Jack Rabbit on Lake Chatuge
Limonite after Pyrite
Towns County, Georgia
January 7, 2006
Story and Field Pictures by Jim Flora
jimflora@alltel.net
Specimen Pictures by Mike Streeter
mcstreeter@charter.net

Page 2

Mike found an area of quartz outcroppings with some pyrite still in place within the massive milky quartz rocks scattered along the shore. He enjoyed the hint of unaltered pyrite which was revealed when he busted these small boulders open. I found a few interesting specimens myself, but most were way too altered and weathered.

Opal had a ball swimming in the lake until she came out was exposed to the cold winds coming off the water! Whine. . . Whine. . . Whine. . .

After three to four hours of poking around the lakeshore, we all came away with some interesting limonite after pyrite pseudomorphs, massive hematite lumps and a few mostly unaltered pyrite specimens. Mike broke open a milky quartz rock and found a pocket that contained a small red rutile crystal on a bed of limonite after pyrite and muscovite. That was a new one to me!


We also found some milky quartz that contained fine masses of black shiney tourmaline crystals, limonite after pyrite and muscovite.

(Use your mouse to drag your pointer over each
of the following three pictures for a close-up view.)

Tourmaline

Tourmaline

Tourmaline

We hiked back to our trucks, said our goodbyes and hit the road for home. While it would take me all of about 10 minutes to get my house, it'd take Mike and Chris about 2-hours to get to theirs.


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