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Showing results for tags 'opal'.
Found 23 results
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Opal-Filled Fossils Reveal Timid, Dog-Size Dinosaur That Lived Down Under By Laura Geggel, January 17, 2019 https://www.livescience.com/64522-opal-dinosaur-fossils-in-australia.html https://www.sciencealert.com/a-gorgeous-opalised-fossil-turned-out-to-be-an-unknown-species-of-dinosaur Bell, P.R., Herne, M.C., Brougham, T. and Smith, E.T., 2018. Ornithopod diversity in the Griman Creek Formation (Cenomanian), New South Wales, Australia. PeerJ, 6, p.e6008. https://peerj.com/articles/6008/ Yours, Paul H.
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I saw some beautiful opalised fossils in An Australian museum and I was just wondering if it is possible to acquire one (without huge funds) even if that is not possible it would be nice if anyone has them if they could show themthese at the ones I saw in the museum
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Hello All, I was hoping that someone could help me identify this bone? its from the mid-Cretaceous Griman Creek Formation of Lightning Ridge Australia I don't think its a yabby button or turtle shell, as the piece is not rounded like a yabby button and there is bone texture. the piece is bilaterally symmetrical and there appear to have joins or groves where the bone meets. The underside is not flat like I would expect for turtle shell... Looking forward to your replies Rod
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Beautiful New Species of Dinosaur Preserved in Opal!
Thecosmilia Trichitoma posted a topic in Fossil News
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2018/12/exclusive-sparkly-opal-filled-fossils-reveal-new-dinosaur-species-paleontology/ For all of the members here who love both minerals and fossils. -
found this this morning... any ideas...fossil?...Opal?..animal mineral or vegetable?..jellyfish?...open to suggestions? I was leaning toward possibly chocolate opal but the weird things in it have me stumped...is it some type of fossil? if its not a fossil and is opal never found one before...the whole stone is about three quarters of an inch with the center only just over 1/4 th of an inch. found in our gravel drive in texas...but really it does not look opal so was thinking fossil of some type?.
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Hello would this be some opalised bone and could be from a dinosaur or some marine reptile ?
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I was wondering a few things about opals effect on fossils and bones in general. 1) does it degrade the value? 2) how long does it take? 3)how does it work? 4) would I be able to do it to some spare animal teeth? (Hope that’s not weird haha)
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I used to be a member her many years ago when young Knackers McGee started the site showing off his wonderful finds, time marches on, now i have somethig to contribute of note. I aquired a collection of Gem grade Opalised Plesiosaur bones, mainly half verterbrae, whatsit called, split vertically. Included, was one unknown perfect split shown below. If anyone is interested in such things, I can post more pics and links to videos for your amusement. This image is of the best split, most likely broken in the field by the pick. The central inclusions are very shallow. I could not believe my luck as the person who sold then to me did not recognise the bones in the parcel. Sadly I did not buy all of it, so there is or are people out there with half a dozen matchng halves to what I have. Some of the pieces have great detail of bone structure on the outside, some look to have internal passages preserved in great detail. Veins or ateries not opalised within the Opal. All very rare to find as ordinary fossilised bone, opalised is very very rare.
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I know this is not a fossil but I need help with identifying the rock
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Its very reflective in the light the other images are used with flash on the camera so it does not capture the reflectiveness
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Opalized Ammonite - Real or Fake, help!
ewecollector posted a topic in Is It Real? How to Recognize Fossil Fabrications
I've recently bought this fossil from a seller on Instagram and these are the seller's pictures, but after some recent digging, I was introduced to the reality of counterfeit and fake ones. Does this one look real or fake? The seller doesn't have location of discovery and I've been trying to google how to learn whether it's real or fake but I haven't gotten far. Thanks for your time!! -
Hi all, Recently saw an opalized ammonite out at a rock and fossil shop in Colorado. It was really quite beautiful but as I'm pretty much an amateur when it comes to identifying fossils, I have concerns about its authenticity. I'm wondering if anyone can give tips on how to spot fakes. thank you!
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Dear paleo experts, I wonder if you could help me out here. Please excuse my naivety if I have totally gotten this wrong... but I am wondering if this slab of opal (Lightning Ridge, Australia) in my collection might actually bear the imprint of some fossilised material? It was the very informative blog of Andre Stucki (opalised fossil specimens) and Johno's Opals that brought me here to seek your advice. Thank you for any information you might be able to provide. And if I am totally wrong about this; my sincere apologies for wasting your time.
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Attached are photos taken of a stone sphere (~ 50mm in diameter) I recently bought from a local store. The vendor told me that it was made of a mineral from Western Australia. In fact, the features in the sphere are quite mysterious. Is it a ball of a frozen scene of lives that were crowded and were busy in reproducing in a time in the past?
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From the album Adventure is an individual thought!
These are the most unusual chalcedony forms to find in the World. Here is one laid upon some pine needles. Some spots will have so many, you will have to pick only the most interesting ones! Have a collecting bag around your neck to put them into it. Have a walking stick to hike with, do some prodding in thick pine needles. We have seen some rattle snakes, actually one, but it was nearly five feet long a Basalt ridge. Just be aware. Wonderful camping. Well maintained roads. Gasoline, groceries and water to be found in Reserve. On a map draw a fifty mile circle and you are just beginning to find places to hunt. Most are to the north, east and west of Reserve. The locals will help you figure out where to begin. -
From the album Adventure is an individual thought!
This is a typical flat to find loose chalcedony. There are areas of Basalt and Rhyolite that you will find the sources of all of the agate and chalcedony. Once you understand lava flows from the Oligocene volcanics... you are on your way to finding the most unusual chalcedony in the world. Step into a Forest Service Office, get the large scale Forest map(s) you need, inquire as to where a good area to begin looking might be... and you are on your way. Make sure you mark where you camped... so you can find it next time and finish looking over the beautiful hillsides. -
From the album Adventure is an individual thought!
Have your dogs pack the water into the back country and pack the finds back to camp. There are so many areas to find agate and opal that you just find a nice camping spot and begin to prospect by walking... and walking... and walking. Even "Apache Tears" can be found north of Snow Lake. Bring a bag to carry them. These are the size of a dime to quarter. The dry creek beds and hillsides are a good place to start... north of Snow Lake are some nice camping spots and the hills further north have the Apache Tears washing out in the dirt roads! -
From the album Adventure is an individual thought!
Reserve, New Mexico is the center hub of agate hunting. Luna, New Mexico. Apache Creek, New Mexico. A thousand square miles of the roughest terrain in New Mexico. Bring a GPS so you do not get lost. Go further south to Glenwood Springs and check out the mining districts. Silver City and the copper mines are not too far away. Visit the Gila Cliff Dwellings. Worth the drive. -
From the album Opalised Fossils
Name: Opalised Dinosaur (Caudal?) Vertebra Age: 110 million years old Locality: Lightning Ridge, NSW, Australia Formation: Griman Creek Formation Length: 16mm end to end Notes: This is an opalised dinosaur vertebra from Australia. I originally bought it as an opalised 'reptile' vertebra but it's ID as being a dinosaur vertebra was confirmed by one of the leading experts on the opalised fossils of Lightning Ridge. It is likely a juvenile ornithopod or theropod vertebral centrum, missing the tall neural arch. It is semi-transparent when held up to a strong light and is an exceptionally rare specimen. So far it is the only vertebrate fossil in my opalised fossils collection but I hope I am able to acquire more soon. Specimens like this very rarely come up for sale as most of them end up in museum collections due to their rarity and scientific value. -
Found while dredge/ highbanking in Oregon. About 6 feet down in a small creek. It has slight color play. Possibly opal? Any one that can help. Thank you.
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Good afternoon, Well here goes my first post and I hope some of you might find it interesting. Two years ago, we found this in our mine at White Cliffs NSW. For those of you who don’t know, White Cliffs is an opal mining community and was Australians first commercial opal field and today it still produces some of the finest opal in the world. You will hear people say that mining there is non-existent as it is mined out; well nothing is further from the truth. Only one percent of the field has actually been mined, so there are still lots of discoveries being made. Anyway, I am getting off track. Here are a couple of photographs of the opal when we found it and what has been partially cleaned so far. The whole fossil when finally reassembled will be about 20cm long and tapers from 16mm wide at the top down to 10mm wide at the end. I was surprised at the quality of the opal. When we first uncovered it, it appeared to be mostly potch, however on cleanup, it runs about 90% precious opal. It is all full colour opal, and varies between $2500 per carat and about $100 per carat. Most of the opal would value at $500 per carat and so working on an overall average value of $350 per carat, the opal value of this fossil alone is around AUD$25,000. There is still a fine layer of white clay across most of the opal which makes the colour almost impossible to photograph, but it really is a beautiful specimen (there is still more pieces to be cleaned to be added – the photos are incomplete). If I may ask advice from the forum, I would really like to lightly polish the opal while still retaining the fine detail of the individual vertebrae and at the same time displaying the brilliant colours of this opal – would this be recommended or frowned upon by fossil collectors? I plan to reassemble the fossil using a clear two pack resin (same as we use for mounting opal in settings), would this be ok, or should I be reassembling it by another means? The original sandstone it was found in was very friable and decayed quickly. Should I mount it on a small block of sandstone (or maybe basalt, I think it would look spectacular with the black background in contrast). There is still a lot more cleaning to go yet and many smaller pieces to be reassembled, but any advice would really be appreciated and comments welcomed. Best wishes and thank you for your time, Chris.
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Hello everyone I have recently obtained an opal parcel of rough to cut into gems from the opal fields at lightning ridge Australia, however right before I was about to grind this one rough opal something stood out. I remembered walking in the natural history museum in Sidney Australia and noticed the opalized teeth of varies animals/dinos etc. This one was just like one I had seen many years ago. I cleaned it only; no polish just water and a soft paintbrush as not to alter it. From my research, I found a possible match a Hypsilophodon it lived in the area where lightning ridge opals are found and some recorded fossils of this dino are sometimes unearthed there in small pieces. I have tried to contact museums and or universities as I live near OSU and they have one of the best paleontological programs in the country (or so I’m told) and have not heard back after 6 months of trying from any of them. I would like to know if it is a real opal replacement of a tooth or a lookalike. It measures 13.33mm long X 10.9mm wide X 4.02mm thick. And is very detailed under a microscope with tooth like root. Any ideas? I have cut thousands of opals from rough, and have seen millions of pieces of rough easy, including opalized fossils, even some plesiosaurs teeth but never this. The miner, who sold me the opals, said that he has been finding some opalized dino bone fragments lately but they are unidentifiable as they are crushed, and very small pieces, and I also purchased a opalized finger or toe bone from a very nearby find, possibly a turtle flipper bone.
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I love the useful information on the fossil forum. For something different I have posted some pictures of where I "mine" fossils from 20m underground in an old opal mine. I am extending an old mine tunnel to find occaisional opalised fossils. The first picture below shows my current tunnel and the second picture the "rock" layer that contains traces of opal and opalised fossils. The rock is quite weathered and can be dug out with an electric jack pick. The majority of fossils that I find do not have gem opal colour play, but they do have exceptional presevation.
