Red Jasper or Red Coral?

[itzyoboyandrew]

Find this alot while metal detecting.... i live south east georgia (about an hour of savannah) so go figure how it got here... i find it randomly/rather deep (6+inches) mainly in a lower lying area of our yard, theres no rocks around them... so i dont think it was in a drive way or anything... I would go with jasper... but doesnt jasper usually have stripes and stuff through the,? this is solid red.... if it is jasper does the bright red effect the value of it?

theres 2 types of have, brownish/tan color and bright red... i took pictures with water on them aswell to show there vibrance.

 

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[wheelerite]

jasper

 

[hvacker]

Never tried it but I would think coral should fizz with a little white vinegar being a carbonate.
It is a carbonate, right

 

[DDancer]

Those are jaspers. They come in solid colors and stripes. The origins of yours are from ancient river deposits common for the region. I find them occasionally in South Carolina as well just up the river from you. Corals would have a distinct patterning to them and a pitting. To my knowledge there are no precious corals or coral fossils in the region.

Hv, fresh corals will show some reaction to vinegar if you powder a bit of it. Fossil corals will not however. A hardness test would be better for determining fresh from fossil and jasper from fresh coral as coral will be softer. Patterning is the best identification next to hardness in my opinion.

 

[itzyoboyandrew]

Those are jaspers. They come in solid colors and stripes. The origins of yours are from ancient river deposits common for the region. I find them occasionally in South Carolina as well just up the river from you. Corals would have a distinct patterning to them and a pitting. To my knowledge there are no precious corals or coral fossils in the region.

Hv, fresh corals will show some reaction to vinegar if you powder a bit of it. Fossil corals will not however. A hardness test would be better for determining fresh from fossil and jasper from fresh coral as coral will be softer. Patterning is the best identification next to hardness in my opinion.

Oh ok, yea it didnt fizz in vinegar.. or phosphoric acid

but i didnt powder it tho.

 

[hvacker]

Oh ok, yea it didnt fizz in vinegar.. or phosphoric acid

but i didnt powder it tho.

Minerals and elements are acid specific. They are used to ID the specimen. So HCL is useful with carbonates.
Most silicates will react to hydrofluoric acid.
Some the acid has to be hot, others not. So use acid as a way to ID a sample but use a specific acid and a
specific temperature. I'm not sure what reaction you'd get with phosphoric acid.
Jasper will react to hydrofluoric acid but that stuff will bite you. It will etch glass.

 

[rodoconnor]

As far as phosphoric acid goes , I don't think so. Drop a piece into a bottle of coke and let us know

 

[itzyoboyandrew]

Minerals and elements are acid specific. They are used to ID the specimen. So HCL is useful with carbonates.
Most silicates will react to hydrofluoric acid.
Some the acid has to be hot, others not. So use acid as a way to ID a sample but use a specific acid and a
specific temperature. I'm not sure what reaction you'd get with phosphoric acid.
Jasper will react to hydrofluoric acid but that stuff will bite you. It will etch glass.

Thanks for the info, the only acids i have acess to is hydrchloric, nitric (i need to make some) and just found out, phosphoric... ive gotten burned by nitric acid before, stuff doesnt play...

 

[itzyoboyandrew]

As far as phosphoric acid goes , I don't think so. Drop a piece into a bottle of coke and let us know

Ill try coke, but i do have some actual coral (not red coral tho) and it fizzed a whole lot in the vinegar (i put it in as a comparrison) and the coral fizzed even more in phosphoric acid.. but ill try coke just to make shore *pun* but i doubt at this point its red coral.

 

[itzyoboyandrew]

Looked at one of the pieces with my really nice mini magnifying glass, the one piece is made up of tiny tiny circles... but not like poppy jasper with multiple colors, its solid red, but has tiny outlined circles... ill try to take pics through the lense... doubt it will work

 

[itzyoboyandrew]

had to crop the pics, as i took them at 6k x 4k resolution

 

[itzyoboyandrew]

also anyone got any clue on these blotches (found it after i broke a very small piece i had open to see what the inside looked like... it felt like i was smashing glass when i hit it with the hammer)

 

[DDancer]

Look up poppy jasper. The magnified piece does not appear to be one of the stones you first showed unless its gone thru a tumbler.

 

[itzyoboyandrew]

Look up poppy jasper. The magnified piece does not appear to be one of the stones you first showed unless its gone thru a tumbler.

it is one of the stones, i put water on it to show the detail. Also the circles arent really visible except through a magnifying glass, which is why it doesnt show up in the originial pics

 

[DDancer]

The top left one in the first post I reckon in the two pictures that show 5 stones. It is hard to pick out that kind of detail with pictures I do appreciate that you gave a magnified view of the material though. That helps with identification.

 

[IAMZIM]

Here is one of my red horn corals from Utah. Maybe this can help a little with ID.

 

[Sir.Catfish]

I have some just like those I belive they are jasper

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[ice9]

People that suggest using HF and other powerful acids... you need to stop doing that.

Might be jasper, flint, chert, they're all fine-grained cryptocrystalline quartz. Find a local rockhound club and see if they polish, I bet they'll tumble nicely!