Radical Rocks

                                   What Is Lapidary Art?                                                                       Lapidary Art   Items on Display in a Lapidary Museum In simple terms, lapidary is an art that requires working with stones. It is the cutting and polishing of stones to create beautiful ornaments. The roots of lapidary art can be traced back to prehistoric times, since as early as human beings started fashioning tools and weapons out of stones. Soon, people started using the same techniques to create items for person...

California Rocks gems and minerals There are so many great rocks gems and minerals and many areas to collect rocks, gems, and minerals in California that we could probably write a book on it. Instead of writing a book we will cover some of the main rocks, gems and minerals with some details to get you started, and we will have links to references and guidebooks as well as all our links below. If you want to collect in the winter there is the beaches and deserts, you want to collect in the dead of summer, California has the mountains and the beaches, you can’t lose. The history of rocks gems and minerals goes back to the Native Americans, that dug up and used many of California’s beautiful, gemstones. Then in 1849 the gold miners came looking for gold and many other finds of gems and minerals continued for over a hundred years, with a few small discovery’s the last few years interesting rocks and some agates. Please remember to check status of areas and rules before collection on...

Alaska State Rocks and Minerals How to Guide Alaska the largest State in the US and the coldest state, yet despite the harsh cold mining of minerals and gems continues to this day. We will investigate the state mineral and state rock, as well as a few others that are noteworthy. At the bottom of the page you will find links to nonaffiliated sites that showcase or sell gems and minerals from Alaska, as well as some affiliate links for guidebooks on rockhounding in Alaska. This is not an exclusive list of Alaska’s rocks and minerals merely a look at some of the most notable. Gold Alaska State Mineral It is probably not a surprise that gold would be picked as the state mineral, as gold is still actively mined today, and popular TV shows are dedicated to several gold miners in Alaska. Gold was a motivating force in the settling of the Alaska frontier, starting in the mid-1800s. Gold was designated as the state mineral in 1968. Gold has been located through out much of the ...

 Jade – Who’s the queen, Nephrite or Jadeite By Shane of Radical Rocks Before 1863, jade and jadeite were considered the same kind of stone. Then a Frenchman was able to prove that although the stones are similar, they are different, he called one nephrite and the other jadeite. Both display monoclinic intergrown grainy and fibrous crystal systems that causes them to be a very tough gem stone. In fact, jade has been often been called the ax stone. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Dagger_India_Louvre_MR13434.jpg Some of the differences are as follows; jadeite is composed with silicate of sodium and aluminum, were nephrite is composed with silicate of calcium and magnesium. Also, there is a difference in the fibrous intertwining, that is slightly denser in the jadeite than the nephrite. Both make excellent carving material that support intricate carving that most stone can’t compete with. Chinese have been carving jade for hundreds of years, over 700 years. So,...