Things Geologists Do #5

Rock & Mineral Collecting

“The 4 stages of addiction: Experimentation, Regular Use, Problem Use, Addiction / Dependency”

My name’s Ralph. I write the urbancrows blog and I’m an addict. I’m years in to my addiction and I now embrace it. It’s an integral part of me, so I’ve stopped looking for help. I’m way past that.

Now that I’m older and a little more affluent, I can pay dealers to satisfy my cravings. Sure, it costs me more than before to scratch the itch, but my suppliers are reliable and I can get the best quality stuff so I don’t have to hit as often as I used to.

Yes, I collect mineral samples.(PS: the mineral photos are at the end)

Mineral collectors fall into 4 loose categories, the same 4 stages that signal alcohol addiction: beginners (experimentation), students (regular use), experienced collectors (problem use), and true lost souls (dependency).

Lost souls like me will spend anything to build their collection. They’ll drop good cash for the right sample. We’re like wealthy alcoholics with the dollars to skip the 2-buck-chuck and get pissed up on fine champagne cognac instead. But in the end, it’s all just shades of the same thing.

Happily, some lucky people can and will kick the habit and go clean, discarding all their samples, stepping out into a brave, new rock-free world. I’ve seen it happen… really, just not to me.

The Experimentation Phase

Typical Fix: Not fussy, anything will do so long as its shiny. Fossils, small pebbles, grey lumps & the odd quartz crystal.

Hell starts off cheaply enough. All you need to score when you’re experimenting is a tatty old back pack, a weather beaten hammer, sensible boots and a nice packed lunch -maybe a wilted ham sandwich or a hard boiled egg.

And there’s the rub. That’s what’s so bloody alluring. It’s so easy to fossick for rocks. Any place where there are outcrops, cliffs or cobbles will suffice, giving hours and hours of happy endorphin-pumping pleasure with each rock you collect.

After a couple of years, somewhere in the addled recesses of your immature mind, you’ll be convinced you own a world class rock collection to rival anything in the Smithsonian. But the truth is, your mum and dad’s garden is now full of your discards, isn’t it? At home, dried out and out of context, those shiny treasures are simply dusty grey doorstops.

I got my start roaming the beaches of southeast Kent, in the shadow of the white cliffs. Armed with a pathetically small rock hammer, a toothbrush and a limited knowledge of geology, I knew enough just spot the countless fossils of sea urchins, sponges and bivalves (clams) sticking out of the chalk cliffs; the visible legacy of a warm, blue ocean that covered the region tens of millions of years ago.

At 12 years old, I hacked away at the soft chalk, gouging out the petrified animals which I diligently cleaned with the toothbrush. The best fossils were kept in match boxes wrapped in today’s most valuable COVID-era commodity, toilet paper.

I also had a cardboard box with some 20 samples of the commonest minerals like amethyst, quartz and calcite -an instant collection that I bought at the local rock shop, Gemset. It cost me 5 pounds, a bloody fortune back then but it was a prized possession – my well-thumbed geological Playboy magazine tucked under the mattress.

I even joined the Thanet Mineral And Lapidary society; a rather sad club reminiscent of the Danebury Metal Detecting Club in the brilliant BBC comedy series, The Detectorists. The infrequent meetings were attended by a motley collection of elderly rock polishers, kids like me and complete nerds. And nobody, but nobody, had any proper knowledge of geology. True amateurs.

Regular Users

Typical Fix: Big chunks of gneiss, schist, pegmatites, fossils -anything with academic significance.

The next step down into the basement of dependency saw me shape-shift into a naïve but earnest student.

Every field school, my class mates and I happily filled our back packs with any old shit from the last quarry we visited. In the college minibus on the way back to the motel, there was lots of pseudo-academic talk about the earth-shattering implications of the small piece of schist or the crappy fragment of trilobite thorax we’d found.  It was all so important.

God help the student who doesn’t pick up a sample or 6 on field school. They’re the losers who lurk alone in the corner of the pub at the end of the day, muttering resentfully to themselves about “knowing better next time” and can they PLEASE borrow your rock to sketch before they write the trip report. No.

Problem Use

Typical Fix: Ore minerals, vein samples w/ cool quartz textures, & anything of professional interest.

Step 3 on the descent into collecting hell is when you get an actual job as a geologist. Your rented apartment soon fills up with a thematic collection of Yukon sulphide ores, collected over 3 or 4 summer seasons spent visiting mines and exploration projects, perhaps tastefully accented with some hand picked drill core samples.

Or maybe you have 23 different pieces of mineralized, copper-bearing intrusive rock representing an east to west transect of the main mineral belts of Chile. Great. Lucky you.

Then you meet the woman (or man) or of your dreams who’s hobby is machine knitting. You move in together but she really needs the spare room to store the textile gear. You realise with a growing sense of panic that it’s you or the rocks; one of you has to go. Love and shagging win the day.

Full Dependency

Typical Fix: Euhedral “cabinet worthy” crystals, spectacular gossan minerals, single rare crystals of anything colourful, meteorites -museum quality stuff.

The “lost soul” stage comes on slowly- it didn’t hit me until I was in my 40s. The purist collectors only collect what they find themselves. True lost souls, in contrast, are more than happy to buy samples from dealers, and we’ll spend good coin for the right piece.

The dealers put in the serious leg work to source the aesthetically beautiful samples that we thrive on. We’re happy to pay for the time they put in travelling to the great locations, hacking around in a hole in the ground, and finally shipping the flats of rocks back home.

We dependents can spot each other a mile off. No need for secret handshakes. The moment we start chatting we know we’ve found a kindred lost soul. We’re up to speed with where the best material is coming from. Aquamarine from Pakistan? Check. Arsenopyrite from Kozovo? Check. Dogtooth calcite on amethyst from Uruguay? Yup.

The toughest part of dependency is knowing what you missed; seeing the shit-eating smirk on another collector’s face when they tell you that they have what you covet most.

Before I hit rock bottom and became a serious collector, the Tsumeb mine in Namibia was producing the finest gemmy blue-green dioptase (copper silicate) samples ever mined. But it closed years back, and I wasn’t collecting at the time so I missed it. Now, I don’t have any, and to buy a good piece would cost far more than I’m willing to pay which drives me fucking nuts. Every time I meet a collector with a piece I want to kill them and steal it. That’s how lost I am.

But Wait -There Is Light

All addicts eventually realise that if they’re serious about their addiction -the buzz is SO compelling they can never let it stop- then they have to cover it up. Those around you can never realise how deep in you are. Hide the habit.

I discovered the best way to hide my own compulsion was to make the collection pay for itself. Yes, it self funds so I can’t be accused of spending money I don’t have. Smart eh?

My best pieces are rented to a mining company in downtown Vancouver, on display in their offices. The yearly rent is nominal but is just enough for me to be able to treat myself every year to a couple of new samples, which I buy from one of the mineral dealers who set up their stalls at the giant annual PDAC conference in Toronto. The holy grail of addiction: a self funding habit.

So take my advice, if you want to be left alone to collect in peace, your collection has to earn its keep.

And Finally – Storage

“It may sound counter-intuitive, but invest in a nice display cabinet or case, and limit your collection to what fits inside.”   yeah… nice try…

Every great collection needs a really bad old cabinet to display it. An unlit, dusty set of dark wooden drawers with no glass is perfect. Don’t forget to stuff it in a corner of the spare room with an old rolled up carpet leaning against it so you can’t open it. When the odd -and exceptionally rare- visitor expresses some vague interest in seeing one or two of your nicer rocks, you’ll have some serious furniture shifting to do.

And don’t forget to store some of your duller unlabelled rocks in damp cardboard boxes in the garage, mummified in bubble wrap. The first time you try to move them, one box is guaranteed to split, dropping a 6lb chunk of Scotland on your foot.

Don’t Forget

Addiction is not just for Christmas. If you have any of your own stories about the strange compulsion to collect rocks, send me a comment. If you understand my severe addiction issues, then PLEASE help me get the therapy I need and subscribe to urbancrows.com via the euhedral crystalline subscription box that mysteriously nucleated from a mineral rich hydrothermal fluid and attached itself to the top of my home page. I’ll be sure to email you more nonsense about rocks and addiction in the future.