- Joined
- Aug 16, 2018
- Messages
- 19
- Reaction score
- 89
G'day everybody 
I'm new to this site, but intend to make this the first of several posts.
Back in 1985, I left teaching (Maths and English) to pursue my love-of-opal hobby and turn it into a business, to buy/sell opal. Along the way I've acquired many opalised fossils from Coober Pedy and Lightning Ridge and would like to share some of them, in here.
Most recently, I was in the Ridge for the 2018 Opal Festival, late July. On Sunday mornings there's a kind of Flea Market with various stalls selling rough/cut/specimen opal, cake stalls, second-hand stuff and usually a sausage sizzle that provides breakfast. It's on the SW corner of the Main Road into town and the 3-Mile Road.
Sometimes, I've been able to buy a decent rub or even a bag of rough. I remember getting a small opalised whelk in situ last April, but I can't find a photo.
However, on that Sunday I got lucky. I bought a bag of several (about 30 pieces) of rough --- I could see one would cut a nice doublet, 2 pieces for solids (maybe more). A mixed bag.
When I returned to my room, I tipped the 30-odd pieces out. Most were geological, ie amorphous lumps or nobbies but one made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
Black potch, covered in tan-brown host rock, broken on one end but the other end had the typical bulbous protrusions of a smallish dinosaur femur, ie the upper part of a knee joint. Here:
and the other side:
It's since been confirmed, (unknown) dinosaur femur fragment, as I suspected. A pity it's broken, and I wish it had even a lick of blue colour, but I still think it was great luck!
I'm new to this site, but intend to make this the first of several posts.
Back in 1985, I left teaching (Maths and English) to pursue my love-of-opal hobby and turn it into a business, to buy/sell opal. Along the way I've acquired many opalised fossils from Coober Pedy and Lightning Ridge and would like to share some of them, in here.
Most recently, I was in the Ridge for the 2018 Opal Festival, late July. On Sunday mornings there's a kind of Flea Market with various stalls selling rough/cut/specimen opal, cake stalls, second-hand stuff and usually a sausage sizzle that provides breakfast. It's on the SW corner of the Main Road into town and the 3-Mile Road.
Sometimes, I've been able to buy a decent rub or even a bag of rough. I remember getting a small opalised whelk in situ last April, but I can't find a photo.
However, on that Sunday I got lucky. I bought a bag of several (about 30 pieces) of rough --- I could see one would cut a nice doublet, 2 pieces for solids (maybe more). A mixed bag.
When I returned to my room, I tipped the 30-odd pieces out. Most were geological, ie amorphous lumps or nobbies but one made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
Black potch, covered in tan-brown host rock, broken on one end
but the other end had the typical bulbous protrusions of a smallish dinosaur femur, ie the upper part of a knee joint. Here:
and the other side:
It's since been confirmed, (unknown) dinosaur femur fragment, as I suspected. A pity it's broken, and I wish it had even a lick of blue colour, but I still think it was great luck!
