This small orbicular hematite jasper was found on Gemstone Beach early in 2021. I have found a limited number of other such stones there and at Kakanui, though this might be the biggest. It is still quite small, being 3.5 cms long by 3 cms wide by 1.5 cms deep. As well as generally being small stones, orbicular jaspers often have cracks and pits in them so that I have not yet been able to produce a fully smooth polished one. This is one of the best, with only one very thin crack and a three tiny pits marring its smoothness.
Such stones often get a little more time in 400 grit from me, often repeating the stage, before going on to be polished, to try to minimise the cracks and holes. As I noted in a previous Post about a similar stone, Mindat states that orbicular jasper is “a highly silicified rhyolite or tuff that has quartz and feldspar crystallized into radial aggregates of needle-like crystals forming orbicular (spherical) structures”. If the orbs are red, we tend to call it “poppy jasper”.
A very similar type of stone is “brecciated jasper” – see the “H is for Hematite Jasper ” entry in this Post for information about this small brecciated jasper I found on Gemstone Beach in February 2021 (compared below with a photo of another small orbicular jasper I found on Gemstone Beach on 22 June 2021):
Hematite is an iron oxide compound widely found in rocks and soils. It occurs naturally in a variety of colours – black to silver-gray, brown to reddish-brown, and red. It is the silvery gray and black that are most noticeable in Stone #4.
Stone of the Day #5 is here. The Index to the January 2022 Stone of the Day Series is here.
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