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Monday, December 27, 2010

Gypsum Sample

Over the holiday, a visit to my cold storage area was in order to obtain a gypsum sample collected from a Mississippian Period road cut in Meade County, Kentucky.  The plan was to compare it to the material found earlier in a Devonian Orthospirifer brachiopod.  The first five images are of the Meade County specimen.  The color changes in some images due to the use of white LED, fluorescent, and incandescent lighting.

The previous post had some great comments on how one might identify whether this material is gypsum.  Working on a venting system to perform those chemical tests.





The last two are of the Devonian specimen. Learn more about it at this post from December 19, 2010.


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2 comments:

  1. DaveDecember 30, 2010 at 7:59 PM

    I see your progressing on figuring out that mineral. It's a lot tougher than trying to ID a fossil, although you have more ways to try.

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  2. Michael PoppJanuary 2, 2011 at 9:24 PM

    I still need to do the acid test. Mineralogy is more an exact science that paleontology. As a result, it seems to me one can get a more precise identification of specimens.

    Hopefully, I will determine if it is gypsum or not. The main issue is there so little of the material exposed on the brachiopod fossil.

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