Where can I find pegmatite in Maine?
Where can I find pegmatite in Maine?
Pegmatite veins are abundant in parts of Oxford, Androscoggin, and Sagadahoc Counties. Most of them were commercially worked for mica or feldspar, creating piles of waste rock (“dumps”) where collectors search for specimens. Road cuts and natural outcrops of other rock types occasionally provide good mineral specimens.
What stone is native to Maine?
tourmaline
The Maine legislature recognized tourmaline as an important product of the state and named it the “official state gemstone.”
What types of rocks are in Maine?
All three major rock groups – sedimentary, igneous, and metamorphic – are represented in Maine.
Where is pegmatite found in USA?
Pegmatite is abundant throughout the 48 mile canyon, and is found in the form of stripes on the cliffs as well as large bodies.
Can you find agates in Maine?
Maine is, without a doubt, the best state in New England for rock and mineral collectors thanks to the widespread, high-quality pegmatites that make up a large portion of the surface geology. You can also sometimes find interesting rocks like jasper and agates in the gravels of some public beaches.
Where can I dig for tourmaline in Maine?
Pieces of pink, green, blue, or watermelon tourmaline can be found at places such as the Dunton Mine, Mt. Mica, or Black Mountain (Rumford). Collecting is usually allowed at these localities for a small fee.
What is Maine State Gem?
Tourmaline
Tourmaline ranges in color from black or white to vibrant shades of red, green, and blue. The color of the best Maine tourmalines rival tourmaline from world-famous localities in California, Brazil, and the Himalayas.
Can u find diamonds in Maine?
Precious gems such as diamonds, rubies, and emeralds are not native to Maine, but some very good semi-precious gemstones have been found here.
What type of rock is the Maine coast?
The stratified rocks include the volcanic, sedimentary and metamorphic rock types. Intrusive rocks include the granites, gabbros and ultramafic rocks that are frequently seen cropping out along eastern coastal Maine.
What crystals are found in Maine?
Pink, green and blue tourmaline, aquamarine beryl and deep red garnet, purple amethyst and sparkling lepidolite — they all lie buried in Maine granite. To find them, all you have to do is dig — and perhaps use a hammer and chisel.
Is there lithium in Maine?
A $1.5 billion lithium deposit has been discovered in western Maine, but mining it could be hard. Smaller deposits have been known in Maine for decades, but this recent discovery, just north of Plumbago Mountain in Newry, is the first to have a major resource potential.
Is gold found in pegmatites?
Gold along with copper, commonly occurs in porphyry deposits. Gold can occur in economic grades in Pegmatites are magmas containing granitic type minerals (feldspar, quartz, mica) which cool slowly and thus allow for very large crystals (>2.5cm) to form.
Where do Maine’s finest gem tourmalines come from?
The black tourmaline crystals and many of the brightly colored ones are usually encased in the surrounding rock. However, conditions in some places favored the development of open cavities in which elbaite crystals grew with greater perfection and clarity. These pegmatite “pockets” are the source of Maine’s finest gem tourmalines.
What is the best type of granite found in Maine?
The best examples in Maine are found in a very coarse-grained type of granite called “pegmatite.” The slow cooling and solidification of the pegmatite veins allowed the mineral grains to grow to much larger sizes than in ordinary granite.
What types of crystals are found in Maine?
The colorful, but less common, species found in Maine is elbaite, named after the island of Elba, Italy. Tourmaline occurs as lustrous, elongate crystals which commonly have a rounded triangular cross section and narrow grooves running parallel to their long direction. The crystals range in size from microscopic to over a foot long.
What is the best book on the geology of Maine?
Mineralogy of Maine, Volume 1: Descriptive Mineralogy, by V.T. King and E.E. Foord, 1994, Maine Geological Survey, 418 p. 88 plates (99 color photos, 537 black-and-white photos), 70 crystal diagrams and figures.
