Copper ("Spinel"-twins and crystals)

This beautiful specimen of Native Copper from the Rocklands Mine hosts a wonderful combination of sharp, euhedral, crystals and elongated "Spinel"-twins intergrown to create a display quality piece. Several fine quality, smooth, defined dodecahedral and octahedral crystals of Copper can be seen from all sides. They show both smooth well-formed positive faces and skeletal or "hoppered" negative faces, but they are highlighted by elongated "Spinel"-twins in the central portion of the specimen. The blending of both the euhedral crystals with their defined geometric form against the free flowing, almost organic appearance of the twins make a gorgeous overall specimen of this exciting material. I love the deep almost bronze-like patina on the surface, which is a highly desirable quality in crystallized Copper specimens. There is no damage anywhere, and the piece is a complete "floater".

The Rocklands Mine (also known as the Rocklands Group Copper Project) is a large copper deposit in northwestern Queensland, Australia and wasn't known primarily for producing much in the way of specimens. We started to see some arborescent / dendritic specimens of Copper trickling out in 2017, but in 2019 there was a major discovery of significant and important CRYSTALLIZED Copper specimens! At the Tucson Show in 2020, we were fortunate to have a good friend who works at the mine and gave us first choice to hand select from a parcel that he brought especially for us.

Specimen # CUAUS72011