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Let's Rock => Rockhounding Tips, Maps, Trips Etc. => Topic started by: montanajohn on December 07, 2016, 07:16:39 AM
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:blob1:Does anyone know if there are still fire agates to be found in the Arizona Deer Creek/Black Hills/Round Mountain (or other) digs? I am planning a trip this winter and can always stop at Tuscon to buy more but would a whole lot rather find them/dig them.
If any of you fellow addicts are up this way next summer let me show you some Montana agate country.
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We have visited the Black Hills collecting area many times over the years. It seems the more times we go the easier it is to find great material. On one occasion the state had plowed a large area exposing hundreds of pounds of new material to the surface. Be sure to look anywhere that the surface has been disturbed. A digging fork can also he helpful.
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Thank you very much for your help. If you are down that way mid-late January and see a Montana pickup/camper please stop by and visit. I am excited about the trip. Fire Agates!!!
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We were at Round Mountain earlier this year on a club field trip and did find some stuff. The majority of the folks stopped at a parking area but our quartet continued around the loop. Best and worst time to go is after a good rain. More stuff exposed but road gets torn up. Good high clearance/4wd vehicle best. Better material is found the further from the road you go.
Jerry
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man that round mountain materials are nice when you find a honey hole (good spot) that hasnt been picked over by everyone.
I have some old stock from the 80's i was given, VERY very good stuff.
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Thanks for the help guys. If you're up my way I'll return the favor
John
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David Penney offers a fee dig at his Deer Creek Dig in late February/March. It runs about $1400 an hour
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Well if a hundred people go it's $10 each right?
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I have a friend that went down in fire agate area to a place that has been reported picked clean... its all picked over... if you can see it from your car. Walk a few miles 1 direction, you will find stuff.
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Thanks. That is the case with all of it these days, more people and fewer rocks. As long as we know there is a chance of finding something worthwhile, the walk seems short
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Thanks. That is the case with all of it these days, more people and fewer rocks. As long as we know there is a chance of finding something worthwhile, the walk seems short
mountain bike!!
just wear some snake proof leggings lol!
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Snakeproof indeed, my dog required an after snakebite shot last year, 850$. Where there's rocks, there's snakes
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We had our dog rattlesnake avoidance trained at the local kennel. Cost $60 with periodic $30 retest/retrain cost. Dog has successfully herded me away from a wild bungee cord in a parking lot. Could have been tragic if that bungee cord had attacked.
See now it was very cost effective.
Sorry about the pain the dog had to go through!
Jerry
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Cool! This dog was supposed to be helping move cows but elected to chase a rabbit into a rock pile (agates?) where a rattlesnake lived. I'll try him out on a bungy
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Snakeproof indeed, my dog required an after snakebite shot last year, 850$. Where there's rocks, there's snakes
Many of those critters around the fossil sites south of Glendive and east of Melstone area....I see them a lot!!
Most of the time I walk away or around them,a few times,I had to kill them,but very few!
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I am with you on that, there's not that many left in the world. What adjusts my attitude however, is a favorite horse comes looking for help a day after being struck on the face, or seeing a calf or colt can't eat, head swollen and waiting to die. I step on black widow spiders and these days I give the rattlesnakes a good whack with a big stick. They cause to much suffering to animals just wanting to go their own way
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Snakeproof indeed, my dog required an after snakebite shot last year, 850$. Where there's rocks, there's snakes
Many of those critters around the fossil sites south of Glendive and east of Melstone area....I see them a lot!!
Most of the time I walk away or around them,a few times,I had to kill them,but very few!
i would shoot them with my .410 in the head, then eat them lol!
Tastes like chicken when they are prepared with Teriaki sauce! (snakes, not the livestock)
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and this.......
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I wear good old snap chaps, rarely needed except for the one time they get tested! I was hunting near Lone Butte in CA. looking for Palm Root when a Mojave Green popped up in the extreme defensive stance about a 2 feet from my knee (Chaps don't do over knee). I unloaded on him in a heartbeat and going to make a headband out of his skin. The Mojave is the only rattler I'll kill, bastard snake with 2 toxins, doesn't like to rattle and the color of a bush. People who haven't seen a rattler in the extreme position it is less angry and more you are going to get bit. Snake puts body straight up in the air with head tilted slightly down. I am putting in a pic on the defensive stance of a Western Diamond Back the we ran into on the Bouquet Agate ranch in Marfa, Texas.
Mojave Green's have only 2 scales (Scapoidal) between the eyes and normal Diamond Backs have somewhere in the low teens. You can only imagine what goes thru your mind when something like this is just in front of your knee cap.
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We all want to see this old world as it is. We want to pick a few of these beautiful rocks and we want to leave a few for the next person to find. We want especially to keep things as they are for the next generations of rockhounds and people who appreciate all the beauty we see, both in and outside of the rocks we find.
Rattlesnakes take some thought. They are part of this landscape, and it would be a poor place without their threat to help keep us aware. But the fact is, they deal a world of misery to a lot of animals just trying to go their way.
You must make the decision, as do I, let this rascal go on or kill him with a big stick. If he is not in a position to deal misery to my dogs, horses or cattle, which depend on me for help, I let him be. Otherwise, I kill him very dead
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Quite alive when I left him. Only thing I shot him with was my camera. Like all the other rattlers I have encountered on the ranches in Texas. I don't advocate killing rattlers and I find them beautiful. I do hold exception to the Mojave Green however. There is no good theory that I have seen as to how the Mojave came to be but it wasn't seen much before the 70's and only around the otwn of Mojave CA. since then they have expanded into many neighboring states. I find that because of the green appearance of the snake and the fact that it doesn't like to rattle makes it a very good candidate for accidental bites by the unsuspecting hiker etc and add the 2 toxins and it is the only rattler I will kill or ever have killed. Included is another rattler from the ranch, when I found it it crawled under a rock into a cavity and after I photographed it I placed the cover rock back over it to give him some protection, not something most people would do.
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Hi, I was at Cuesta Fire Agate Mine this winter and was in a new hole. I was got a 5 gallon bucket full for a days dig. Pcs from nodules to pcs 5"X8" in size. Most showed fire or good possibility of Fire. I have started working 10 pcs which only one hasn't shown any fire yet, Plus I got a few nice pcs of Druse Crystal Clusters (Desert Roses). Well worth the money spent. Will be going back.
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Thanks for the good information. Where is the Cuesta Ray mine? A fee dig I assume?
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The "Greens" are in the Nebraska grasslands where we were looking for Fairburns in the piles left by the ice age.