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Digging for diamonds, crystals
By Judy Wells, The Times-Union
Jul 20, 2008
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - Shell collectors talk about the Sanibel stoop. Would-be rock hounds have the crater crunch and crystal crouch.
At Crater of Diamonds State Park, the world's only public diamond mine, you crunch down over your screens and stare as you sift, sift and sift some more, hoping that a magically clear stone emerges from piles of clay and dirt.
At Mount Ida's crystal mines you crouch, moving your head up, down and side to side to catch the sun glinting off a six-faceted point in globs of clay.
Buried treasure draws thousands of visitors and residents to toil in this state's soil. The more commercially valuable the treasure, the harder the toil, but others have succeeded and so might you. In 2007, 1,024 diamonds were found at Crater; 356 have been found so far this year. Sharp-eyed crystal hunters always have luck at Bear Mountain Mine, where the deep digging is already done for you.
Everyone's best friend
Beads of sweat are already forming as Ranger Waymon Cook tells us how 3 billion years ago and 60 to 100 miles below the earth's surface, diamonds crystallized from carbon. A diamond-bearing volcanic vent thrust through to the surface here 100 million years ago, exploding into an 83-acre, funnel-shaped crater.
To find a piece of crystallized carbon, imagine taking a needle out of that proverbial haystack, compressing it to the size of a match head, coloring it white, brown or yellow then burying it in a 37-acre field of plowed dirt and more than 40 other kinds of rocks. Your tools will be eyes, shovels, spades, buckets, box screens, perhaps a plastic stool and definitely patience.
There's more hunting than finding. Most diamonds found here are small - 1/4 carat or so - but not all. Since 1972, out of 5,324.65 total carats found, 778 diamonds were of 1 carat or more; the largest was 16.37 carats.
Cook demonstrates how to use the wet method of screening, described the dry method and points us toward the diamond field where a few groups were digging. Indecision fills the mind: If I were a diamond washed into furrows by rain, where would I be? I take a stab, pick a spot, shovel dirt into a bucket, perch precariously on the low plastic stool, scoop up some of the dirt, crunch over and start sifting, remembering Cook's advice:
Diamonds don't have sharp edges; look for rounded shapes and a special shine. Diamonds are never wet or dirty so don't bother breaking up clods of dirt. Be careful of glass shards; lots of people have left debris here. A diamond is clear enough to see into but not through.
After an hour or so of digging and sifting, a new vision comes to me: The only round thing in the vicinity is my fanny, and the only place I am likely to find a diamond is a jewelry store. Returning the rental equipment I chat with Cook, who says that most of the larger diamonds have been found using the third method, surfacing screening. That's bending over and walking slowly along staring at the ground.
Now he tells me. Next time, I bring my best Sanibel stoop.
Crystal harmonics
"Clay is where the nice clear crystals will be," Kathy Fecho said. She and her husband, Jim, own Bear Mountain Mine and Fiddlers Ridge Rock Shop in Mount Ida.
Never mind claims for their metaphysical properties, quartz crystals are beautiful and - hooray! - easy to find. Veins of crystals run within the Fechos' 35 acres of mountainside and in five to six other working mines in this section of the Ouachita Mountains.
"There's no two alike, every crystal has its own personality," Fecho said. Like many crystal fanciers, she doesn't discount the claims of healing, channeling and being "chosen" by a crystal.
There aren't the amenities of Crater, but the view is memorable, there is a portable toilet and the breeze is refreshing. MSHA (OSHA for mines) forbids self-diggers from going down to the opened pit, so after working a section for its large specimens, the Fechos dump the tailings on the mountain top. That's where you pay to "dig," although we found plenty of crystals on top of the ground. After watching the Fechos work in the pit we crouched over hillocks of freshly deposited tailings. We used our bare hands and found more than we could reasonably take home, but the temptation was strong to reach for yet another flash of light. Some would say the crystals were choosing us.
All I know is hunting is boring, but finding is addictive.
judy.wells@jacksonville.com, (904) 359-4155
Copyright 2008
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