DENVER SHOW HAMBERGITE, LAMPROPHYLLITE, & KLEINITE

 

The most unique specimen in the Show: Cave pearl nest, Ouray County, Colorado.

 

The Denver Area Mineral Dealers held their fall 2019 Gem and Mineral Show at the Jefferson County Fairgrounds on November 15-17.  I have attended this event for the last several years; however, I was rather underwhelmed this fall.  I thought the number of dealers decreased this year and some of those in attendance had decreased the size of their offerings.  In addition, the Friday buyers seemed low in numbers, especially for a free show.  However, every rock and mineral show represents a “good day” and I enjoyed my time visiting with the dealers and coming home with a couple of purchases.

 

The most unique name for a mineral dealer: O'Dark Thirty Boyz Mining.

Joe and Susan Dorris of Pinnacle 5 Minerals out of Colorado Springs brought a great display of amazonite, smoky quartz, topaz and jewelry.

At a show like this, an event that attracts all types of collectors and buyers, one sees the same common minerals over and over—how many South American amethyst crystals are for sale?  Therefore, I gravitate to dealers who often have some nice, rather uncommon, mineral specimens that are offered at a reasonable price (at least what I consider reasonable).  Dan, of Dan’s Used Rocks, is one of those dealers where I enjoy perusing his specimens, especially the thumbnails.

 

Buyers cluster around the thumbnails at Dan's Used Rocks.

 

 

 

Although I am fairly new to mineral collecting, I attend several shows per year but have never seen specimens of hambergite, kleinite or lamprophyllite “for sale.”  I am certain that more serious collectors would sort of chuckle and say something like “newbie, look a little harder.”  But, I found these minerals interesting and they came home with me!

 

Hambergite is ”an especially rare and unusual collector’s stone…and a lesser-known gemstone” (gemselect.com).  It is a beryllium borate hydroxyl [Be₂(BO₃)(OH)] that is associated with beryllium bearing granite pegmatites as an accessory mineral  although it was first described from a nepheline syenite in Norway. The orthoborate ion (BO₃) of hambergite is the simplest of the boron’s different ions. It has three oxygen ions surrounding a central boron ion in the shape of a triangle.  Each of these ions can then share the oxygen ions of other “triangles” and form larger units.  The boron ion has an oxidation charge of 3+ while each oxygen ion (3 total) has an oxidation number of 2- so the total orthoborate ion has a total charge of 3- and is an anion. 
 

The orthoborate ion as drawn by chemspider.com.  Each oxygen has an oxidation number of 2- while the boron has an oxidation number of 3+. (BO₃)

The hydroxyl [(OH)] in hambergite [Be₂(BO₃)(OH)] is also an anion with a total oxidation number of 1- since the hydrogen is a 1+ and the oxygen a 2-.  Each beryllium ion, there are two of them, has an oxidation number of 2+ for a total of 4+ for the cation.  That 4+ balances the 3- and 1- for the two anions. There, I have just been practicing my limited knowledge of chemistry trying to learn a wee bit more!

So, how do you do it? No, not make a baby but balance an equation?  I had biology last year.        Hank Green

Hambergite is an Orthorhombic mineral where crystals are usually prismatic (long) with good cleavage, and white (often with a pale-yellow sheen) to colorless (the rare gem variety).  It has a vitreous luster, a white streak and is transparent (colorless variety) to translucent (white variety).  It is very brittle, quite hard at ~ 7.5 (Mohs), commonly striated along the prisms, and some crystals are terminated.

Partial crystal of hambergite.  Width of crystal is ~1 cm.  The unseen "thickness" is ~4 mm.  Terminations of hambergite commonly are etched.

Striations noted parallel to long C Axis.  The etching of the termination shows clearly.

The specimen I acquired is a rather flattened, white, striated, prismatic crystal that is etched at the termination..  It was collected near Rangkul in the region of Gorno-Badakhshan in Tajikistan.  I just cannot find out much information about the geology of Rangkul except that it is in the high plateaus located in the Pamir Mountains, a region of tectonic plates activity.  My guess is that the hambergite formed in miarolitic cavities in the Mika pegmatite along with lepidolite, microcline, albite, quartz, schorl, elbaite, topaz, muscovite, apatite, fluorite, calcite, barite, beryl, and cassiterite (Jambor and others, 2000).

More than 50% of Tajikistan is above 10,000 feet in elevation.

I was not overly familiar with the Kola Peninsula except to realize that it was a hunk of land in extreme northwestern Russia above the Arctic Circle bordering northern Finland.  I now realize that the Peninsula is part of the Baltic Shield, a now stable area where rocks underwent extensive mountain building events during the 2.5-2.0 Ga Lapland-Karelian-Kola Orogen (Precambrian). The Kola Peninsula is also an important ore base for Russia’s metallurgy industry.  It is very rich in titanium, apatite, nephelines, copper, nickel, mica, kyanite, iron ore, and other precious metals and rare-earth elements (Mitrofanov and others, 1995).

So, I have a specimen of lamprophyllite from the Murmansk (the capital) Oblast (an official district or province) in the Kola Peninsula (a geographical term). The mineral is a titanium silicate with a chemical formula that is amazing: [(Na,Mn)₂Ti,Fe)₃(Si₂O₇)₂O₂(OH,O,F)₂].  The mineral is yellow to yellow brown to brown and the crystals are usually acicular (needle-like) radiating from a center.  The crystals are flattened and belong to the Monoclinic Crystal System (3 axes of unequal length).  They are translucent, very brittle and leave a brownish white streak on unglazed porcelain.  Crystals are very soft at ~2.5 (Mohs) and have a luster ranging from vitreous to pearly. The name, lamprophyllite, comes from the shiny cleavage planes parallel to the prisms.

Acicular crystals of lamprophyllite showing cleavage planes parallel to long axes. Width FOV ~1 cm.

Crystals of lamprophyllite radiating from a common point, the typical arrangement of the mineral.  Width FOV ~1.7 cm.

Lamprophyllite at its type locality in the Murmansk Oblast (a mountain range named the Lovozero Massif) is found in extrusive rocks indicative of volcanos in a continental rift basin.  These rocks are termed peralkaline and are very deficient in aluminum with abundant sodium-rich pyroxene and amphibole minerals.  The Massif rocks seem to be rich in obscure minerals such as lamprophyllite and rare earth minerals.  As MinDat notes, lamprophyllite is found at the Gem Park Complex in Fremont County, Colorado, an area previously mined for rare earth elements in an intrusive dike.

Although most of the Kola Peninsula lies above the Arctic Circle, proximity of the Oblast to the Gulf Stream leads to unusually high temperatures in winter. 

Kleinite is a rather rare mineral that is only found in three localities around the world—Germany, Texas and Nevada.  The best known of these locations is the McDermitt Mine, Opalite District, Humbolt County, Nevada. The McDermitt is just one of several mines that are located in the Opalite Mercury Mining District that straddles the Nevada-Oregon State Line,  The District is associated with a volcanic caldera complex where eruption centered around a Miocene age of ~16 Ma (Henry and others, 2016).  The original mercury mineralization was in the Cordero Rhyolite, but later hydrothermal action deposited the metal into nearby lake or stream-deposited tuff (volcanic ejecta) (Henry and others, 2016). Mercury in the caldera complex was first mined in the 1970s and the operations ceased in 1990. Porter GeoConsultancy noted that the McDermitt Mine was the most important mercury producer in the Americas during the 20^th century producing 279,000 flasks to 1988 (geoconsultancy.com.au).  The minerals cinnabar (mercury sulfide HgS) and corderoite (mercury sulfide chloride Hg₃S₂Cl₂) yielded almost all of the mercury; kleinite was just an insignificant rare accessory mineral. 

Bright yellow to orange adamantine kleinite. Width FOV ~1.9 cm. Note "earthy" crust in right central.

Lower half of photo is kleinite. The blue-purple is opal. I remain uncertain about the crust in the top half.  Width FOV 2.2 cm.

Same situation as above. Adamantine kleinite on left with yellow crust on right.  Is the crust kleinite?  Or is it another  mercury mineral? Width FOV ~1.3 cm.

This photo may be a mixture of mercury minerals.

Adamantine kleinite with a single well-defined crystal near top.  Crystal length ~1.5 mm.

So, kleinite is sort of the lost kid at the mercury mines and is quite rare. The crystals have a vibrant yellow (canary) color ranging to light yellow—often on the same specimen. If left in the daylight the color transforms to orange or reddish yellow; hide the specimen in a dark box and the original color comes back.  It has a yellow streak and is soft at ~3.5 (Mohs).  Crystals are short prismatic and hexagonal, although not equidimensional.  Kleinite can also occur as a “crust” with a massive appearance.  Crystals appear to be translucent rather than transparent; I would call the “crust” opaque. The luster ranges from adamantine to greasy/earthy. There is also a distinct possibility that the earthy crust may not be kleinite but one of the other rare mercury minerals present in the District.  I simply do not have the skills to call the shot.

TIDBITS FROM THE 2019 UNITED STATES GEOLOGICAL SURVEY MINERALS YEARBOOK, MERCURY 2019

Mercury has not been produced as a principal mineral commodity in the United States since 1992. In 2018, mercury was recovered as a byproduct from processing gold-silver ore at several mines in Nevada; however, production data were not reported. Secondary, or recycled, mercury was recovered from batteries, compact and traditional fluorescent lamps, dental amalgam, medical devices, and thermostats, as well as mercury-contaminated soils. It was estimated that less than 40 tons per year of mercury was consumed domestically. The leading domestic end users of mercury were the chlorine-caustic soda (chloralkali), dental, electronics, and fluorescent-lighting manufacturing industries. Only two mercury cell chloralkali plants operated in the United States in 2018. Until December 31, 2012, domestic- and foreign-sourced mercury was refined and then exported for global use, primarily for small-scale gold mining in many parts of the world. Beginning January 1, 2013, export of elemental mercury from the United States was banned, with some exceptions, under the Mercury Export Ban Act of 2008. Effective January 1, 2020, exports of five additional mercury compounds will be banned. 

An inventory of 4,437 tons of mercury was held in storage at the Hawthorne Army Depot, in Hawthorne, NV. The Mercury Export Ban Act of 2008 required the U.S. Department of Energy to establish long-term management and storage capabilities for domestically produced elemental mercury. Sales of mercury from the stockpiles remained suspended.

China, Kyrgyzstan, Mexico, Peru, Russia, Slovenia, Spain, and Ukraine have most of the world’s estimated 600,000 tons of mercury resources. Mexico reclaims mercury from Spanish colonial silver-mining waste. In Spain, once a leading producer of mercury, mining at its centuries-old Almaden Mine stopped in 2003. In the United States, there are mercury occurrences in Alaska, Arkansas, California, Nevada, and Texas; however, mercury has not been mined as a principal mineral commodity since 1992. The declining consumption of mercury, except for small-scale gold mining, indicates that these resources are sufficient for centuries of use.

REFERENCES CITED

Henry, C. D., S. B. Castor, W.A. Starkel, B.S. Ellis, J.A. Wolff, W.C. McIntosh, M.T. Heizler, 2016, Preliminary geologic map of the McDermitt caldera, Humboldt County, Nevada and Harney and Malheur counties, Oregon. Nevada Bureau of Mines and Geology Open-File Report 16-1.

Jambor, J.L., E.S. Grew, A.C. Roberts, 2000, New Mineral Names: American Mineralogist v. 85. 

Mitrofanov, F.P., V.I. Pozhilenko, V.F. Smolkin, A.A. Arzamastsev, V. Ya. Yevzerov, V.V. Lyubtsov, E. CV. Shipilov, S.B. Nikolayeva, Zh. A. Fedotov. (Edited by F.P.Mitrofanov), 1995: Geology of the Kola Peninsula: Apatity. 

ANOTHER TIDBIT: Members are the lifeblood of the CSMS. The officers are the brain that makes the organization move in the right direction.  The Show Director, Field Trip Coordinator, and Webmaster represent the legs that muscle the club so that it stands out to the community.  But the heart of CSMS is the Editor of the Pick n Pack. 

I have been writing for the Pick n Pack for over a decade and had the privilege and joy of working with a number of editors who have produced an excellent product.  I would estimate that in the last ten years the Pick n Pack editors and writers have garnered more awards in the RMFMS and AFMS than any club in the Federation.  I want to take this opportunity to thank the current editor, Taylor Harper, for his yeoman’s work during this last year.  Unfortunately Taylor is leaving his editorial post at the end of the year (work related).  Thank you, Taylor, and I will miss you.