In order to comment on strange rocks, I need context. Things like:
Where found. (eg: 35 km WSW of Rockhampton, QLD.)
How big is the body of this rock. (eg: 1 metre x 50 metres on the surface)
Surrounding non-strange rocks. (eg: unmetamorphosed medium grained sandstone dipping shallowly to the west.)
Hardness of minerals in it. (eg: fine-grained groundmass cannot be scratched by a pocket knife – knife leaves silvery trail. Spheroidal inclusions easily scratched by a knife.)
From roughie, earlier in chat:
More strange rocks.
I’m afraid there is little context to go with these small samples.
Though that dark sample looks like wood, it is possibly fossilised wood but I’ve never seen it so dark. It has what appear to be fossilised scale insects but surely that could not be possible.
roughbarked said:
I’m afraid there is little context to go with these small samples.Though that dark sample looks like wood, it is possibly fossilised wood but I’ve never seen it so dark. It has what appear to be fossilised scale insects but surely that could not be possible.
Most unlikely to be fossil wood. It looks to be some fissile metamorphic rock that has been altered in such a way as to produce those spheroids.
The other specimen also has spheroids, and is a little reminiscent of the thunderegg rhyolite at Agate Creek, though not reminiscent enough for me to have any confidence.
Oh, and another thing that is needed is a scale. Always have a scale. A five cent piece in each photo would be fine.
Michael V said:
roughbarked said:
I’m afraid there is little context to go with these small samples.Though that dark sample looks like wood, it is possibly fossilised wood but I’ve never seen it so dark. It has what appear to be fossilised scale insects but surely that could not be possible.
Most unlikely to be fossil wood. It looks to be some fissile metamorphic rock that has been altered in such a way as to produce those spheroids.
The other specimen also has spheroids, and is a little reminiscent of the thunderegg rhyolite at Agate Creek, though not reminiscent enough for me to have any confidence.
Oh, and another thing that is needed is a scale. Always have a scale. A five cent piece in each photo would be fine.
I’ll remember the scale in future. I do believe these rocks come from north Queensland, most likely Cairns district.
The dark piece is about six inches long and the reddish rock is slightly bigger. The reddish type can be easily scratched but there are both soft and harder pieces.
The grey one looks like hornfels? Those nodules might be calcite or quartzite, sometimes get nodules like that in hornfels.
> It looks to be some fissile metamorphic rock that has been altered in such a way as to produce those spheroids.
dv said:
The grey one looks like hornfels? Those nodules might be calcite or quartzite, sometimes get nodules like that in hornfels.
That was my first thought, too. Definitely looks metamorphic, and hornfels is possible.
This one is not so strange but the way it breaks down is interesting. Since most of the rocks around here are Devonian sandstone and conglomerates, presumably these are too.
roughbarked said:
This one is not so strange but the way it breaks down is interesting. Since most of the rocks around here are Devonian sandstone and conglomerates, presumably these are too.
That’s clearly a hippopotamus with bucked teeth
dv said:
roughbarked said:
This one is not so strange but the way it breaks down is interesting. Since most of the rocks around here are Devonian sandstone and conglomerates, presumably these are too.
That’s clearly a hippopotamus with bucked teeth
A giant frog, surely.
dv said:
roughbarked said:
This one is not so strange but the way it breaks down is interesting. Since most of the rocks around here are Devonian sandstone and conglomerates, presumably these are too.
That’s clearly a hippopotamus with bucked teeth
bloody pareidoliaists
ChrispenEvan said:
dv said:
roughbarked said:
This one is not so strange but the way it breaks down is interesting. Since most of the rocks around here are Devonian sandstone and conglomerates, presumably these are too.
That’s clearly a hippopotamus with bucked teeth
bloody pareidoliaists
At least we are hard rock pareidoliaists.
The Rev Dodgson said:
ChrispenEvan said:
dv said:That’s clearly a hippopotamus with bucked teeth
bloody pareidoliaists
At least we are hard rock pareidoliaists.
Geologically, that’s soft rock. (It’s sedimentary rock.)
Michael V said:
The Rev Dodgson said:
ChrispenEvan said:bloody pareidoliaists
At least we are hard rock pareidoliaists.
Geologically, that’s soft rock. (It’s sedimentary rock.)
mutters
bloody geologists
:)
The Rev Dodgson said:
Michael V said:
The Rev Dodgson said:At least we are hard rock pareidoliaists.
Geologically, that’s soft rock. (It’s sedimentary rock.)
mutters
bloody geologists :)
Maybe you meant it’s hard to work out what it is…
dv said:
roughbarked said:
This one is not so strange but the way it breaks down is interesting. Since most of the rocks around here are Devonian sandstone and conglomerates, presumably these are too.
That’s clearly a hippopotamus with bucked teeth
Yep. :)
The Rev Dodgson said:
dv said:
roughbarked said:
This one is not so strange but the way it breaks down is interesting. Since most of the rocks around here are Devonian sandstone and conglomerates, presumably these are too.
That’s clearly a hippopotamus with bucked teeth
A giant frog, surely.
That too. :)
ChrispenEvan said:
dv said:
roughbarked said:
This one is not so strange but the way it breaks down is interesting. Since most of the rocks around here are Devonian sandstone and conglomerates, presumably these are too.
That’s clearly a hippopotamus with bucked teeth
bloody pareidoliaists
Indeed.
The Rev Dodgson said:
Michael V said:
The Rev Dodgson said:At least we are hard rock pareidoliaists.
Geologically, that’s soft rock. (It’s sedimentary rock.)
mutters
bloody geologists :)
Well, they oughta know.
roughbarked said:
ChrispenEvan said:
dv said:
That’s clearly a hippopotamus with bucked teeth
bloody pareidoliaists
Indeed.
crazy i’n‘it, to us it’s just a bunch of grid points illuminated by various rgb combinations but these crazy viewers you read ^ are making like it’s a rock formation or some geology or something
It seems that the collection of rocks this friend has been showing me may be a collection picked up at some rock enthusiast place. Maybe a lapidary shop or stall. I doubt they all originate from collection at Cairns.
He has been rubbing some of the specimens down.
roughbarked said:
It seems that the collection of rocks this friend has been showing me may be a collection picked up at some rock enthusiast place. Maybe a lapidary shop or stall. I doubt they all originate from collection at Cairns.He has been rubbing some of the specimens down.
Fair enough.
