I collect beach stones that are visually interesting or that seem special to me for some other reason. Most of the beach stones I collect are reasonably small, half a dozen able to fit easily in the palm of my hand, and they are mainly smooth – because I want to tumble polish them. They have to be small enough so that a number of them can go into a tumble barrel. And it is useful if they are reasonably rounded and smooth so that they do not need a lot of tumbling to prepare them to take a good polish. The identification of a stone is of secondary consideration to me. Nevertheless, I am curious enough to care about it.
Accurate identification of a stone is often far from a straightforward matter. Stone types are defined by such things as atomic and chemical composition, crystal structure, hardness and specific gravity, as well as colour and transparency. Only some of these things are observable to you and me, and these don’t always provide much certainty. Furthermore, each stone you find on a beach is almost unique in some way, and can be a mixture of material. Geological information seems to be aimed at large-scale processes, not stones. What often seems most helpful are the views of fellow fossickers met on the beach, at mineral club meetings or online in Facebook Groups or discussion forums. But such “local knowledge” and individual views, often of immense value, can be fallible and misleading, and often impossible to verify authoritatively.
So the stone identifications I provide here in TumbleStoneTwo are not reliable, scientifically-based, or verified. They reflect the “local knowledge” I have been able to collect, as well as whatever I have been able to access in publications and online information sources. Instead of saying, “This is hydrogrossular garnet” or “This is quartzite” or “This is brecciated jasper”, I am saying “This is what I have come to believe is this kind of stone based on what I have learned from other people or read in a book” and “This kind of stone is given this name by people who pick it up from these beaches”. Note: Stone types for which a page has not yet been developed below may include links to TumbleStone Blog Posts referring to such a stone. Also included in the List below are characteristics of stones and some fossils that appear in stones.
THE BEACH STONES:
Amygdaloidal Stones Blog1
Argillite Blog1 — Banded Argillite (after Stone Gn7) — Brecciated Argillite (after Stone Gn33) – – Spotted Argillite (after Stone Gn19)
Bands and Veins in Stones Blog1
Bone Fossil (Agatised) Blog1
Breccia Blog1
Bryozoan Fossils Blog 1
Coral Fossil Blog1
Dendrites Blog1 (see 2nd part of Post)
Greywacke Blog1 (towards the end of Section 6)
Igneous Stones Blog1 (towards the end of this Post)
Jasper Blog1 — Orbicular Jasper1 Orbicular Jasper2 — Brecciated Jasper — Hematite Jasper
Quartz Blog1
Rhodolith Fossils Blog1
Rhyolite Blog1 — Blog2 — Blog3 — Chrysanthemum Rhyolite — Orbicular Rhyolite
Trace Fossil/Fossil Worm Cast Blog1 — Blog2 — Blog3 — Blog4 (after Stone Gn39)
Zoophycos (Trace Fossils in Limestone) Blog1 — Blog2
HOME – FOSSICKING BEACHES – TUMBLE-POLISHING – LIST OF CONTENTS TO DATE
