DGMS Club and Shop updates……
DGMS SHOP IS OPEN !!!
We have done so much work making the Shop safe for all qualified members to come in and get out of the house!
Our shop Supervisor Lynn has made a couple videos to share with you what COVID precautions we’ve have taken to make it as safe and comfortable as possible!
This is the new Rock Shop Sign-Up for July and August. [ We’re using SignUp.com (the leading online SignUp and reminder tool) to organize our upcoming SignUps. Here’s how it works in 3 easy steps: 1) Click this link to see our SignUp on SignUp.com: https://signup.com/go/XCRfVxD 2) Review the options listed and choose the spot(s) you like. 3) Sign up! It’s Easy – you will NOT need to register an account or keep a password on SignUp.com. Note: SignUp.com does not share your email address with anyone. YOU MAY SIGN UP FOR 2 SHIFTS OR ALL THREE IF THE SPACE IS OPEN
McKinney Trade Days Field Trip July 19th
Join our next DGMS Field-trip this Saturday, Meet at the Main Entrance at 11:00. It’s located at 4550 W University Dr. in McKinney. No sign up is required. If you plan to attend you will need to visit the website https://thirdmondaytradedays.com/ so you can follow any COVID mandates required by the city of McKinney.
There are quite a few Rock & Mineral Dealers there!
Thank You Gerald P. for giving us a DGMS Blast From The Past with some pictures from The Creede Mine!! We used to have a bi-annual field trip there in August every other year, so many of our members will remember this place.
Gerald P. says:
I snapped a couple of photos of the entrance to the mine where the annual Creede Gem and Mineral Show is held. The entrance had some issues so the whole face of the mine had to be removed and rebuilt. The rest if the work will be done in September.
History: Blasted out of solid rock cliff by three Creede miners, construction of the museum began in 1990. County-hired laborers and volunteers completed all the other work, including rock removal, cribbing, rock batting and cement work. The next summer, tours were given to show actual mining in operation. The miners created 600 feet of drift with 22 displays, a gift shop and the Creede Community Center. While the Museum and Community Center have never been used for the commercial production of silver, the spaces were ‘mined’ from solid rock and are an authentic example of the methods and techniques used in the ‘boom’ days of the silver rush in Creede, Colorado.
Thanks Gerald! If you have anymore interesting pics from cool rock related places you’ve been, let us know by emailing dgms.sec@gmail.com
One of our DGMS Members, Betsy Bloodworth, recently visited North Carolina and visited the Linville Caverns between Linville and Marion and was struck by the natural beauty of the rock formations.
Linville Caverns is an active limestone cave system formed in a deposit of Shady Dolomite at the base of Humpback Mountain located in northern McDowell County, North Carolina.
This picture is of an area of the caverns with an unusual history. During the Civil War, deserters from both sides hid out here using the sandbar to build fires too cook food and keep warm since the average temperature in the caves is 52 degrees year round!
Unfortunately, we also want to highlight and inform you about White-Nose Syndrome (WNS) that is beginning to affect the local bat population at the Linville Caverns. PLEASE be aware of and follow any safety procedures the caverns (and any other local area) provide to help prevent the spread of this deadly disease. Bats are very important members of the local ecology.
Have you ever been hunting for quartz up in western Arkansas?? If not…. GO NOW! Like this weekend, or leave today! It’s just too much fun!
I am a newer member of the Dallas Gem and Mineral Society, and have just gotten into the (addictive) hobby of Rockhounding. I’ve been around Dallas hunting for fossils like sharks teeth, but just found out, that with a short 4 hour drive, I can find clear quartz!
Super clear Arkansas quartz point
There are many mines in the area where you basically “pay to dig”. This involves paying a fee for an entire day of digging around a spot (like the tailings area) and you get to keep whatever you find! You can spend all day searching for one perfect piece… or… like me… take bucket after bucket to the truck!
Quartz Hunting Tips
I read many posts about hunting quartz but I’ll add a few of my own common sense tips. (I thought I new what I was doing, but there was definitely a learning curve)
Look for “black mirrors”
Sounds mysterious, but it’s not! Basically, dirt doesn’t stick to naturally terminated quartz points. They are so slick and shiny that the dirt just wipes off! I read about this online, didn’t quite get it, so I took a series of pics to illustrate it
What to look for while hunting quartz in Arkansas
Look for the dark “black mirror” shine, then plop down and start digging around it. It may just be a single point like this one, but it could also be just one of many points connected to a cluster.
If you find that your quartz is attached to a larger rock, be sure to leave the dirt on and just put it in your bucket. As much as you want to clean it off, it’s safer for the drive home.
Get in touch with your inner kid & play in the dirt!
Be realistic…
I’m not saying that you won’t find that $1000 quartz point, but it’s more likely that you come home with buckets of lovely milky quartz rock and a ton of smaller clear points.
I (unfortunately) get too excited that I’ll win the lottery, or hit the jackpot, or find a giant quartz point. It really depends on where you are hunting. I went to two very different mines, one place had bigger points, the other had smaller clusters.
That’s part of the fun of rockhounding, you never know what you’ll find!
A pretty big single Arkansas quartz point
If you don’t find what you want, you can always buy it!
While researching, nobody told me that the rock shops there are AWESOME!
You can basically spit and hit a rock shop, all of which have a huge variety of stuff. Everything from rare specimens to yards of tables with rough that they sell by the pound! I think I bought as much rock as I found!
Loved digging through the tons of rough at the shops
Now what do I do with my rocks?
If you’re like me, you get home with multiple 5-gallon buckets of quartz, but what now?
There are many posts around the web that explain how to clean the iron staining off your quartz, but I’m gonna give you a couple pointers too.
1. Wash off as much clay and dirt with the hose. Super Fast! Let the dirt dry out & hit them with a spray nozzle! If any points fly off, they aren’t attached well and will come off eventually. * if you happen to be lucky and find an amazingly delicate piece, don’t listen to me
2. I think IronOut works the best. I have been cleaning my quartz with both the Oxalic Acid and IronOut. It seems to me that the IronOut works faster!
Cleaning your precious finds takes time, but it’s worth it!
Bonus Tip
Are you interested in going to the Ron Coleman Mine?
If you go after 3 pm, then you pay for the “day” which includes the rest of that day PLUS the entire next one! This is perfect if you are driving up from Dallas cause you don’t have to leave too early, and then you kinda get 2 for 1.
So in conclusion… ARKANSAS ROCKS! (literally)
Hard to imagine that there is beautiful quartz buried in this pile of rubble
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