Is Silver found in quartz?

adalabama

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Jun 15, 2013
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We have a large rock that was buried in our back yard. We have having some grading done so we have started to chip away at the rock. We have found a lot of quartz. In some of it we are finding "silver" pieces the size of a flea. The pieces are usually found near a empty pocket in the rock. We are also find pockets of yellow fluffy stuff. Limonite I assume?

I can post some pics if anyone is interested.
 

Dustedyou

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Dec 27, 2012
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id agree with Dave asenopyrite .. a telluride don't lick the rock! and yes silver is found in Quartz

arcenopyrite.jpg
Arsenopyrite

silver in quartz.png
silver in quartz (typical)
 

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gold tramp

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We have a large rock that was buried in our back yard. We have having some grading done so we have started to chip away at the rock. We have found a lot of quartz. In some of it we are finding "silver" pieces the size of a flea. The pieces are usually found near a empty pocket in the rock. We are also find pockets of yellow fluffy stuff. Limonite I assume?

I can post some pics if anyone is interested.

Silver is found in quartz, but you need a mnt of it to get to get any silver out. ive been collecting silver pockets for years, got a few hundred pounds of ores, when I get a ton I will attempt recover the silver.

I think you just got the ole pyrites there, I find the pyrites I stop digging, as the gold values get so fine, it takes a mnt of ore to get any gold..... BUT GOLD IS WHERE YOU FIND IT !!!!!

When in doubt just crush and pan !!!
 

cryptic

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Oct 10, 2009
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In some areas you can find large amounts of silver in quartz.:icon_thumleft:
 

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FelixWankel

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Apr 28, 2013
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In some areas you can find large amounts of silver in quartz.:icon_thumleft:

How does silver react in a gold pan? If I crush a rock with some gold and silver, then try and pan it, does the silver stay in the pan just like gold would? If so, how would you seperate the silver from the gold? Thanks
 

id_au_digger

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Sep 3, 2013
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Stupid silver question .. Does raw silver appear like lead(color& soft)? Found small pieces free of rock and in quartz with detector. Any advice? Thanks much...
 

timberjack

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I thought arsenopyrite was a sulfide, FeAsS? Not a telluride. I did not think it had tellurium in it like calaverite AuTe2??
 

G Freeman

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I think you are right cryptic, I got some quartz with what looked like gold coating on it and big silver looking spots on it too so I did the wet towel test on the yellow part and turned the towel yellow so tried the same test on the silver part and got a yellow towel too and after research found out that white gold can be in there too. So I got a yellow point on the wet towel rubbing the silver place.
 

G Freeman

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That is a great question Felix and I been trying to answer that myself. Sure hope some of these guys and gals can get your answer back to you and I will know too as some of the people here are really smart as I am but a rookie.
 

Salura

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I don't know about how the precious metals look in rock or quartz.

But it reminds me of something I learned when I was panning the Arkansas River in Buena Vista Colorado. The gold came out silver looking. After researching it was determined that this was because of the mercury that the old timers used to use in their pan to make the gold "stick" to the pan. At the end of the day, the old timers would rinse their pans out in the river. We now know the risks of mercury, but back then... Anyway, the gold and mercury find each other and you can pull gold out that is silver colored for that reason.
 

dave wiseman

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....And on a few occasions over 35 years of doing hardrock quartz vein sampling and mining I've come across quartz gold that had was coated with mercury in areas where no placer mining was done.This was likely the result of the quick leaching out of cinnabar.
 

TerryC

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Based just on the pic, I must say you have Iron Pyrite. The brown color is indicative of iron and the cleavage from the pieces I see are very much like the Pyrite I find. If you have a detector, I suspect the display will show up far right if silver and far left (if at all) for the pyrite. I will admit that I have never done this test myself as I have never found detectable amounts of native silver. Good luck! TTC
 

cryptic

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The majority of silver ores tend to reside within a category from foil to pulltab range.
 

ToloBird

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Jul 10, 2019
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Can you pleas tell me if this quartz has a silver vein?

I’m having trouble starting a new thread the only thing I could do I’m having trouble starting a new thread the only thing I could do is quote someone when in reality I have a question here. I chose somebody pretty knowledgeable to quote tho sure this community is full of educated people! Anyway I have some quarts for sure , I would like to know if it has silver veins in it! There are some super dark spots on some of the pieces from me trying to break it open on an asbestos floor! One of the images shows the inside and outside from a cracked open piece. These pieces where pretty hard to break open even with a big hammer! Lots of sparks! Anyway please let me know!
Thank You!!!
 

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