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Description
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Title: Copper In Matrix
Medium: Digital Photography
Photographer: Aaron J. Greenblatt
Camera Type: Panasonic DMC-LZ7 Lumix 7.2 MP
Editing: Edited in PhotoShop 7.0 for color accuracy, size, and to apply copyright and border.

Location: Photograph taken at the 49th Annual Gem and Mineral Show held at the American 1 FED, C.U. Event Center - Jackson County Fairgrounds in Jackson, Michigan on March 18, 2011. Show hosted by the Michigan Gem & Mineral Society of Jackson .

Description: Sitting behind glass in a display case at the show, was this neat nugget of native copper. It was found in Michigan's Upper Peninsula and was more than a foot long. It had been acid etched to better reveal the glittering veins of copper, but not etched so much that the calcite matrix was dissolved. I decided to take an up-close image of it as best I could through the glass. You can clearly see how the copper has formed within the various spaces in the matrix.

About Michigan Copper Deposits: The first copper miners in Michigan worked copper-filled fissure (grooved) veins that cut across various stratigraphic layers of rock. In Michigan's Keweenaw County, the fissure lodes of copper were nearly vertical mineralized zones with deposits nearly perpendicular to that of the enclosing basalts and conglomerates. In Michigan's Ontanogan county, by contrast, the fissures had deposits nearly parallel to, and slightly steeper than, the surrounding beds.

Copper miners in Michigan sometimes found masses of native copper that weighed up to hundreds of tons. To extract a single mass of copper, miners could spend months chiseling it into pieces small enough to hoist out of the mine. Although they were pure copper, removing such large masses took a great deal of effort, and were thus sometimes not even profitable.

Lots of the copper recovered in Michigan was termed "barrel copper" - pieces broken from the rock and hand sorted in the "rock house," and then shipped to the smelter in barrels. Another major type recovered was in the form of fine copper veins. These veins were broken loose from the host rock in stamp mills and then separated by gravity using jigs or buddles (machines which separated lighter ore from heavier ore using an inclined plane and water). The best of the separated material was then subjected to the action of bumping or rocking tables to further separate out the native copper metal.

Here are some more of my copper deviations:
Copper - [link]
Copper Uses - [link]
Native Copper - [link]
Copper Display - [link]
Copper Nuggets - [link]
Copper and Quartz - [link]
Copper Comparison - [link]

Information Sources:
[link] (wiki - copper mining in Michigan)
[link] (wiki - copper)
[link] (mindat - copper)
[link] (dhub - buddle)

Legal: Copyright © Aaron J. Greenblatt. All rights reserved. Commercial use prohibited. This image and personal commentary may not be used for any reason without expressed written consent.

Please click here to view my photography work located in my Gallery.

Please click here for images of my glass work located in my other Gallery.

Please click here for images of my glass studio located in my other Scraps.

Description
(please click image for full view)

Title: Copper In Matrix
Medium: Digital Photography
Photographer: Aaron J. Greenblatt
Camera Type: Panasonic DMC-LZ7 Lumix 7.2 MP
Editing: Edited in PhotoShop 7.0 for color accuracy, size, and to apply copyright and border.

Location: Photograph taken at the 49th Annual Gem and Mineral Show held at the American 1 FED, C.U. Event Center - Jackson County Fairgrounds in Jackson, Michigan on March 18, 2011. Show hosted by the Michigan Gem & Mineral Society of Jackson .

Description: Sitting behind glass in a display case at the show, was this neat nugget of native copper. It was found in Michigan's Upper Peninsula and was more than a foot long. It had been acid etched to better reveal the glittering veins of copper, but not etched so much that the calcite matrix was dissolved. I decided to take an up-close image of it as best I could through the glass. You can clearly see how the copper has formed within the various spaces in the matrix.

About Michigan Copper Deposits: The first copper miners in Michigan worked copper-filled fissure (grooved) veins that cut across various stratigraphic layers of rock. In Michigan's Keweenaw County, the fissure lodes of copper were nearly vertical mineralized zones with deposits nearly perpendicular to that of the enclosing basalts and conglomerates. In Michigan's Ontanogan county, by contrast, the fissures had deposits nearly parallel to, and slightly steeper than, the surrounding beds.

Copper miners in Michigan sometimes found masses of native copper that weighed up to hundreds of tons. To extract a single mass of copper, miners could spend months chiseling it into pieces small enough to hoist out of the mine. Although they were pure copper, removing such large masses took a great deal of effort, and were thus sometimes not even profitable.

Lots of the copper recovered in Michigan was termed "barrel copper" - pieces broken from the rock and hand sorted in the "rock house," and then shipped to the smelter in barrels. Another major type recovered was in the form of fine copper veins. These veins were broken loose from the host rock in stamp mills and then separated by gravity using jigs or buddles (machines which separated lighter ore from heavier ore using an inclined plane and water). The best of the separated material was then subjected to the action of bumping or rocking tables to further separate out the native copper metal.

Here are some more of my copper deviations:
Copper - [link]
Copper Uses - [link]
Native Copper - [link]
Copper Display - [link]
Copper Nuggets - [link]
Copper and Quartz - [link]
Copper Comparison - [link]

Information Sources:
[link] (wiki - copper mining in Michigan)
[link] (wiki - copper)
[link] (mindat - copper)
[link] (dhub - buddle)

Legal: Copyright © Aaron J. Greenblatt. All rights reserved. Commercial use prohibited. This image and personal commentary may not be used for any reason without expressed written consent.

Please click here to view my photography work located in my Gallery.

Please click here for images of my glass work located in my other Gallery.

Please click here for images of my glass studio located in my other Scraps.