What Does An Emerald Mine Look Like

Most emeralds are highly included so their toughness resistance to breakage is classified as generally poor.

What does an emerald mine look like.

North carolina designated the emerald as the official state precious stone in 1973. A greater variety of minerals have been found in north carolina than in any other state more than 300 including some of the most valuable and unique gems in the world. Raw emeralds like cut emeralds are all green but the shade of green varies from blue green to pale yellow green to a rich forest green. Check the emerald with a loupe using reflected light to check for cracks and inclusions.

Emerald crystal from the kagem emerald mine zambia on a matrix of quartz and mica schist. Emeralds with many flaws and cracks around the corners aren t good candidates for setting in jewelry. We found a few specimens like this where you could see small green crystals in the rock with close inspection or magnification. Even if they can be set without damage they aren t likely to last long in the setting.

Emerald is a cyclosilicate. Beryl has a hardness of 7 5 8 on the mohs scale. In the photo this looks a lot like the aventurine green quartz that you can find at the mine but the crystals and color are more like emerald. Emerald is a gemstone and a variety of the mineral beryl be 3 al 2 sio 3 6 colored green by trace amounts of chromium and sometimes vanadium.