Emerald Stone?

P

Pro7

Temporal Navigator
Can anyone with geology-mineralogy expertise can help me out on this? Its been buggin the hell out of me for years.

Can you tell me what this rock/stone is? Some people say its just a plain river rock. Other people say its a stone of some kind. I took this stone/rock to a mineralogist at the utah natural museum of history, even he, couldnt exactly figure this out. He said it looks like a unusual quartzite of some kind. It has a smooth shell from being in water for eons. When I place it on a shelf near the window where the sunshine comes in, it turns eerily dark to light green all over the stone.

I found this stone when I was 13 years old in Bell Rapids desert near Hagerman Idaho. My dad and I were looking around for old bottles, rocks, etc.. I tripped over this thing. My dad told me this is a weird form of a geode.. is it a geode?

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p.s. few of the pics are upside down, that is how I used to measure it with a measuring tape.

Unusual characteristics:

1. It weighs approx. 17 LBS.

2. It causes this 'tingling feeling' in my hands when I rub my hands on it. It does that every time.

3. When I pour water on it with a rag, milky white substance starts appearing on it.. in spots. It looks like its "shedding its skin in spots" as if it has a reaction to water. It does that every time I clean it with a watered rag.

4. Some people are extremely sensitive to this stone. In matter of a fact, one person didnt like this feeling and the left the house quickly when I handed it to her and other people in a superbowl football party. She refuses to talk with me again afterwards ever since. She told other people she thinks I am a devil. Other people felt nothing while some felt weird feelings in their hands after handling it. Is it possible this stone could be radioactive? or something?

I appreciate your help on this. Many Thanks!
 
Are you a devil? :eek:

I'm no mineral expert, but it looks like an ordinary stone with a mix of quartz & something else. However, you can do some tests to try to figure out what it is:

1) Get a geiger counter & check for radioactivity
2) Measure its hardness with a hardness tester
3) Find its density
4) Do a chemical analysis on the surface material (you said it reacts with water. what else does it react with?)
5) Does the rock have a smell or taste?
6) Is it magnetic?
7) Is it translucent or opaque?
8) Does it glow under UV light?

Every geode I've seen has a rough limestone shell, unlike the rock in your photos. Also, you should take pictures of the rock in the sunlight so we can observe the change. Some compounds change colors or glow when light is shone on them. I would like to know the identity of this mineral if it's capable of exerting a psychological influence on others, as it could lead to a better understanding of mind-matter interactions.

As a last resort, you could compare your rock to pictures of every recorded mineral:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_minerals_(complete)
 
I am no devil. lol.

Will have to find someone who has a geiger counter to check for radioactivity. Even though I dont think its radioactive, but never know. Will check that out anyways.

Hardness tester? hmm.. is there a such device like that ?

How I do measure for density? I have no idea how that works. A chemical analysis on it, seems like I have to take it to a rock shop or lab somewhere. The stone has no smell, I know that but I never tasted it. I dont think I would want to taste it since it gives out tingling feelings in my hands when I rub my hands over it. It has a little effect on magnetism. I put a refridgerator magnet on it and it sticks but not in all places on the stone. I look at it, it does look like it has iron deposits on it. It does allow light to go through it but not completely, its a mixture of transculent and opaque. When its held up in the sunlight, the rock changes its colors to almost like its emerald.

The place where I found it in the desert, is close to where the lavatubes are. There are alot of underground lava tubes up there in the southern side of the desert. It was also found close to a massive indian burialgrounds. Those burialgrounds had regular rocks piled up in triangluar shapes all over there. Am not sure if this stone was a part of that? It was literatelly buried in the sand when I tripped over it.

Phsycological influence? Yup this is what it does. If you are meaning that it keeps "buggin" me in a way, yes, I do have repeative dreams about this stone.

The dream repeats are about this meteor/asteroid coming from space and crashing in a large ocean, causing massive bubbles in the ocean and when the indians arrived after the ocean dried up in this area, they picked this stone up and have used it in their rituals. In the dreams, the stone is bigger than what it is now. The stone had spikes on it..

These ridicilous dreams that I kept having, made me look closer at the stone. I recognized "holes looking" on the stone and if you look closely at the pictures, does indeed looks like it had spikes on it but were eroded off from being in the water.

Yea it coincides with one person telling me that this could be a part of a meteor or a asteroid. Normally after my research on that part, stones or rocks coming from asteroids or meteors are usually dark charcoaled black colored and rough looking.

I truly do not know what this is, even though people have told me its either a unusual quartzite or a emerald stone. Could a emerald stone come from space? I am not so sure about that and I do doubt that though. One other option people have told me, is to have it cut in half, open it up and look inside of it. I did try with a screwdriver on the bottom "hole looking" twisted it, and I could feel that it might lead to a "explosion" if I even try to crack it open or whatever.

One thing I do know.. I havent touched that stone/rock in a long time since I have left it alone, and the dreams faded away. I was seriously thinking that it was influencing my mind somehow by touching this thing. I am not alone in this, people who was at the superbowl party, told me that they had unusual stuff happening to them... from all of them touching that stone/rock with their hands.

Was it a demonstration of mass delusion? I dont know.

I will get a UV bulb and test this thing. I never thought of that.
 
lol no

If you're referring to the little blue car in the pics, that came out of the cereal box as a toy for kids. :) I do eat cereal at my desk every morning. these pics I posted are about 4 years old. I had one heck of a good web camera that time.. It was one of the older Intel webcams.. I loved that.. most webcams I try out nowadays dont have that clarity of pictures.. hmm unless u suggest me a good one? Ill go buy another one. :)
 
may i ask why you chose to put a piece of newspaper over the packaging of the car?

and i have never seen a cereal toy come in a plastic case. must not have been too much cereal in that box...
 
to put the newspaper over the car? I dont know. I must have moved it around to get a clear snapshot. I dont remember the name of cereal which that toy came out of. the car was in a plastic bag type, not a case. :confused:


I do certainly wish to show this to people. People will have to feel it to believe it. Its the only way. Talking about it, heck I even tried selling this stone over the internet and yet serious stone collectors wont buy it I guess. I dont really know if I should sell it or not.
 
Name a price & I'd consider it. The worst that could happen is I'd be out a few bucks & possibly made a sucker. Life's too short to not take a few chances.

Why not return to the location where you found it & try to find more?
 
lol. I did go back up to the area where I found this stone a lot of times. I couldnt find any more. Its probably because of summer desert storms up there. Sand piling up on sand. Makes anything harder to find. A friend of mine did find a rare big white ivory looking arrowhead up there in one of the canyons. That was so long ago..

Now we cannot go up there anymore to do digging expeditions. It has become a government property. It is now the Fossil monuments. The last time I went up there a couple years ago, there were alot of black suv vehicles driving around with gov plates, it kinda scared me so I left. Hagerman was my hometown, and when growing up living in hagerman, I have heard constant stories about UFOS up there on the cb, police scanners and weird things going on up there. A small town, once, we knew everyone and eachother. Now all of that changed. The town grew.

Every time something odd comes up, we kept our mouths shut. I was taught that by my parents and their friends when growing up. A secret was meant to be kept a secret. My brothers had found some odd things up there, which defies explanation of human history as well. One of my brothers did find a fossilized horse leg bone which was cut, as if it was cut by a saw or something which made the smooth cuts on it. That fossilized piece of leg bone was confirmed by the palentologist in Hagerman. That office wanted to claim that bone from my brother. He said no and kept it. Even then, if trying to cut it now, it would shatter into pieces, since it is that fragile. One will wonder how ancient man was able to cut animal bones so smooth like that?

Stuff like that, are found up there. Strange stuff like glass like crystals everywhere was found in a lava tube cave once, literatelly millions of pieces of them all over the ground inside the cave.

so many many strange things everywhere up there, it is of no wonder the government made it a national monument in respect to the fossilized horse. (which in reality they made it a monument in respect to other unmentionable things too)

Hagerman Fossil Beds National Monument - Hagerman Fossil Beds National Monument

Is it just possible, that maybe this is a real emerald stone? or maybe parts of emeralds inside of quartzite? If that is true, the only way I will ever find out is by cracking or cutting it open.

Example of site reference confirms exactly what I am thinking: (many thanks to TimeLord)

File:Emerald specimen with matrix.jpg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

If that part is true with this stone, then indeed it will be the most rarest stone in the world because according to science, people finding emeralds attached to a host rock, are usually found in pieces and never been found "complete" as in one total stone. This is what I believe regarding to this stone.

My specific claim according to this stone, is that it was found in Idaho, USA. This claim may be challenged because no one has ever heard of emeralds being found in Idaho. (If that is what it is, being attached to a host rock of quartzite)

According to this Wiki:

Emerald - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Emerald localities
Emeralds in antiquity were mined by the Egyptians and in Austria, as well as Swat in northern Pakistan.[6][7]

"A rare type of emerald known as a trapiche emerald is occasionally found in the mines of Colombia. A trapiche emerald exhibits a "star" pattern; it has raylike spokes of dark carbon impurities that give the emerald a six-pointed radial pattern. It is named for the trapiche, a grinding wheel used to process sugarcane in the region. Colombian emeralds are generally the most prized due to their transparency and fire. Some of the most rare emeralds come from three main emerald mining areas in Colombia: Muzo, Coscuez, and Chivor. Fine emeralds are also found in other countries, such as Zambia, Brazil, Zimbabwe, Madagascar, Pakistan, India, Afghanistan and Russia. In the US, emeralds can be found in North Carolina. In 1998, emeralds were discovered in the Yukon, Canada [1]."

North Carolina, USA? hmm...

do you know how much a carat of pure emerald would be? I can only imagine the immense wealth that I could gain from it, that is, if it is true of what it has. The reason I think of emeralds is because of the color that it becomes when it is in direct sunlight. If you look at one picture above, which has the measuring tape on it, you will notice the greenish color starting to "form" because I had the sunlight directed on it but not totally.

For the sake of interest in this, I just went and bought a new web cam from walmart. I will be taking pictures and maybe make a movie on this stone to bring it up to date.
 
Emeralds are deep green even in ambient light (not only in sunlight). Though I could be wrong, I don't think this is an emerald or anything quite like it. There is no guarantee that breaking the stone would reveal any more information about it; I recommend doing as much non-destructive testing as possible before doing that. It sounds to me like some sort of fluorescence, since sunlight contains UV rays. Perhaps the fluorescent material is below the surface of the stone, or not very concentrated in the rock (making it change color but not glow much). Also, there are several natural radioactive ores; a strong alpha or beta emitter might make one's hand feel "tingly" because of the strong electric charge that would build up. That's why I recommended using a geiger counter: you could purchase one on ebay, build one, or borrow one from a lab. Be careful, though, as beta emitters are likely to release gamma rays as well, resulting in cumulative cellular damage.
 
Yea hmm...

I found another article on this:

http://www.gemstoneeducation.com/Emerald.htm

It says:

Emeralds - Where its Found and Formed

"The Emerald is one of the most well known and most attractive gemstone available. It is actually a form of beryl, which is a common mineral. Beryl includes trace elements of beryllium, a rare element. Beryl is the mineral that is associated with many gemstones. For instance, beryl that is yellow or orange is usually called Heliodor, pink or salmon colored beryl is called Morganite and the rarest type of beryl, bixbite is a deep, intense red. Emerald usually comes in a deep, intense green. However, it is sometimes found as a light green or even to have a tinge of yellow in the stone.

What gives Emeralds there color are two trace elements, one is chromium and the other is vanadium. While both elements are usually present, at certain times vanadium might be absent. When vanadium is absent, the stone is still a deep green.

Emeralds are often formed in mica schist’s which are hydrothermal in origin. They are usually associated with rocks that are formed in association with granite or pegmatite’s. Most Emeralds are found in mines which are hydrothermal (hot water or steam). The most famous of the Emerald mines are deposits in South America. Minerals that are sometimes found near Emeralds are pyrite, calcite and quartz. Emeralds are also found in eluvia and alluvial deposits as well due to their hardness and gravity characteristics. While Emeralds have been found in many regions of the world, the finest quality Emeralds are found today in the Muzo and Chivor mines of Columbia."

"Minerals that are sometimes found near Emeralds are pyrite, calcite and quartz."

Found near quartz? Hmm..

Also.. there is alot of folklore regarding emeralds..which even makes me think harder about this stone. Again, it might not be what it is, since like you said that it could be something else.

http://www.gemsuite.com/gemstones/emeralds/emeralds_and_mythology.html
 
If it is radioactive, its a foregone conclusion it would be either a form of metatorbenite or meta-autunite.

I just asked someone on IM who is familiar with radioactive mineralogy and materials which could be attached to quartz or quartzite. Only Meta-Autunite fluoresces.

Hmm.. A pic of meta-autunite here:

http://www.mindat.org/photo-12036.html

I mentioned earlier about the reaction to water on the stone. This could be the answer.

Here is the chart:

http://www.uraniumminerals.com/UTh/M-Autunite.htm

Oh gawd.. what if that thing is a timebomb? ready to go off? lol.
 
I guess I have no common sense. I just wasted $$$ on ebay for a geiger counter. Didnt even think that my boss would have one. Will find out on monday when I bring it in to work to have it checked. LOL oh well, next time I shouldnt jump to conclusions.
 
Hmm..

Well.. cant wait til monday to have it tested for radioactivity. hmm..

I did test it with UV light. On the shell of the rock, its showing light brown with spots on it. thats consistent with quartz and other things, but on the greenish side, it started to glow alittle bit purplish-red color, but the quartz is still in the way but I am able to see it now.

Then when I turn off the UV light, the stone is glowing alittle bit in the dark. Some other mixture causes that. Its fascinating! hmm
 
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