Hobbies And Interests
Things You'll Need
Instructions
Identify Minerals
Take a field guide or portable illustrated book used to help identify things such as minerals, birds and trees.
Try to use color as a gauge. Although not always reliable with minerals like quartz, malachite is a sure bet as it always appears in a green color.
Rub the mineral across a streak plate, or unglazed tile of porcelain. Here, the mineral will always leave a trace of the exact same color. Even quartz, which comes in several colors, has a consistent white streak.
Judge a mineral's transparency, or how well light passes through. The three degrees are transparent (objects can be seen through the mineral), translucent (you can see light but not objects) and opaque (you can't see either light or objects).
Notice how the mineral reflects light. Its luster is determined to be metallic, as with gold, or non-metallic, as with turquoise and diamond.
Scratch it. Using Mohs' hardness scale at the San Diego Museum of History, follow the instructions for testing hardness by trying to scratch one mineral with another (see Resources below).
Crack the mineral with a hammer. Its cleavage, or breakage along planes of weakness, can identify what it is. Rhombohedral cleavages form six-sided prisms, as with calcite.
Observe whether your mineral fractured rather than forming the clean breaks characteristic of cleavage. Quartz and copper will not show cleavage, but will fracture into jagged, uneven pieces.
Take a look at its crystal form or how it has crystallized. The mineral can be determined by the axes of the crystal, the angles at which axes intersect and the degree of symmetry.
Identify Worth of Minerals
Preserve minerals with a bold color. Bold, intensely colored minerals usually receive a higher market value than dull, plain colors. Rhodochrosite from Alma, Colorado is a very expensive mineral, primarily because of its attractive color.
Keep transparency in mind when choosing minerals for your collection. The higher the transparency, the higher the resell cost.
Note any highly unusual forms in your collection of minerals. Abnormalities or irregularities within the minerals are thought to be special, unique and even rare. An odd number or crystals or peculiar color may add to its value.
Choose crystals from a matrix or embedded rock, rather than individual mineral crystals. These are uncommon and quite beautiful, with a price tag to match!
Remember that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Some of the most unattractive minerals have an extremely high price due to rarity or composition, especially when they contain gold or silver.