January 2022, Stone of the Day #1 – A Gemstone Beach Gem

New Year greetings!

I haven’t made many Posts lately, though I have been continuing to tumble-polish stones collected during my fossicking trips of 2021. I’ve decided to run a “Stone of the Day” Series for the first month of 2022, featuring recently polished beach stones. This will ensure more blog activity on my part!

Stone #1 in this Series is a Gemstone Beach stone, notable for the depth of its pattern and for its smoothness. Clouds of mineral permeate the stone, giving it colour and interest. It is 4 cm long and 3 cms wide and 1.5 cms deep, what I would call a “small medium-sized” stone.

The other side of Stone #1 has slightly less colour in it:

I found this stone on Gemstone Beach in Southland in June 2021 – I called it the “Find-of-the-trip” (see the entry for Thursday 17 June 2021 in this Post). I was near the Waimeamea River mouth, over a kilometre from the carpark, when the usual massed banks of stones ran out temporarily and a stretch of mainly sand appeared. I was tempted to moved further up the beach, closer to more stones but decided to keep going in my original direction. Among a small number of scattered stones, this stone suddenly appeared. It was very difficult to miss.

It was very smooth, having been well tumbled by the waves of Te Waewae Bay. In some ways, the wet stone as found on the beach that day looks better than the polished version. However, polishing keeps the shine on the stone, it would otherwise go dull when dry. At the time I thought it might be a jasper. However I now think it more likely to be a quartzite. I have found maybe a handful of similar stones – they are quite stunning. Stone #1 finished the polishing process in December 2021.

I tumbled the stone in 400 grit for about 10 days, then because of its special character, in 600 grit for another 10 days or so. It spent 14 days in tin oxide polish and was burnished in borax for 13 days. I recently decided to let the barrels tumble longer than I have previously (between 7 and 9 days per stage has been my practice previously) , and I think some stones come out better. This stone probably didn’t need the extra time, but wouldn’t have suffered from it.

A stone found near Kakanui in August 2020, with similar “clouds” of mineral through it:

Stone of the Day #2 is here. The Index to the January 2022 Stone of the Day Series is here.