Calcite (unusual locality)

Item Description

This specimen comes with a label from Jack and Marty Crawford that states it was collected south of Montrose, Colorado. Montrose is the northern "gateway" to the San Juan Mountains, and lies about 35 miles north of the town of Ouray. This piece looks somewhat similar the the Calcite and Siderite specimens that were collected years ago at the Billy Creek Wildlife Refuge, which is also south of Montrose, but it does have a slightly different style and coloring. The piece hosts a predominant, sharp, well-formed, translucent, colorless to slightly smoky brown colored scalenohedron of Calcite measuring 5.7 cm long, sitting atop somewhat gemmy chocolate brown rhombic crystals of Siderite with minor associated Selenite. The back of the main Calcite crystal is partially incomplete, due to the fact that it was intergrown with the pocket wall, but it's not really what I would call damage, just an irregular growth. If you collect worldwide Calcites, oddball locality pieces or simply minerals from Colorado, I'll bet that you don't have something like this in your collection.