Possible amber from New Jersey

[frankh8147]

Hello!

 

I found this a while back around Big Brook Park in Monmouth County, New Jersey (not a place you would expect to find amber) and was wondering if that is what I have here. Also, I don't see any reason amber couldn't be here but have never found any in this location, so IF it is, could we looking at possible contamination or do you think it originated here.

 

As always, all help is greatly appreciated!

-Frank

[Misha]

Amber has been found in NJ but I do not believe this is amber.

Try using salt water and see if it floats in it Amber has a fairly low density so it should sink in normal water but float in salt water.

[ynot]

1 minute ago, Misha said:

Try using salt water and see if it floats

You have to dissolve as much salt in water as You can for this test.

[FranzBernhard]

This does not look like amber, it looks like a piece of a somewhat water-tumbled slag.

Beside the float test, you could try to poke a very hot needle at it - what happens?

And can you scratch the specimen easily with a knife blade?
Franz Bernhard

[frankh8147]

36 minutes ago, Misha said:

Amber has been found in NJ but I do not believe this is amber.

Try using salt water and see if it floats in it Amber has a fairly low density so it should sink in normal water but float in salt water.

 

33 minutes ago, ynot said:

You have to dissolve as much salt in water as You can for this test.

 

It is light-weight but still sank, no matter how much salt I was dissolving.

 

32 minutes ago, FranzBernhard said:

This does not look like amber, it looks like a piece of water-tumbled slag.

Beside the float test, you could try to poke a very hot needle at it - what happens?

And can you scratch the specimen easily with a knife blade?
Franz Bernhard

 

I tried to scratch it with a few different knives and nothing happened - not even a mark on it, actually, and I tried decently hard. I will try to get a needle (if necessary) to try that test too. I tried it with an old dental pick though and didn't really get, or smell, anything. 

 

Maybe a glass slag? 

[Plax]

amber from marine deposits (not common) can look like this but guess it has failed amber tests. The amber would have originated in a lignified log carried out to see and bored etc.

[Misha]

16 minutes ago, frankh8147 said:

 

I tried to scratch it with a few different knives and nothing happened - not even a mark on it, actually, and I tried decently hard. I will try to get a needle (if necessary) to try that test too. I tried it with an old dental pick though and didn't really get, or smell, anything

Probably just some kind of non fossil stone or slag like Franz said.

[frankh8147]

21 minutes ago, Misha said:

Probably just some kind of non fossil stone or slag like Franz said.

 

New Jersey has produced a lot of glass over the last few hundred years so slag tends to end up everywhere.

 

Thanks for your help!

-Frank

[The Jersey Devil]

It is a stone. Maybe a silicate.

[FranzBernhard]

Thanks for the tests! Its too hard to be amber, yes. No hot needle test required.

1 hour ago, frankh8147 said:

New Jersey has produced a lot of glass over the last few hundred years so slag tends to end up everywhere.

Yes, most probably this is glass slag.

Franz Bernhard

[Carl]

I suspect it's silica. Way too hard to be amber. If you tap it on your tooth and hear "tink tink" instead of "tok tok" that should clinch it as something like chert.

[abyssunder]

It looks like the specimen might have borings in it. Maybe you have something similar to Gastrochaenolites or Teredolites.

[Bronzviking]

I was thinking Chalcedony which is a cryptocrystalline form of silica like Carl said. It has a waxy luster, and is semitransparent or translucent. I'm seeing some banding in the third and fourth photo. It can assume a wide range of colors, but those most commonly seen are white to gray, grayish-blue or a shade of brown ranging from pale to nearly black. The hole and pockets are unusual though.

[frankh8147]

35 minutes ago, Carl said:

I suspect it's silica. Way too hard to be amber. If you tap it on your tooth and hear "tink tink" instead of "tok tok" that should clinch it as something like chert.

 

I see what you mean by that and it does make a 'tink tink' sounds.

 

When I originally picked it up, I thought is was a 'gnarly' looking piece of oyster Iike Pycondonte because it was close to an area which produces a lot of them. Do you think it could be silica shell replacement?

[Carl]

Never heard of such a thing for the brooks and it doesn't retain any obvious Pycnodonte morphology.