Rock & Mineral Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ rocks, minerals, crystals, and gemstones — with properties, formation, colors, hardness, and how to tell them apart.
Landscape Agate
A translucent chalcedony agate whose mineral inclusions form miniature scenes resembling mountains, trees, deserts, and skies.
gemstone
Feather Agate
A translucent chalcedony agate containing delicate, feather- or plume-shaped mineral inclusions that branch like soft feathers.
gemstone
Sweetwater Agate
A translucent Wyoming chalcedony filled with delicate black manganese dendrites that resemble tiny ferns, moss, or starbursts.
gemstoneCarey Plume Agate
A prized plume agate from near Carey, Idaho, showing red, pink and black feathery plumes floating in translucent chalcedony.
gemstone
Bumblebee Jasper
A vivid yellow-and-black banded stone from Indonesian volcanic vents, colored by sulfur, arsenic minerals and iron oxides, not true jasper.
sedimentary
Snake Skin Agate
A chalcedony with a distinctive scaly, reptile-skin surface texture, typically in pale tan, pink, and gray tones.
gemstoneOwyhee Blue Agate
A soft sky-blue chalcedony from the Owyhee region of Oregon and Idaho, prized for its calming, opaque powder-blue color.
gemstone
Holley Blue Agate
A rare translucent lavender-blue agate from the Holley area of Oregon, prized for its soft purple-blue color.
gemstone
Dendritic Agate
A translucent chalcedony decorated with branching, fern-like manganese or iron oxide inclusions resembling tiny plants.
mineralStarburst Agate
Agate containing radiating sprays of mineral needles that fan out like bursting stars within the chalcedony.
gemstoneGraveyard Point Agate
A celebrated plume agate from the Oregon-Idaho border, known for dramatic black, gold, and red plumes in clear chalcedony.
gemstoneWoodward Ranch Agate
Plume and fortification agate from the famous Woodward Ranch near Alpine, Texas, known for red and pink plumes.
gemstone
Turritella Agate
A brown fossiliferous chalcedony packed with spiral freshwater snail shells, technically agatized fossil rock from Wyoming.
sedimentary
Brecciated Agate
Agate that was shattered and naturally re-cemented by silica, creating a mosaic of angular fragments in a quartz matrix.
gemstonePaintbrush Agate
A plume agate whose inclusions form upright, bristly clusters resembling the strokes of a paintbrush.
gemstoneDragon Vein Agate
A treated chalcedony with a network of crackled veins, usually heated and dyed in vivid colors for affordable, eye-catching beads.
gemstone
Zebra Jasper
A black-and-white striped chalcedony-quartz rock whose bold zebra-like banding makes it a popular ornamental and lapidary stone.
sedimentaryPolyhedroid Agate
A rare agate that forms naturally with flat polygonal faces and angular geometric shapes rather than the usual rounded nodule.
gemstone
Oregon Opal
Opal from Oregon, USA, ranging from translucent blue Owyhee opal to clear and fiery contra-luz precious opal from Opal Butte.
gemstone
Orendite
A rare ultrapotassic lamproite carrying sanidine, phlogopite and diopside, classically from Wyoming's Leucite Hills.
igneous
Orthoclase
A common rock-forming potassium feldspar, the Mohs hardness reference at 6, found in granites and used in ceramics and glassmaking.
mineral
Orange Opal
A vivid orange opal, classically Mexican fire opal, prized for its bright, fiery body color that glows when backlit.
gemstone
Peacock Ore
A copper-iron sulfide ore famous for its iridescent peacock-like purple and blue tarnish; often sold as treated chalcopyrite.
mineral
Orange Garnet
A trade term for orange garnets, mainly manganese-rich spessartine and the brownish hessonite variety of grossular.
gemstone