Summary of 2019 Field Trips
Saturday, January 5, 2019
Northeast, AL
COLLECTING: Limestone with unidentified markings, trilobites, and brooksellas.
Saturday, January 19, 2019
Jefferson County, Tennessee
TRIP: Collecting at a Major 30,000 acre impoundment Lake located in Eastern Tennessee with over 500 miles of shoreline. It is managed by the Tennessee Valley Authority. Each winter, the TVA lowers the water level significantly, exposing miles of dry lakebed. We searched the dry lakebed for “Quartz Diamonds”.
COLLECTING: “Douglas Lake Diamonds” is a phrase coined by local rockhounds for the quartz crystals found at the site due to their resemblance to Herkimer “diamonds” from New York. Crystals found here are often double terminated or twinned and are very clear. Sizes range from smaller than a pea to thumb size. Small crystal lined geodes are found here as well as chert, fossils, and agate.
February 23, 2019
This was a field trip for the adventuresome and experienced rockhound. We collected in a pegmatite about 40 miles from the CCGMS clubhouse. The trip was for the hardy: there is a half-mile hike along a mountain road followed by a 200 yard scramble up a steep hillside to an old mine.
COLLECTING: The site is covered with pegmatite boulders with tourmaline (several inches long), large mica books and some sizeable garnets. The tourmaline is black schrol, the mica is predominately muscovite often in 5 to 7 inch plates that are an inch to two inches thick. The garnets are fractured but show crystal forms while in the rock. There are also many beautiful yard rocks if you are ambitious enough to carry them the half mile back up to the parking lot. There are over a dozen minerals listed for the mine from beryl to fluoroapatite, but good specimens of these minerals are rare.
Saturday, February 23, 2019
A Georgia Mineral Society field trip to the Jacksonville, FL Area
TRIP: We were invited to tour 2 different heavy sands processing facilities. We saw mining operations as well as processing operations. These trips are close to local beaches so you can also visit those to look for shells and sharks’ teeth.
COLLECTING: Heavy mineral sand samples.
Friday, March 1, 2019
Elberton, GA
TRIP: Elberton, GA is known as the “Granite Capital of the World”. According to the Elberton Granite Association website, the Elberton granite deposit is approximately 35 miles long, 6 miles wide, and 2 to 3 miles deep. GMS had a field trip to Elberton including a working granite quarry, a tour of the Elberton Granite Association Museum, and a tour of a granite processing plant.
COLLECTING: Granite, associated minerals, and excess pieces of imported materials used for countertops. This was a great place to get lapidary material as well as material for grab bags.
Sunday May 12, 2019
Chattooga County, GA
This was a great site for children, and adults of all skill levels.
COLLECTING: Crazy lace agate, banded agate, druzy quartz, colored chert, oolitic chert and dolostone. Nice pieces for making cabochons can be found at this site.
Saturday, May 18, 2019
Chunky Gal Mountain
Clay County, NC
TRIP: Chunky Gal Mountain — people always wonder about that name. Legend has it that it was named for a young Native American woman who fell in love with a young man from another tribe. Some stories say she prevailed by defying the odds and crossing the mountain to be with her beloved, while other stories say she never saw him again. Hopefully it was the happy ending. It is certainly a happy place for rockhounds.
COLLECTING: Green smaragdite is abundant and was found in small chunks to large boulders. It is a variety of the amphibole mineral actinolite and gets its emerald green color from a touch of chromium. Some of the smaragdite had tiny bits of pink to red corundum in it.
Saturday, May 4, 2019
Davidson-Arabia Mountain Nature Preserve
Lithonia, GA
TRIP: Field trip to a local Nature Preserve that is a granite monadnock, a former granite quarry and a historical site as well as a pleasant nature hike. There was a short introductory video at the ranger station. We studied the structure of the granites and gneisses exposed in the quarry and collected hand samples. Afterwards, there is a walking path to the top of Arabia Mountain close by.
COLLECTING: The Lithonia Gneiss is the oldest of the “granite” outcrops near Atlanta. We had permission to collect handsized samples from the quarry and the paths to it. Some were able to find other rarer minerals in the quarry itself including apatite and fluorapatite, apophyllite, beryl, epidote, fluorite, scolecite and black tourmaline, mostly near or in pegmatite dikes.
Saturday, June 29, 2019
Dahlonega, GA
TRIP: Field trip to multiple locations in Dahlonega to learn all about gold and gold mining in Georgia.
COLLECTING: Knowledge, a taste of history, a lot of fun, and maybe some real gold!
Saturday, July 13, 2019
Central, KY
TRIP: To express our gratitude to the property owner for allowing us access to the collecting site, we had volunteers help remove trash that has accumulated in the area.
COLLECTING: Geodes with quartz crystals, botryoidal chalcedony, and (rarely) pale amethyst. Occasionally Ordovician fossils e.g. crinoids, horn corals, colonial corals, etc. were found.