Rock/Mineral Identification

[markfothebeast]

Landscaping yard. Found unusual rocks, minerals, etc. Never had a home around here with this type of soil and rock.

Photo 1 and 2. Large rock with quartz. Scraped off what appears to be gold flakes. Is this gold? Could there be more inside the rock? How do you crack something this large open?

Photo 3. I keep finding green rocks. Havent seen these around here before. What type of rock is this? They are everywhere when I did 42" for footings.

Photo 4. Iron? Magnet sticks to it. Shiny, black/grey and smooth texture.

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[P.ALLEN]

Quartz and Iron Pyrite, take a stone chisel and hammer and give it a wack. Greens and brown look like different types of sed rock that have undergone some heat and pressure.

 

[markfothebeast]

The rock that looks like gold or pyrite is very flake like. It is nearly everywhere on the rock.

I chipped away several small stones from the surface, crushed them up, and swirled the sediment around in a pan and several small gold-like speckles came to the top.

Would you consider the flakes to be gold or pyrite? This is considerably less than the amount of gold colored material that was removed from the rock
Perhaps a small amount gold exists?

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[stdenis_jd]

If u can run the (pyrite) with a small piece of unglazed porcelain (streak plate) that would be definitive. Grayish will be pyrite. Gold is, well, gold:-D

 

[DeepseekerADS]

If u can run the (pyrite) with a small piece of unglazed porcelain (streak plate) that would be definitive. Grayish will be pyrite. Gold is, well, gold:-D

Good tip! I don't remember ever hearing that tip.

 

[stdenis_jd]

Sorry i meant to say rub, not run haha...yeah, streak tests are great, probably the easiest for pyrite vs. gold

 

[Rific]

Gold wouldn't normally float on top of the water. While that rock may have gold in it, what we can see in the image in most definitely not gold. Crush it all up if you'd like, and you may find some small pieces in the very bottom of the gravity separater (gold pan or whatever you're using). While gold does exist in flake form, that is not dendritic gold. Just google gold/gold ore/dendrite gold/wire gold and you'll be able to tell the difference pretty easily. Another thing that helps me the most where the size of the gold (or hopeful gold) isn't that large, just turn the piece over and around and out of direct sunlight and if the gold stops shining and looks drastically differant, it isn't gold. Most minerals you hope are gold lose their shine and become almost invisible away from good lighting.

 

[Aurora]

Another thing that helps me the most where the size of the gold (or hopeful gold) isn't that large, just turn the piece over and around and out of direct sunlight and if the gold stops shining and looks drastically differant, it isn't gold. Most minerals you hope are gold lose their shine and become almost invisible away from good lighting.

Is this also true of copper? I mean will copper still shine out of direct light?

 

[Rific]

Is this also true of copper? I mean will copper still shine out of direct light?

I would assume so, but good luck finding a piece of copper that isnt tarnished or reacted with some other element! Gold is not only valuable because of its rarity or beauty, but because of its properties. It doesnt combine with other elements very easily, and is very corrosion resistant. So thats why after millions of years, you can still see that baby shine!

I think the difference between the two metals and non metals would be reflection and refraction. Metals reflect light and the transparent minerals refract light.

 

[Eu_citzen]

It's likely mica, not pyrite or anything related.