Can you identify my rock?

Can anyone explain how this pattern could have formed in my little rock? What it's made of etc?

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/baea516ac7ec.jpg[/atsimg]
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/680168586032.jpg[/atsimg]
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/fc7f9d2c09d1.jpg[/atsimg]

yeah me too. yours is a little cooler though.
I thought mine was currency.

my pictures

reply to post by wigit

Wow, very cool! Sunstone?
Maybe google your areas geology to see what kind of formations are around you.
Jasper maybe?

Peace

Looks like a Sankara stone to me, a village in India will be suffering the effects of its loss

It's a petrified Cyclops Potato Head! The Smithsonian has been looking for a sample of this species, as they so far have only heard rumors of it's existance. you should contact the Smithsonian currator and see what they'd be willing to pay for it!


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reply to post by wigit


Its man-made, maybe over 10000 years old, See if it shines under black light... If it does, call project avalon.

That's a very beautiful rock

Really cool to have, make sure the Illuminati don't steal it.

No idea on the scale of this. It could be an igneous intrusion, the white being quartz and the centre of the 'eye' a very small pipe. This is the sort of formation that you get in volcanic areas.

Are you in the vicinity of Aberdeen for example? Or Edinburgh. Either way you should take this to Edinburgh or Aberdeen University for identification.

I have never seen a rock like that. Fascinating!

By the way pipes are what produce gold and diamonds

The white definitely looks like vein quartz, though at a push it could be calcite. Have you tested it with acid (hydrochloric 10%)? If it fizzes it will be calcite.
Obviously the rock has been subjected to quite an amount of transport given the smooth shape.
The red 'country rock' looks like it could be a sandstone, but it's hard to tell without a handlens and actually holding the rock. Is the groundmass made up of crystalline (well-formed crystal shapes) material or sub-rounded etc grains?
Without holding the actual hand specimen it is difficult to tell, but the 'quartz' looks like it is pressure-infilling giving hydrothermal fluid flow a possibility. Certainly the white material (quartz/calcite) is a later occurrence than the surrounding material.
Where did you find it?
Where there other rocks of the same material?

You're in Scotland, yeah?

www.google.com...:// upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d4/Scotland.central.geological.jpg/300px-Scotland.central.geological.jpg&imgrefurl=http://en.wikipedia. org/wiki/Geology_of_Scotland&h=292&w=300&sz=35&tbnid=pYPtObCh6wQSHM:&tbnh=113&tbnw=116&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dscottish%2Bgeology&hl=&usg=__fEvkmg51WPUFhk1 O0EEkQe4m7MY=&sa=X&ei=yvowTMa2HImycZOF_K8D&ved=0CDwQ9QEwCA

www.google.com...://www.scottishgeology.com/geology/geo logy_images/map.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.scottishgeology.com/geology/geology_of_scotland_map/scotland.html&h=946&w=1352&sz=308&tbnid=PjG29EQXVP6ZLM:&t bnh=105&tbnw=150&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dscottish%2Bgeology&hl=&usg=__ucsvNWq22Yo9YZB41b-rR1YzC90=&sa=X&ei=yvowTMa2HImycZOF_K8D&ved=0CDQQ9QEwBA

www.bgs.ac.uk...

These links may help you and there should be someone you can contact, either at the British Geological survey, a museum, or a Geology Department at a University.

looks like it hit something and the white strokes are just the cracks..

nice stone, is it magnetic?
looks like it may of been used to pound
or ground up something like a mortar and pestle

That is a really cool rock!

My guess at how this happened if not by human interference, is a combination of weathering processes. I think that in the eye in the centre is a different band of rock than that surrounding it, creating a natural rift around the central piece. Over time moisture gets into this rift and when winter roles around it freezes and expands cracking the rock. This process occurs time and time again until the cracks are as pronounced as the ones in your rock.

Once the cracks are open to more outside elements, a further process occurs called crystallisation, this is similar to the above process but also includes the creation of salt crystals between the cracks;

Crystallization can cause the necessary stresses needed for the mechanical rupturing of rocks and minerals. Crystal growth causes stress as a result of a compound's or an element's change of physical state with change in temperature. The transformation from liquid to solid crystalline form produces a volumetric change which in turn causes the necessary mechanical action for rupture. There are primarily two types of crystal growth that occur; they are ice and salt. Upon freezing the volumetric change of water from liquid to solid is 9%. This relatively large volumetric change upon freezing has potentially a great rupturing effect. Several researchers have discovered in the laboratory and the field that frost action plays a major role in weathering in temperate and polar regions of the Earth. The threshold temperature for frost action is at least - 5° Celsius, and it is at this temperature that the most effective rupturing occurs.

www.physicalgeography.net...
www.landfood.ubc.ca...

The cracks are then filled by mineral deposits which in turn crystallise into the white residue you see around the 'eye.' Anyway that's my theory.

Mmmm......looks like a potato to me, lol.

Thanks for the input guys. I've had this stone for approx 12-14 years. My nephew picked it up on the beach and cried out "this one's for you" I thought it was covered in bird poop at first glance, lol.

It was found on the coast a few miles east of Largo Law (extinct volcano)in Fife. Can't remember the name of the beach. There's a couple of ruined castle type things there too.
The background mass is really dense and granular I'd say. It's quite heavy too for it's size. And the white is kind of glass-like. When I first got it the black dot was really black. I scrubbed it up for those pics which were taken years ago too. The dot's gone dark again though. I put the pics on a fossil website years ago and they said it was probably calcite. Someone else said I'd painted the white on, lol.

Around the time I got this stone I was really into synchronicities and things, long story but the nine spokes fitted right in there with the rest of the stuff that was happening, so I did think it was some kind of apport lol, ( for a little while) especially when I turned it over and found the thumb print dent on the back. I was disappointed to find when I went back to the beach nearly every stone has a little 'thumb-print' chunk out of it somewhere. No two stones alike though.

Just took these pics a few minutes ago to show size. It's a little'un.
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/19d4b4241cd9.jpg[/atsimg]
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/7c2634f475b1.jpg[/atsimg]

[edit on 4-7-2010 by wigit]

The holder of this stone has a destiny to fulfill. The Sun is our Heavenly Father in as much as the Universe is God. Our Earth is our Mother.

This stone speaks, and you can hear its message just as I can hear its message.

May your Journey take you to many wonderful places. This stone is a living stone that should be honored on your alter or have it placed on a wrap so that you can wear it.

A Blessing Stone!

It may be a "little un" LOL but i like it!
yes i see the sun like symology too
i don't think its fossilised anything either
most prosaic answer is probably the action of nature
still all the less it is what you make of it yourself that matters.

reply to post by Greensage


Thanks for that. I do cherish my little stone as special. I class it as 'the one that didn't get away'.

I had another special rock- a little fossil of three perfect (common garden) daisies. I was about 7 years old and found a black pebble on the beach that I cracked open, just like I saw a bloke on the telly do, and there it was. Perfect. Alas, I didn't look after it so it's gone forever.

Another one that got away was this huge, (and I'm positive about this now) meteorite. It weighed a small ton, about 10-11 inches long, was perfectly conical on one end and the other two thirds was covered in what they call regmalypts (thumbprints), and I'm sure it had just fallen. Found it in a neatly mown park under some trees. I think the trees broke it's fall. I picked it up to keep it but as we'd just started our walk I eventually got fed up carrying this ton weight around and i threw it into some long grass. Boy do i regret that one.

Originally posted by PuterMan
Are you in the vicinity of Aberdeen for example? Or Edinburgh. Either way you should take this to Edinburgh or Aberdeen University for identification.

I have never seen a rock like that. Fascinating!

That is a fascinating rock!

Are you going to follow this guys advice and take it to the university for an opinion? I think it would be worth it. I spent about an hour trying to identify it, and couldn't. I collect special rocks so I'd love to have something like this in my collection, but I've never seen it before either.

If you do go to the university to get it identified, please post what they tell you here, I'd really like to know what they say about it, it looks quite special!

It looks like a fossilized/petrified potato.
(someone else mentioned potato too)
Beautiful stone!

I would write more but gotta poop!

Thanks for sharing, can't wait to see what it turns out to be.

reply to post by Arbitrageur


If I get any information on this I'll be sure to post it here.