Fieldtrip report:
Ray Mica Mine,
Yancey County, N.C.,
October 16th 2004_______________________
Hello members, we had yet another excellent fieldtrip to the Ray Mica Mines today, this was another of the largest MAGMA fieldtrips I have seen, I had also invited the Henderson County club to join us and three of their members came along. The lure of the beryl crystal is bringing out many new members. I met with several of our members at the Silver Armadillo at 8:00 in the morning, we proceeded to the mine to meet with many more that had already arrived, and more arrived throughout the day. After visiting this mine seven times in the last three weeks, you would think that material would be harder to find, not true!, today I saw the best mica, fluorite , apatite and some of the nicest beryl so far. We had people collecting the length of the creek, two of our new members Troy and Greg were on their first rockhound trip ever and they are spoiled for good now, they found numerous nice beryl crystals, some were gemmy specimens, what a way to start rockhounding, I remember when I started, I was lucky to bring home a single decent piece! Our club is hosting school and geology classes from the southeast universities for guided trips to the mine, Our member Steve Penley led a tour to a school group just last Thursday, I will be leading a tour of the mine for the Alabama University students next Friday, today the University of Florida showed up, about 30-40 students descended on the mine to find specimens for their studies.
Grant heading to the Little Ray Mine to hunt.
Steve Penley ready to attack!
Steven getting dirty.
Our member Steven is the owner of the Ridgecrest Kyanite site in my book, he leases the property to the railroad, he also has a mine on his property.
Drew, just happy to be here.
Drew, Troy and Steven having fun.
One of the clubs founding members, David Hillhouse and his new wife Nilda.
Can you guess why Thomas is smiling?
Maybe because of all the big beryl crystals he was finding!
Since the flood, almost everyone has been working the creekbed, that is where most of the new material is, our member Curtis has a knack for finding the unusual minerals in places other than the creek.
Maybe the best fluorite specimen I have seen from the Ray, the fluorite in this piece measures an inch across.
Troy and Curtis.
Just one of the nice beryl specimens Troy found.
Our Henderson County Geologist Mike brought his two Sons to hunt with him.
Mikes Son, rockhound1.
Mikes other Son , rockhound 2.
John Deney working the creek, John found one of the best mica book specimens I have ever seen from this mine, I tried to trade him a big beryl crystal for it and he said "no way", it has to be nice mica when you can't trade beryl for it!
Top three pics of John D's mica book
New members Troy and Greg working the creek, this was their first time rockhounding and they found around 20 nice crystals!
MAGMA members Tate and Drew came all the way from Wytheville Virgina to hunt with us today.
About 3 o'clock the students from the University of Florida arrived in a convoy of vans and cars.
The herd of students as they began to arrive at the mine.
Adrien having fun peeling some mica specimens.
Our MAGMA member Steven found this well formed apatite crystal, terminated on both ends.
I like knowing people use my book for rockhunting, I think Steven uses it more than anyone else i've seen.
I never thought i'd see the day that I was leaving beryl at the Ray Mine because I had enough, I know that several of us left numerous specimens of beryl crystals and crystals in matrix in the creek and on the trail leading to the mine, we also gave quite a few away to the students visiting the mine, hopefully they will find a good home.
Of course there were some crystals that I just could'nt leave, I found one nice piece under this waterfall.
I was hoping to get a picture of the mother bear and her cub who charged at one of our members last week, she was near the top of the mine where the dumps ended in the creek, I thought I was going to get a shot but it turned out to be Curtis on all fours crawling around looking for rare minerals!
Here are a few things I dug up when I wasn't taking pics:
Matrix specimen with two large terminated beryls.
Apatite crystals by themselves are rare at the Ray, this one measures 3".
This doesn't look like much but it is actually sphalerite crystals, whole and eroded in matrix, the rust looking material is the eroded sphalerite, pretty rare for this area.
Closeup of sphalerite in matrix.
Thulite is abundant in the creek, it is easily distinguished from garnet by it's hot pink color, garnets at the Ray are red and black, thulite is a variety of zoisite and can sometimes be fluorescent.
I found this beryl in matrix with the end broke off, after looking at the end, we decided that the beryl crystal was pregnant and had given birth to a little beryl causing the end to pop off!
Pic of the end of the crystal where the little beryl popped out.
This 2 pound crystal was the one I found under the waterfall, it is actually a triple crystal, I have never seen a triple from the Ray before.
2 pound beryl.
2 pound beryl.
Spessartine garnet in matrix, 3/4".
I will add more pics of what the other members found as they email them to me.
Here is a beryl in matrix that Drew found and trimmed out.
