Crystals In The Red Georgia Clay

 

Back in November the Blind Pig family spent a week in Georgia. Amid all the relaxing,

 

                               hunting,

 

                                 hiding,

 

                                 teaching,

   

                             knife drawing,

 

and silliness, Chatter and Chitter made time for one of thier favorite pastimes-looking for rocks.

  

They started out in a neighbors turnip patch (due to the drought not many of the greens had come up). The recently overturned dirt made it easy to spy choice specimens.

 

Chatter moved into the road to sift through the gravel-picky rock collectors Chatter and Chitter are not. After just a few minutes of searching in the road, Chatter began to find crystals-clear pretty crystals.

 

It took a little convincing to get Chitter to move to the road but...

 

       once she did-she began to find crystals too.

 

The following days found the girls searching the road for crystals.

 

This isn't the first time I've seen crystals ready for the picking in North Georgia. Back in the day before The Deer Hunter and I were married, he camped at a different place-about 20 miles away from the present location. I remember walking around the old lease picking up the big clear crystals-so plentiful they were like gravel.

I've read minerals form crystals-but-maybe that Red Georgia Clay has someting to do with it too.

Tipper

  

Comments

[Sandra]

I have never seen crystals on the ground, only in stores. this is amazing to me. i really enjoyed this post from your archives. loved all the photos of the Deer hunter and chitter and chatter.

[Marlene Affeld]

Sounds like you had a delightful time - rockhounding, gold prospecting and hunting for crystal are some of my favorite pastimes - thanks for sharing your adventure.

[Egghead]

Funny my youngest daughter collected all sorts of rocks and her favorites were the crystals. We moved that box around with us everywhere we went. Each year it became heavier and heavier. I wonder where she has it now? Probably in one of the closets of our house I am sure.

[Sarah]

Interesting to see them rock hounding as teens. Did they like it as littles too? Jack always has pockets full of rocks.

[Brenda Kay Ledford]

Tipper,

I enjoyed these photos very much. They bring back a lot of childhood memories.

[Carolyn A.]

Wow! That's one serious deer stand! Glad everyone had a relaxing time.

Love the crystals and the fact that the girls were 'down in the dirt' to find them. When Sister S lived up on the farm, Niece J would visit and we saw her putting rocks in her pocket. When asked about it, she just said, "Cause they're pretty." We let her be as she seemed to be having a good time. When we took her home she was fast asleep. Her Mom undressed her for bed and all those rocks fell out of her pockets. She had played all day with them in there. No wonder she was tired. :) xxoo

[Mary]

Tipper,

There is lots of minerals in that red Georgia clay and I'm not at all surprised that there are crystals there. Very interesting. I'm glad to see the girls enjoy something so simple.

Blessings,
Mary

[cathy]

You were probably in my back yard! Those rocks are everywhere, and mica too.

[Miss Cindy]

One of my favorite things to do when I was young was collect rocks. Actually if the truth be told I still pick up rocks that call my attention. I don't know what it is about rocks but they have always seemed to talk to me.
You can look around my house, I mean inside, and see jars of rocks. The bigger ones are outside.
Used to look in the creek bed (natures tumbler) for small red stones. I fancied them rubies but actually they were garnets.
Stay warm, it's cold today!

[Paula]

I'm with Chitter and Chatter and can often be found on my hands and knees looking for pretty rocks. Wyoming is a great place for crystals also. I found a few really big ones during the years that we lived there.

[noble pig]

Oh how my boys would go crazy for this! It's as good as glass beach!

[Denese]

How neat!
We've found arrowheads around here before and quartz polished by the river but no crystals, yet.
Hope you all didn't get all the rain and flooding like we did, heard it was bad over there, too.

[Kim Campbell]

How fun!!

[Becky]

What a find! Boo enjoyed this post, as he likes to collect rocks, too.

[David Templeton]

I went back to a hillside in Tennessee where my little brother and I used to pick up quartz crystals from the red clay outcroppings. Fifty years later the landscape hasn't changed (government property) but there were no crystals to be found.

Rockhounds have ways to clean and brighten these crystals but the procedures are not good for kids' use.

Here's a nice site about the crystals.

http://www.mineralminers.com/html/rkxminfo.htm

[yolanda]

I so love coming here. It reminds me so much of home.

[Julie at Elisharose]

Up at The 100 Acre Wood where we escape to sometimes, we always find petrified wood. We have found pieces tiny to almost too big to lug around. It's cool.

Thanks so much for your kind words. Things are already getting better.

[Fishing Guy]

Tipper: What a neat post. Do the girls polish up the crystal and make something from them. It seems they would make a great necklace.

[Patty Hall]

Nice crystals!

I have a question for you. I am needing a recipe for venison loin other than fried. How do ya'll like yours?
Thanks
Patty

[threecollie]

We love hunting for them up here in NY too.

[petra michelle]

Evening Tipper! This post reminds me so of a dear friend and his love of rocks. It started out as a hobby around the same age as the girls and he's now in his early 50's and it has become a passion. Just for fun, he displays and shares his accounts and self-acquired knowledge of rocks and their age at high schools.
Perhaps their passion will turn into a field in archeology? One never knows. :))

[Janet]

Looks like you went camping, we did that lots when our kids were little. We loved it! I'm always searching the ground for things, around here about all I find are arrowheads (but I love finding arrowheads)I've always wanted to go to one of the public gem mines in NC, have you all ever done that?

[Louise]

When I was a kid, finding crystals was about the coolest thing my brother and I ever thought we did. I love how your kids love the simple things in life.

[The Texican]

The Arkansas diamond mine is nothing more than a muddy field. Keep looking you might find a keeper. Pappy

[Nancy Simpson]

Hi Tipper and Girls,

Good find. When I first came here in the 1960's my sister and I used to walk, walk, walk and "dilly dally along" hunting for rocks. The other walkers left us in the dust. We bought a rock tumbler and polished our stones. Many of them were crystal quarts, some clear, some cloudy yellow and some pink. We found garnets too at Buck Creek. The best thing for me is I learned the names of different stones. We made some bracelets. I still pick up small shinny rocks when I walk.