Hey everyone, I'm here with Sam at Vermillion Point
and
what are we doing, Sam?
looking for rocks
that's what we always do
so hopefully we find a few this time
kind of a plain rock, but
two slightly different colors, it's just sort of
a unique color
a tugboat I think out there pushing something
got like a little crane on it
ooh, what's that?
ah
I always pick these up
always wondering if they're an agate
still haven't had anyone tell me exactly what that kind of rock's called
must not have a name
water's a little ripply to see through it
real clearly
pretty piece of quartz
that's banded iron formation
those tumble up nicely
Sam's been collecting a few of those to throw in the tumbler this trip
(Sam) fun little omar
a little hole in the back
(Rob) yeah, three hole one, that's pretty good
I like it
there's a lot of those here, at least in the past there have been
(Sam) kind of a neat one
(Rob) yeah
(Sam) probably undercut though
(Rob) oh yeah definitely wouldn't be good to tumble, but
sure is interesting to look at
that's pretty
nice piece of quartz
(Sam) nice little banded iron
or maybe some sort of jasper, probably banded iron though
(Rob) yeah
really bright red there
I like that
what'd you find, Sam?
probably the first agate of the day
(Rob) it's a little one
(Sam) weird little swirly things
on that end
this end is kind of boring
that end's got bands
(Rob) well good
got some nice little stripes
okay, I gave the last banded iron to Sam and
I almost didn't get this one back from him when I just showed it to him
that one's going in my tumbler
that's really cool
(Sam) some sort of porphyritic rock
(Rob) yeah, a big
big oblong crystals in that
(Sam) it's got some holes in it though that probably wouldn't tumble
(Rob) yeah, cool looking rock though, I like it
(Sam) yeah
some cracks
(Sam) kind of a neat one
like the one you found the other day
(Rob) yeah, that is neat
you're going to tumble that, aren't you?
(Sam) Yeah
(Rob) yeah, that's really cool
big stripe
little stripe
big stripe
okay, where are the giant agates?
(Sam) fun little piece of driftwood
(Rob) it's like the world's tiniest little wooden hatchet
that's funny
(Rob) I just picked up
a fun little agate
pretty happy about that
(Sam) I found an agate
certainly agate in that white part, some little banding in there,
it's kind of weird around the rest of it though
(Rob) yeah not your typical agate, but
I think that's
I think-yeah that white to black, there's a definite band right there
(Sam) yeah, banding in there
(Rob) Sam almost always finds more agates than I do
and I just scooped this one out of the water
I'm actually keeping up with him
look at the bands on the end there
what'd you find, Sam? (Sam) maybe a moss agate
there's some banding going on in there
right there by my thumbnail
kind of mossy looking almost
(Rob) yeah
you ever find a piece of yellow quartz like this
if you slice that open, it's almost for sure going to be much more white on the inside
not necessarily pure white, but
not as yellow as that
still pretty though
(Sam) think I found my first tube agate
tubes at the top
they look kind of like eyes, but I think they're tubes
they go all the way- they're holes kind of in the middle there
some banding around there
and up and down there
(Rob) yeah, you can see the little tubes
up and down there
that's a neat one
well I was just showing Sam this thing
which I'm going to call a magate, a maybe agate
got some interesting stuff going on, and then while I was showing him that, he
went "ooh, ooh, ooh" wait, how'd you do it? Something like that
(Sam) something like that yeah, and I saw this little blue-ish
agate
little seam agate type thing
it's a nice little guy (Rob) yeah it's cool
better than mine (Sam) good little bands in there
and around the back
neat
(Sam) well
I think I found the found the biggest agate, I believe this is an agate
it's hard to tell, there's no real bands, but it's got some, it's very waxy
it's got like a crystal pocket in there
almost some bands maybe right there
(Rob) yeah, I think it's like a whole nodule so you're just not seeing the bands
but I think that's an agate (Sam) yeah
I think that's my biggest ever then, if it is
which I'm pretty sure it is
(Rob) yeah, that's really cool
you kind of want to like, grind off an edge or something and see for sure, but
(Sam) but then that's it, and you want to keep it all whole
it's hard to decide what to do with it
(Rob) well
you'd be excited about it either way
(Sam) yeah
(Rob) nice piece of quartz
alright, so people have asked about banded iron, and if it's magnetic so
I have this one
using Sam's hand for a
lab table
and this one doesn't
doesn't attract at all
but this one really does
and so does
this other one he has
working my way up your arm here
so this one
picks it right up, so some is and some isn't
I think that one deserves to be tumbled
not sure how that top part'll do, but it might just tumble right off and
be left with that bottom part
be nice if it tumbled though, because I like that color up there
(Sam) just found a little agate, looks like it's mosty quartz, but that orange line
that goes all the way around it has little
agate bands there
I think that's smoky quartz there
and then there's some weird dots on the end
(Rob) yeah that
smoky quartz is interesting there
(Sam) and then there's like a little bit little pocket right in the middle there too
so, neat little guy
mostly quartz, but I think it's an agate
(Rob) nice, whatever it is
(Sam) just found a nice little one
don't even- didn't have to question it when I was picking it up
(Rob) yup, you said "there's an agate", usually it's like "ooh, I wonder if that's
an agate" but
no wondering about that
(Sam) nice bands going around in there
(Rob) we got a lot, mostly small ones, although that one you got was really big
(Sam) yeah
(Rob) we sure have found a lot today
well in between all the pretty little agates that we've been finding I've
got to stop and show some other little things once in a while
give these lowly pieces of quartz
some loving
did you just find another?
(Sam) yeah, not great but it's a nice little agate, you can see there's some banding
there
but it's almost like a moss agate there, with some banding there
kind of a moss agate maybe? (Rob) yeah
(Sam) neat
(Rob) nice stripes on that one
well I reached down and I really thought I might've found something here, but
I think it's not an agate
interesting looking rock though
okay, we were on the beach and we met these two guys, who actually live here
so
would you guys introduce yourselves and say what you do here?
I'm Collin, I'm a piping plover monitor here at Vermillion Point
(Rob) and what's a piping plover?
a piping plover is an engangered shore bird
there's only 126 breeding pairs in the entire great lakes region
(Rob) wow, so
so we just kind of make sure the
they stay good, nothing messes with them and that they're doing alright
(Rob) and you are?
I'm Mitchell, I'm the other plover monitor
(Rob) so you guys have like a cool job, you just live here
watch the birds
and pick agates
yeah
yeah pretty much that's it
(Rob) I think I want your job
so
you were telling me you've got a jar full of agates, so let's see
what you've got here, so
(Mitchell) they're not all agates, but
(Rob) I can see a lot of them are (Mitchell) there's actually a piece of
plastic in there, but yeah a lot of them
are, a lot of them are chunks of agates, like this one
was one of the first ones I found, it's just got a little piece in it
lot of host agates, a lot of just
nodes and chunks
there's a tube agate right there
(Rob) oh cool
(Mitchell) but, yeah
(Rob) alright, first I want to see the one that you found while we were out in the
beach, and you were just going to look at the birds and picked up
that
which is better than anything we found today, that's a really nice one
(Collin) yeah
(Rob) and your best one of the summer?
that's just crazy
how excited were you when you found that?
I actually
when I found it, I looked at it and I was like "yup, that's an agate", threw it in
my pocket and walked about 10 steps and was like, "oh wait, I just found the
best agate I've ever found in my life"
(Rob) that's really awesome
but yeah
this one's sick, I love it
(Rob) yeah, that's great, that's better than anything I've ever found
so if you missed our video from last year, Sam and I were here last year and
there was actually a huge storm
that drove us off the beach, but before that we found a couple nice ones, not
quite as nice as those, but we found a couple really nice agates here, so
if you haven't seen that video, check it out now
see you there