May was a fun month for rock hounding adventures. I visited the Lake George area several times in May, the first was to prospect and find the claim borders / corner posts, I went with my son and his friend. We had a fun hike and I found a couple of spots that looked interesting. I then came back and the first rock I turned over had a small spray of Goethite on it. I have never found Goethite before and so I was pretty excited. Ended up digging at this location for two days and pulled out a lot of Goethite and related Onegite sprays, some combo pieces, and many Smokey Quartz crystals and small microcline clusters. No amazonite, however, but that is okay as I had a wonderful time with what I did find.
Looking at these sprays under a loupe I discovered that there are small citrine, smoky and amethyst quartz crystals all over these things. I guess that is by definition the Onegite — Goethite with these small crystals. I read online on how to clean these and have soaked them in soapy water for days and then used water spray to avoid breaking the delicate crystals. On some of the onegite I was able to use a soft toothbrush. They didn’t clean up 100% yet; I don’t know if some ever will. Note you can’t put them in Iron Out since this is an iron based mineral.
I will post some of the microcline and smoky quartz in a different post when I have them ready; but here is a slideshow of some of the pieces that I found. What a cool mineral!
You could get the goethite much cleaner and brighter in iron out! I’ve cleaned many goethites in iron out, but I do it for short spurts and check often. Don’t take my word for it, but it worked for my and mine are black and shiny. Giving them an ultrasonic cleaning at the end made them really pop
Thanks Laura! I’ve tried Iron Out and Ultrasonic. Iron Out worked on some others I have found, but not on all! I’ll try again this winter!