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Books : Science : Nature & Ecology : Field Guides : Rocks & Minerals
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Color photos accompany descriptions, facts on formation, plus quick keys to group, composition, hardness, cleavage and fracture.
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Perfect for mountain climbers and hikers, this valuable reference covers more rocks and minerals in North America than any other available guide. 794 full-color photographs depict all the important rocks, gems, and minerals -- in many variations of color and crystal form -- and the natural environments in which they occur; written descriptions provide information on field marks, similar rocks and minerals, environment, areas of occurrence, and derivation of names. Includes a guide to mineral collecting and a list of rock-forming minerals
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Gemstones of the World is truly the single volume that every hobbyist, jeweler, jewelry maker, and rockhound needs: it’s the cornerstone of the field. And this updated edition contains a host of new findings on “Gemstones for Collectors,” additional gems in the “Table of Constants,” and the “double fraction” figures that experts have long wanted—a very special new feature.
All the gemstones are treated in their many variations: more than 1,500 full-color photos showcase each precious and semiprecious stone in both its rough, natural, and its polished and cut renditions. Each entry offers complete information on the gemstone’s formation, structure, physical properties, and characteristics, along with the best methods of working, cutting, and polishing it. There are even full treatments of lesser-known gems, from andalusite to vesuvian, and a special section is devoted to rocks as precious stones, including alabaster, onyx, obsidian, and fossils. Organic gem materials are also covered, such as coral, ivory, amber, and pearl. Charts and tables help collectors identify unknown gemstones and check for genuineness.
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This concise field guide to more than 250 common gems, ores, and other rocks and minerals features beautiful color photographs, information for the beginners on how to identify rocks and minerals, as well as facts and information about rocks and minerals. Author: Frederick H. Pough Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
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Practical, concise, and easy to use, Simon & Schuster's Guide to Rocks and Minerals contains everything that the rock and mineral enthusiast needs to know. This field guide is divided into two large sections -- one devoted to minerals and one to rocks, each prefaced by a comprehensive introduction that discusses formation, chemistry, and more. All 377 entries, beautifully illustrated with color photographs and helpful visual symbols, provide descriptions and practical information about appearance, classification, rarity, crystal formation, mode of occurrence, gravity of mineral, rock chemistry, modal classification fields, formational environments, grain sizes of rocks, and much more.Whether you are a serious collector or an information-seeking amateur, this incomparably beautiful, authoritative guide will prove an invaluable reference.
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A heart stone is one of nature's gifts. Heart stones are not rare or precious in the typical sense--a good scour of a beach with any stones at all will usually turn up one or two heart-shaped stones. But heart stones, lifted from their obscurity, with all of their cracks and blemishes, lopsided and imperfect, are simply the best find on any beach. Beachcombers collect them, keep them as talismans, and give them to friends and lovers.
Josie Iselin, author of Abrams' very popular Beach Stones, has put together a magical collection of 100 heart stones, and each one expresses a universal feeling. Love, passion, admiration, obsession, reassurance, joy, intrigue, comfort, wonder, and many other human emotions seem to be portrayed in these homely but appealing objects. This little book can bring great pleasure to anyone who has ever sought inspiration and solace in nature.
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Walking along the water's edge, who among us has not stopped to admire the evocatively patterned, shaped, and multihued stones that beckon? Fun to collect and free for the taking, beach stones are objects of contemplation, beauty, and sentiment. This exquisite volume-at once a gorgeous art book and a nature guide-presents more than 200 exceptional stones from around the world and describes the fascinating natural processes that produced them.
Photographer and installation artist Josie Iselin, who uses a flatbed scanner to generate her imagery, has arranged these stones with great artistry, and nature writer Margaret Carruthers yields their secrets, revealing, for instance, that a pebble from Maine was created 400 million years ago during the birth of a great mountain range. Art lovers and beachcombing spirits everywhere will cherish this gift book.
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The fascinating, often surprising story of how a simple black rock has altered the course of history. Prized as "the best stone in Britain" by Roman invaders who carved jewelry out of it, coal has transformed societies, powered navies, fueled economies, and expanded frontiers. It made China a twelfth-century superpower, inspired the writing of the Communist Manifesto, and helped the northern states win the American Civil War.
Yet the mundane mineral that built our global economy - and even today powers our electrical plants - has also caused death, disease, and environmental destruction. As early as 1306, King Edward I tried to ban coal (unsuccessfully) because its smoke became so obnoxious. Its recent identification as a primary cause of global warming has made it a cause cilhbre of a new kind.
In this remarkable book, Barbara Freese takes us on a rich historical journey that begins three hundred million years ago and spans the globe. From the "Great Stinking Fogs" of London to the rat-infested coal mines of Pennsylvania, from the impoverished slums of Manchester to the toxic city streets of Beijing, Coal is a captivating narrative about an ordinary substance that has done extraordinary things - a simple black rock that could well determine our fate as a species.
"Engrossing and sometimes stunning... [a] strongly argued and thoroughly researched book... Coal, to borrow a phrase, is king." - New York Times Book Review March 9, 2003
"Freese's writing is a bit like coal smooth and glinting, burning with a steady warmth...An intriguing, cautionary tale." - Kirkus Reviews starred review, 11/15/02
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Simon & Schuster's Guide to Gems and Precious Stones provides both the connoisseur and the casual collector with a compact, easy-to-use volume describing more than 100 rare varieties of minerals whose beauty and mystery have possessed our imaginations from time immemorial. More than 450 brilliant photographs accompany profiles of each gem, covering such aspects as appearance, physical properties -- density, hardness, refraction -- occurrence, and how to judge quality and value. Additional sections describe the process of cutting gemstones and the techniques professional gemologists use to evaluate a stone's weight and optical properties.Detailed and comprehensive, this book is essential for anyone interested in the study of gems and precious stones.
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This revised second edition of The Allure of Turquoise, originally published 10 years ago, offers an illuminating look at the cherished gemstone that has come to symbolize the culture and history of the Southwest. Two brand new chapters, updated original chapters, additional photographs and a revamped format mark this absorbing, informative and visually stunning book. The powerful allure of New Mexico’s crown jewel comes alive through a diverse collection of feature stories contributed by some of the state’s best writers. Their work delves into many facets of turquoise, from the miracle of its geological creation and its centuries-old mining history to its significance and use in the lives of Native Americans.Intriguing chapters touch on the mystery of old pawn, the treasures that reside in the world’s first Turquoise Museum, the innovative artistry of New Mexico’s contemporary native jewelers and how to distinguish the genuine article from cheap imitations. Readers will find plenty of turquoise lore and a fascinating essay on the strange-but-true relationship between ants and the blue-green stone.
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160 drawings 6 x 9 Complete beginners guide to fossil collecting Includes lesser-studied vertebrate fossils Detailed illustrations for identification and comparison Earlier life forms are buried all over the earths surfacein oceans, on mountain slopes, in our backyards. Discovering Fossils provides an essential background on where to search for fossils, how to scan for the right textures and shapes, and how to properly extract and protect ones findsa perfect reference for new collectors young and old. Includes practical advice on what to wear and which tools to carry as well as an illustrated identification section of common fossil finds. Frank A. Garcia is responsible for more than 30 previously undiscovered species of prehistoric animals. He lives in Ruskin, Florida. Donald S. Miller is a fossil collector, writer, and proprietor of Millers Fossils in Wilmington, Delaware. Artist, author, and fossil collector Jasper Burns lives in Charlottesville, Virginia.
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This guidebook is for anyone who has walked along a Lake Superior beach, picked up a stone, and wondered, “What is this?” Bruce Mueller and Kevin Gauthier researched Lake Superior’s entire shoreline to create this thorough and accessible volume. With great detail and helpful illustrations, they describe the kind of rocks you’ll find—including copper, iron, and gold—provide hints for telling the stones apart, and show you the best places to find each stone. Also included are suggestions for handling the stones, including the best polishing methods, and fascinating information on the rocks’ origins.
A section of color photographs is included to help with identification.
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This is the ultimate photographic guide to the world of rocks and minerals, with a strong emphasis on how to build a diverse and colorful collection.
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This handbook includes more than 600 stunning color photographs showing rocks, minerals, and gems from all over the world. Each specimen is described in detail: its origin and structure, chemical composition, hardness, color, and other properties.
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Here at last, is the ultimate guidebook to actual locales that can be driven to for collecting rocks, minerals and fossils in Connecticut, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wisconsin. The four volumes, with over 1,200 maps, describe over 5,000 specific sites; this Volume 1 includes over 300 to-scale maps marked with over 1,000 collecting sites and detailed directions on getting there, the types of rocks, minerals and fossils to be found at each site, and how and where to search once you've arrived.
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Over 130 gemstones are depicted with description, occurrence, composition, crystal structure, luster, and other details.
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Here are forests of petrified wood, veins of brilliant turquoise, and troves of facet-grade garnet, peridot, and amethyst-in all, more than 640 mineral species that make Arizona a rockhound's paradise. In Rockhounding Arizona, formerly The Rockhound's Guide to Arizona, expert rockhound Gerry Blair describes more than seventy of the state's best rockhounding areas, from jasper hunting in the historic mining district near Bagdad to searching for gold in the Superstition Mountains and digging for turquoise at the foot of the Hieroglyphic Range. This guidebook covers popular and commercial sites as well as numerous little-known sites. It also describes where to view mineral specimens and prehistoric artifacts at Grand Canyon and Petrified Forest national parks, as well as on tribal lands. Brimming with advice on collecting and preparing gems and minerals, this handy book also includes maps and directions to each site and directories to museums, rock shops, and major public land areas. For the beginner, Rockhounding Arizona offers a complete introduction to this many-faceted hobby. For the expert, it is an outstanding guide and source-book.