Published by The Flatirons Mineral Club
Volume 50, No. 5 September/October 2008
Flatirons
Facets is published bimonthly by The Flatirons Mineral
Club. The deadline for submission of articles to
Flatirons Facets is the 20th of each month.
Permission is granted for reprint if credit is given
to the publication and author unless specifically
restricted.
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Flatirons Facets
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P. O. Box 3331
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Boulder, CO 80307-3331
The Flatirons Mineral Club is
a non-profit organization, established March 9,
1957, and dedicated to developing and maintaining
interest in all aspects of earth science and
associated hobbies. The club meets the second
Thursday of each month at 7 p.m. We meet at
The Senior Center, 9th and Arapahoe Avenue,
Boulder, CO. Guests and visitors are welcome.
Membership dues are $15.00 per year (beginning
October of each calendar year). People interested in
membership can contact the club either by writing to
the above address or by attending one of the
meetings.
Deadline
for the November/December Facets is
October 20.
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President's
Corner Gerry Naugle I would like to thank all club members, their guests and/or their family members who attended the club annual picnic on Aug 23rd at North Boulder Park, and helped to pack several hundred grab bags for the FMC scholarship program and the Denver Show allotment. The 2008-09 FMC Scholarship Program recipients were also in attendence. In the photo at right, they are from the left: Colin Melvin, first alternate, Cassia D. Roe recipient, and Jeffrey Godwin recipient Our September monthly meeting program on Thurs Sept 18th at the West Boulder Senior Center, start at 7:10 pm will be Shale Splitting of Florrisant and Douglas Pass areas. Come and split some shale, you get to keep all fossil leaves and flora-fauna that you find. This is a one-time ever club event. Speaking of the Denver Show, which is coming up on Sept. 12th-14th at the Denver Merchandise Mart [DMM] at 58th and I-25; I would like to urge all FMC members to attend at least one day of the show and do some volunteer work at the FMC club tables (it's fun) or volunteer to work at the DMM show facility and be able to attend the day that you do work for free plus all days subsequent up through Sunday. Come in Friday and be able to attend all three days for free. Don't forget the Saturday evening finger-food and silent auction and mineral-related professional level lecture in the big DMM west-atrium is open to the public. The lecture presentation this year will be very good. Hope to see you there. And don’t forget about our second Silent Auction of the year, to be held on our regular club meeting date in October, Thursday, Oct 9. See the article in this newsletter. Thanks, Gerry Naugle
FMC 2008-09 Scholarship
Recipients Fall Meeting Schedule
Our program chair, Terry
O’Donnell, has sent us
this list of club
program activities for
the remainder of 2008.
He has one tentative
speaker lined up, Don
Cook, to give a talk on
Trilobites, but that may
not occur until the
January 2009 meeting,
since the fall meeting
dates already have
planned activities.
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This summer the Junior
Geologists have been
working on the
requirements for the
Stone Age Tools and Art
badge, where they
learned how native
cultures used rocks and
minerals for tools and
their art. They will
finish this badge with a
trip to the CU museum
for a special tour of
the museum’s Native
American collection.
Many thanks to the club
members who helped with
this program this
summer. Nico Caballero, Charles Mock, Evan Penzceck, and Katherine and Stephan Codrescu grind corn using a stone mano and metate. **************** Two Juniors Earn Rockhound Award Two Junior Geologists, Stephan Codrescu and Lucas Simon, have finished the requirements for the American Federation of Mineralogical Societies’ Rockhound Award. To earn this award, they must complete the requirements for six of the Future Rockhounds of America badges. Only one other Colorado junior has previously earned this award (Joel Hyde, who is also a member of our club). We congratulate Lucas and Stephan on earning this award.
Ray Horton shows Native American stone implements to the Juniors. ****************
Jr. Geologists
Activities
Thursday, September
25. Because the club
meeting has been moved
to the third Thursday,
we will have the Jr.
Geologists meeting one
week later at
Charlotte’s home. The
Juniors have selected
three badges to work on
this fall – Gold Panning
and Prospecting,
Fossils, and Gemstone
Lore and Legend. We will
kick off these badges at
this meeting. **************** An Elephant Never Forgets!
A friendly reminder that
the annual dues to the
FMC become due on
October 1st, 2008. The
dues are only $18 per
individual and member
immediate family. ****************
November Towel Show **************** Field Trips Upcoming Field Trips
Two great field trips
remain for the summer
season, listed below.
Please contact the trip
leader for more details
or to sign up for the
trips. We would love to have two field trips a month throughout the summer and fall, but we need more volunteers to lead trips. Perhaps you have a favorite place to go collecting that you would like to share with club members. Or, there is a new place that you would like to explore with others in the club. Or, pick a collecting place out of one of the Colorado collecting books and have other club members join you. Leading a trip is pretty simple, you just need to select a place and date, promote the trip and get club members to sign up, collect the liability releases from participants, and go out and have a good time. For more information about leading a trip, please contact Dennis Gertenbach. Field Trip to Dotsero and the Flattops
July’s field trip took
14 club members to
Dotsero and the Flattops
to collect pseudomorphs
and fossils. The area
has interesting goethite
specimens that were
originally pyrite
crystals that were
collected on Saturday.
Although the pyrite has
been replaced with
goethite, the specimens
still retain the shape
of the pyrite crystals,
including the striations
on the crystal faces.
Collecting Devonian age fossils on the Flattops among the fantastic wildflowers.
Katie Runions with a gastropod (snail) she found.
Charles Mock with several of the large goethite pseudomorphs after pyrite.
A close-up of the pseudomorph specimens, showing the original pyrite crystal shape with striations on the crystal faces. **************** The October 2008 Flatirons Mineral Club Silent Auction
The FMC will hold a
silent auction on
October 9, 2008 at the
Boulder Senior Center on
West Arapaho St. No
applications will be
required for sellers.
There will be a limited
number of tables so
space will be available
on a first-come
first-serve basis.
Sellers are asked to
limit their items to
about 1/4th of a table. ****************
Fossils in the News
Newly discovered fossils
have been found in a
quarry near Hanksville,
including well-preserved
dinosaur bones,
petrified trees, and
even freshwater clams.
These fossils provide
fresh information about
the environment in
southeastern Utah 150
million years ago. The
fossilized dinosaurs are
from the late Jurassic
Morrison formation, as
are those found in
Morrison, Canyon City,
and Dinosaur National
Monument in Colorado. Ancient Fish Found with Unborn Embryo
The Devonian age is
known as the Age of
Fishes, as fish became
widespread at this time.
A recent discovery from
the Gogo fossil site in
north Western Australia
has yielded a
380-million-year-old
fossil placoderm fish
with an intact embryo
and a mineralized
umbilical cord.
Placoderms were
armor-plated shark-like
fishes with no modern
relatives. The
discovery, published in
Nature, makes this
fossil the world’s
oldest known vertebrate
mother, as well as the
oldest known example of
any creature giving
birth to live young.
This fossil has been
named Materpiscis
attenboroughi, meaning
‘mother fish.’
Diamonds May Show
Earliest Life on Earth
Diamonds found inside
zircon crystals that
formed a few hundred
million years after the
Earth began hint that
they may be from a
biological origin. The
carbon in these diamonds
contains elevated
amounts of carbon-12, a
lighter isotopes often
associated with plants
and bacteria. Organisms
are known to
preferentially extract
light carbon, leaving
heavier isotopes in the
atmosphere. If the
carbon was derived from
primitive organisms,
this would show that
life on Earth began 4.25
billion years ago. The
Earth’s beginning is
dated at 4.6 billion
years old.
Upcoming Events, Nearby
& Elsewhere
Saturday, Sept. 6, Dr.
Dexter’s Mineral World
auction. Dr. Dexter is
retiring and offering
his entire world-class
collection at auction,
Sat. Sept 6 at 11:00
a.m., doors open at
10:00 a.m. Preview
Friday Sept. 5, noon to
5:30 p.m., or
www.gormanauctions.com,
or call 719-687-2400.
Gorman Auctions, 136
Manitou Ave, Manitou
Springs, CO 80829. **************** Return to Facets Index
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