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Rockhounding in Arkansas


cowbreath

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I thought it would appropriate for there to be a topic about rockhounding in the state of Arkansas. To me it is a major draw to our "Natural State". With all of the publicity to the diamonds this year I think it was about time I became interested in rockhounding again. Anyways, I searched for diamonds in the Arkansas forum and did not find any results so I think there must not be anything started about rockhounding (probably wrong).

Here are some interesting websites I've found so far (didn't take much searching):

Arkansas Geological Survey

Rockhounding In AR

Crater of Diamonds Website

Some major points about rockhounding in AR will be the quartz mine areas in the Ouachitas near Hot Springs - Mt. Ida area. This is a world famous area for quartz crystals. Magnet Cove is nearby and is just world-famous for all of the varieties of minerals collected there. The Crater of Diamonds of Murfreesboro, AR is becoming more famous as it makes national news and publications more regularly. The pace of diamond finding there has jumped to 3/day from 2/day last year because of the surge in tourism.

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I thought it would appropriate for there to be a topic about rockhounding in the state of Arkansas. To me it is a major draw to our "Natural State". With all of the publicity to the diamonds this year I think it was about time I became interested in rockhounding again. Anyways, I searched for diamonds in the Arkansas forum and did not find any results so I think there must not be anything started about rockhounding (probably wrong).

Here are some interesting websites I've found so far (didn't take much searching):

Arkansas Geological Survey

Rockhounding In AR

Crater of Diamonds Website

Some major points about rockhounding in AR will be the quartz mine areas in the Ouachitas near Hot Springs - Mt. Ida area. This is a world famous area for quartz crystals. Magnet Cove is nearby and is just world-famous for all of the varieties of minerals collected there. The Crater of Diamonds of Murfreesboro, AR is becoming more famous as it makes national news and publications more regularly. The pace of diamond finding there has jumped to 3/day from 2/day last year because of the surge in tourism.

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  • 2 weeks later...
Yeah diamonds and quartz are the two that mainly hear about. I've been meaning to get down to around Mt Ida and try my hand at some quartz. I've been down to Crater of Diamonds State Park, didn't find anything though. I wish it wasn't so far away. I actually saw mention of the park while I was on vacation. A man from Albuquerque found a 2 carot diamond there and they made a big deal about it on the local news out there.
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Yeah recently (last week) someone found a 3.9 carat light colored diamond. I'm still sifting through some dirt I brought back from there. At this point I'm hoping for big diamonds. At one point I would have settled for the smallest diamond. I'm back to the flaky dream of finding the big one.

Have you rockhounded at any locations in particular? I haven't been many places but I've read about potential spots.

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I might go the route of requesting some free/cheap information from the state's geological survey and maybe from some private geologists who have written publications about Arkansas geology (info is found in rockhoundingar website). I did find a nice place to stop in Magnet Cove through a website. Since the land is all private it is about your only non-adventurous option. On highway 51 just north of Magnet Cove (the town), I stopped at a bridge and went under it and brought some rock back. About all of the rock there was crystal plated. You have to go there to see it. I realized there was a tiny bit of pyrite and developing cubes on some rocks later on. I wouldn't venture too much there without permission, but at least bring a shovel and dig under the bridge for some minerals. There's quartz, smoky quartz, magnetite, pyrite, and many more things I know nothing about.
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