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cl2007 — native copper
Published: 2009-09-20 15:13:01 +0000 UTC; Views: 1662; Favourites: 37; Downloads: 66
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Description
native copper found as a polycrystal... it of course does not come out of the ground this bright- the tarnish/patina oxidation has been removed with acid.Caledonia Mine, Ontonagon Co., Michigan
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Comments: 12
You do know that that's not how it looks when it comes out of the ground/mine, right?
I happen to live in Michigan and have collected numerous pieces of copper here. Your piece has been dropped in acid to remove the natural oxidation that appears on all natural copper specimens.
It still has its native form (sort of) but certainly not its natural patina. In fact, when you visit the Michigan copper mines, it can be really hard to tell what's copper and what's not because all of the rocks in the mines look gray/brown/black/greenish if they're not quartz or calcite. Hence why metal detectors are used to find nuggets these days - they blend in so well when oxidized.
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doh, I should have mentioned that in the description- when you buy them, all the ones I've seen have been- ahem- enhanced (ohhhh... shiny! 
Never had the opportunity to find my own- are they deep mines or pit mines?
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You don't even need to go into the mines to find nuggets usually - as there are still many just lying about on the surface and even more in the mine tailing piles. With a metal detector you can find them with minimal digging at all. But you can also go into (or dig your own) mines and see veins of the dark metals along the walls. Getting specimens out is a bit difficult as of course the metal bends and doesn't break.
The coolest thing is that you can saw out large pieces of matrix rock with seams of copper through them. Then you can slab those pieces and seal them with varnish and have a really cool matrix/seam-copper specimen.
You can also find silver nuggets or half-breed nuggets - part copper and part silver - closer to the surface again just using a metal detector. Of course the copper will be oxidized dark brown or greenish brown and the silver will be oxidized black, but they're still really cool. And of course you can always polish them up a bit to a shine with some acid. If you're really lucky, you can find some silver nuggets that contain a trace of gold - and thus aren't tarnished much.
You can see some Michigan silver nuggets of mine in this deviation: [link] (Silver Nuggets deviation). You can also see some copper specimens (including seem copper) from Michigan here: [link] (Copper Display deviation) and here - [link] (Copper Uses deviation). And a super sweet copper specimen here: [link] (Crystallized Copper deviation).
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wow! thanks for the info, and if I ever get up that way I will try to do some looking
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You're welcome.
The specimens are definitely worth looking for.
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wow, never thought one might find it in this state, how pretty
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