Central Pennsylvania gemstones and how to find them

[matt_72]

Hello,

I am pretty new to mineralogy, but I know that Pennsylvania has some pretty interesting minerals, gemstones and fossils if you're willing to work for it.

If you have been to the State College area, you are probably familiar with I-99 near the Grays Woods exit ramp near Skytop. At this spot, there are three large cuts into the hillside. Last year when it was cold out, I decided to go to this area and have a look around to see just how easy it would be to pull a hunk of crystal out of the hillside. Of course, it's not easy. I was there for about 30 minutes before I finally gave up and went home, hammer in hand.

I've never understood how some people can walk right up to a cut in the road like the one I'm talking about, and just pull out a beautiful chunk of quartz from the land. But when I walk up to it, all I see is one giant cliff of bare rock.

Can someone point in the right direction? Thanks!

 

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[Moesia]

Hello,

I am pretty new to mineralogy, but I know that Pennsylvania has some pretty interesting minerals, gemstones and fossils if you're willing to work for it.

If you have been to the State College area, you are probably familiar with I-99 near the Grays Woods exit ramp near Skytop. At this spot, there are three large cuts into the hillside. Last year when it was cold out, I decided to go to this area and have a look around to see just how easy it would be to pull a hunk of crystal out of the hillside. Of course, it's not easy. I was there for about 30 minutes before I finally gave up and went home, hammer in hand.

I've never understood how some people can walk right up to a cut in the road like the one I'm talking about, and just pull out a beautiful chunk of quartz from the land. But when I walk up to it, all I see is one giant cliff of bare rock.

Can someone point in the right direction? Thanks!

Take a picture of the road cut, post it and give the exact location of the spot...

 

[huntsman53]

Have you heard of folks finding Quartz crystals in the location you noted? If so, then you might have to do some digging as a lot of Quartz crystals are found in the dirt/soil because they either eroded out of rock formations or because of decomposition a long time ago, they are loose in the dirt/soil. However, be careful not only for highwalls that could collapse and fall on you but if the cuts are in right-of-way of a highway, you could get into trouble with the State and/or County as you could possibly cause any highwalls to collapse into the roadway. It appears from various websites, that the best areas are further East of you in areas around McAdoo and Kuntz for Quartz crystals (i.e. along and probably up to 30 miles West of I-476 and around Danville for fossils. Good luck!


Frank