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- Written by: Rod Boyle
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Insects in Amber are, while interesting, rather commonplace. This isn't. Someone is going to get rich...
Insect in Opal: https://entomologytoday.org/2019/01/18/fossilized-insect-discovered-amber-opal/
And, bonus, almost entirely unrelated: http://digg.com/video/opal-reveal
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
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Headline says it all: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/large-diamond-dominion-nwt-1.4946571
The biggest diamond found so far in North America.
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
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And because I haven't been online, not regularly, not with a computer, there's a lot of treasures I've missed.
I mean a lot.
Here are a few to catch you up to speed:
https://www.space.com/42084-valuable-michigan-meteorite-used-as-doorstop.html
The fact that it was saved as a doorstop is remarkable - that it was recognized and/or saved at all; and I've never passed by a farmer's pile of rocks on the edge of a ploughed field without wanting to stop and search it for artifacts or other such rocks of interest.
Now I'm stopping.
And the 177 Carat Diamond from Rio Tinto's Diavik mine in the NWT:
http://www.mining.com/rio-tinto-unearths-260-carats-diamonds-rough-diavik-mine/
And a 1500 year old sword pulled from a Swedish lake, I like the first person narrative and photo so this article before the rest...
A good sized gold nugget in the UK:
And, really, believe it or not there's got to be bigger ones here in Alberta. Believe it or not. It's a big country...
Meanwhile, down under, Lasseter's Gold Reef get's some press (not new, merely an afterthought I throw out because I found it while searching for something better...):
https://mysteriousuniverse.org/2015/05/the-mysterious-lost-gold-of-the-australian-outback/
which is listed under found because if you do some searching there are some claims on it...
But that wasn't what I wanted to show you, it was:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-09-10/rich-gold-seam-half-a-kilometre-deep-in-kambalda/10219576
And, finally, this, which is just too cool - it's not old, not natural, but like hobo-nickels I could see these entering circulation and passing most of us by...
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The lack of vehicle - 3 weeks now while ICBC sits on their asses twiddling their thumbs - means that my prospecting interests are confined a lot closer to home.
A lot closer. Specifically, walking the beach along Kootenay Lake looking for arrowheads.
I've never found an arrowhead, it's long been a delayed childhood ambition. I've found better - the hammer/maul, other artifacts, flints, but never for some reason, an arrowhead.
And so I begin again walking the beaches of the lake, eyes peeled, scanning the gravel...there sure is a lot of gravel...
Days go by. I'm acquiring the eye.
Finally, digging in the sand I come across this. Entirely by chance.
thin, flat, could be, turning it over and over, clearly broken, but when finally I spot the line of symmetry I have it. My first arrowhead, out of Kootenay Argillite. Walking back up the beach I spy a couple of other flints, out of place in the gravel, clearly napped/worked, discards perhaps or remains of other tools.
I'm not sure about the arrowhead, I was expecting something a bit more - well, complete, and obvious, but shining a light through it reveals the tiny pressure points where it was napped, the edges are serrated from multiple tiny flakes pushed off, it's an arrowhead, sure enough.
Not a bad find, but not perfect, there are better. And so in the morning before week I get up and comb the beach. It's a big beach. I find a few flakes and a sinker, which I discard (later research shows me an image of the same, I should have kept, I had a hunch and disregarded, not good...).
Then the next day, more flakes, and then:
Another broken arrowhead, top, and a few flints/flakes on the bottom.
I'm getting an eye for this, although they're still bloody hard to find, it reassures me that I'm not entirely incompetent and maybe soon I'll be finding complete ones...
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Found this by the side of the road, in a "Free" Pile, it's rife with re-purposing possibilities...
Before I re-purpose it though I should probably try it out a bit first...I mean, look, it goes to 11! Past 11, to 12!! Imagine the superpowers I could possess, (if I don't already, carrying the thing to my jeep, weighs a ton, must be all the enriched Uranium or Plutonium); oh, boy, there will be some fun had here...