Zircon

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Seiland is one of a plethora of small islands around the northern coast of Norway and here Zircon occurs in the nepheline syenite pegmatites in the southern part of the island. Now this entire area is a National Park, mineral collecting is completely forbidden and these old time specimens are becoming ever increasingly difficult to acquire. Although this specimen can be classed as a miniature it certainly contains a lot of Zircons for your buck! Set in a granular black crystalline matrix of mixed Biotite and Hornblende, several Zircon crystals richly pervade the specimen, the largest being a double terminated crystal which measures 3.6 cm between terminations and with many of the prism faces exposed from the enveloping matrix. The Zircon crystals are mainly an opaque dark burnt toffee orange-brown, but where light is able to penetrate their sides, patches become bright translucent clove brown, barley sugar orange and cherry red.