Comments on: Leave the stone alone

By: Tommy Williams

Tommy Williams — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 18:26:57 +0000

Thanks for clarifying that. BTW, although my ability to distinguish rocks is no more refined than distinguishing sandstone from granite, I enjoy what you write and I have been learning from your posts.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 20:27:26 +0000

Yes there is. I think that bedrock is beautiful, and that if you want to study its minerals you either find a loose piece and break that open, or maybe you look for an outcrop under a bush and hammer on a corner of it that no one will see. That way, the bedrock is still beautiful and the scene looks untouched.

I’ve been on field trips with people who just haul out their hammers and bash away for no good reason. Sure, it was a roadcut, or a rock that wasn’t special, or behind a fence or whatever, but I think it’s important not to let your curiosity become self-righteous. I was on another field trip to a locality whose owner said no hammers, and seeing all that unmarked, stream-polished rock was like being in a temple.

I do feel bad in retrospect that I left the pieces of the concretion by the road; I should have tossed them downslope. But there are more concretions to be eroded from the roadside, and one was enough for me. And I collected the sandstone from a landslide scar that’s full of crumbled concrete foundations and loose boulders, a place where a few more broken pieces make no difference.

By: Tommy Williams

Tommy Williams — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 19:58:02 +0000

I hope you don’t take this as criticism because I’m not sure I understand: in your previous post, you wrote: “But I kept looking and eventually spotted a dark pod of rock—a concretion. I banged it open and this is what I saw.”

That seems like it’s in opposition to the principle stated in this post.

Or is there a difference between “big” stones and smaller, plentiful ones?