Black Rock itself is ultrapotassic and in the past (and even still now) shed peridot. The best place to rockhound in Wyoming is Fremont County where you can find nephrite jade and Turritella agates in relative abundance. Rockhounds can find opal within the deposits associated with the parks hot springs. Post navigation. Wyoming Rockhound Locations Wyoming is among the top rockhounding locations in the United States. Proceed up canyon dirt road (12) until you reach the top plateau and it is flat. Black jade is a real prize to find. Copyright 2022 Rockhound Resource | Birch on Trellis Framework by Mediavine, Greybull, area washes and draws btwn Big Horn River and Mountains, Lovell, E to Big Horn Mountains in draws and washes, Fremont County, all regional washes and draws. As you You can also find agates a few miles west of Saratoga, Carbon County. Agates, copper minerals, uranium minerals, and calcite-aragonite can be found throughout Park County in northwestern Wyoming. Follow the road a short distance until it splits; stop at the fork and walk up the washed-out left road for a few hundred feet. The Bridger Formation in areas north of Wamsutter, Sweetwater County, and in an area north and east of Farson, Sweetwater, and Sublette counties, the western half of the Bighorn Basin of Bighorn, Hot Springs, Park, and Washakie Counties, or the Steamboat Mountain in the Leucite Hills. Here you can find minerals, rocks, and varieties of quartz such as allanite, beryl, calcite-aragonite, columbite-tantalite, copper minerals, euxenite, galena, hematite, jade, mica minerals, monazite, opal, pyrite, agates, uranium minerals, vermiculite, gabbro, pegmatite, sedimentary rocks, taconite, and slate, among other things. The most commonly found gems and crystals in Wyoming are quartz and feldspar, but you can also find many others including garnet, tourmaline, and opal. google_color_border="1B1B1B"; And you can typically find them laying around, but often youll have to pry open the rocks. Rainbow agates are located along the Wind River near Riverton, in Fremont County. Sublette County, located in western Wyoming, is noted for jade findings. This club hosts multiple outings every month during the summer. Triceratops fossils are mostly found in the Hell Creek Formation in the Black Hills region of South Dakota, eastern Wyoming. These include allanite, beryl, calcite-aragonite, columbite-tantalite, cordierite, feldspar minerals such as orthoclase, plagioclase, galena, graphite, kyanite, magnetite, manganese minerals, mica minerals, uranium minerals, and varieties of quartz. Rainbow agates are plentiful in the Wind River near Riverton, Fremont County. Petrified wood is also found in the Early Basic Breccia of Eocene age, in the Specimen Ridge and the Amethyst Mountains area of Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming. Additionally, you cannot progress away from Black Rock to the southGoogle Earth and maps for the area are old, but mining concerns have cordoned off the area and dug huge swaths of land away, so youll just drive for 30 minutes and get stuck. Gold can also be found in Park County, specifically the Wood River and Sunlight Basin areas.
Places to Expore in Wyoming | Wyoming State Mineral and Gem Society As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. 130 to Walcott Junction. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites. Thats both an easy and challenging question since all of Wyoming is excellent for rockhounding enthusiasts. Belemnites and other fossils near Bridger, MT: Winton petrified wood near Rock Springs, WY: Sharktooth Ridge teeth and trace fossils near Rawlins, WY: Interesting sedimentary features near Adobe Town, WY: Fossil Mountain & Darby Wind Cave near Jackson, WY: Red Gulch Dino Track Site near Shell, WY: Devils Kitchen walk-in access near Red Gulch, Wyoming: Moonshine Arch near Vernal, UT along with a dinosaur track site at Red Fleet: Blue forest petrified wood near Granger, WY: Fish fossils and some shark teeth near Farson, WY: Agatized fossil shells near Rock Springs, WY: Calcite for making lamps and also nice bots in roadside cut near Lander. google_ad_format="120x240_as"; google_ad_client="pub-2930148589555936"; The GPS coordinate I put up in the map at the top of the page is right by a place called Black Rock, which is an ultrapotassic, lamproite volcaniclastic exposure. In Sweetwater County, west of Wamsutter along the old road to Baggs, the Green River Basin is plentiful in agates. These public lands administered by the BLM are open to everyone to take limited amounts of rock material for noncommercial purposes without charge. However, there was some trouble with this in the recent past. In Wyoming, you can find sedimentary rocks such as bentonite, chert, coal, concretion-geode, conglomerate, gypsum, limestone-dolomite, oil shale, shale, taconite, or trona, among many others. Fremont, Sweetwater, Washakie, Natrona, and Carbon Counties are all prime rockhound locations to find Jade. Im here to serve you! Members have access to the Jade State Newsletter, containing news and updates on subjects concerning geology and mineralogy. Red Gulch Dino Track Site near Shell, WY: 8a.) Volcanic type agates or chalcedony usually occur in stream gravels in the western half of the Bighorn Basin, of Big Horn, Hot Springs, Park, and Washakie Counties as well. Pictures and notes on the fossils near Farson. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases with no additional costs for you. The road is really easy going, but the locals arent friendly, even by my states standards. The higher hills to the west (the mesas and buttes) are all ultrapotassic and mafic rocks. google_ad_type="text_image"; Youll see a lot of shining material along the tops of the exposure, but unless you really want some trona, you can ignore it. If opals are something you hope to find, check around Smith Creek. , Places to See Geologic Displays in Wyoming, Guide to Prospecting and Rock Hunting in Wyoming, "Rockhounding, Prospecting, and Fossil Hunting on the Shoshone National Forest".
Rockhounding Locations in WY, MT; UT. (Rough Draft, 05/02/2021 Revision) Fossil Butte National Monument (Rough Draft, 05/02/2021 Revision), Hiking and Adventure Map (Work in Progress). A quick jaunt down a nice dirt road brings you to the overlook, which is marked with a sign. Though there are many locations listed here, this list is far from exhaustive. Membership is only $15 for adults 18 and up. Carbon County is also a famous location for rockhounding in Wyoming. Obsidian is plentiful in Wyoming, especially abundant in Yellowstone National Park, where the Obsidian Cliff is located in the northwest part of the Park. Gemstones are some of the most enjoyable specimens that rockhounds can find, but its not always easy to know where to look. google_color_border="1B1B1B"; You can also find other types of agates like moss agate and Sweetwater agate, another variety that is unique to the state of Wyoming. The most commonly found and collected rocks and minerals in Wyoming are: If youve already found a rock and youre not sure what it is, I would highly recommend checking out my Practical Rock Identification System. lol Thanks again! If you want to hunt for Jade in Wyoming, you can start from the northern part of the Granite Mountains, or to the south of Crooks Countys Gap-Green Mountain. google_ad_format="120x600_as"; Only very minor surface mining has been done here. Belemnites and other fossils near Bridger, MT: 4.) Other sources include: North Carolina Rockhounding Location Guide & Map, Montana Rockhounding Location Guide & Map. Wyoming is full of jades, mostly of the nephrite class, and the jadeite class, which sounds like something out of Star Wars. The Sand Creek and Red Buttes areas of Albany County are full of sedimentary rocks. 2. Gold can also be panned in Douglas Creek in the Medicine Bow Mountains of southeastern Wyoming, or the Sweetwater River and tributaries in the southern part of the Wind River Mountains. As you travel through Wyoming's basins and across its mountain ranges, you can pass over all of the geologic eras of time which produced a variety of rocks, minerals, and fossil types. The ant hills are basically everywhere if you get out and walk around, and your biggest issue will most likely be needing 44 to get there, and especially across the creek to the north. TIP:Feldspar minerals are very common in Wyoming. Anyway, follow that Jeep trail down toward the bottom, where it first starts getting pretty flat, and youll find a ton of fossils. The Rocky Mountain area, the Encampment district in Carbon County, Hartville district, Platte County, the Copper Mountain district, Precambrian pegmatites in Fremont and Natrona Counties, the Black Mountain, and the Copper Mountain, The Eocene Wind River formation of the Gas Hills area, Fremont and Natrona Counties, the Shirley Basin area of Carbon County, the Fall River, and Lakota sandstones in the Black Hills area of Crook County, The Casper Mountain, Natrona County, Haystack Range, Goshen County, Laramie Range, Albany, and Laramie Counties, In Albany, Fremont, Johnson, Natrona, Washakie, and Weston Counties, north of Sundance in the Warren Peaks area of Crook County, In the Laramie Range, Albany and Platte Counties, the southern part of the Medicine Bow Range, Albany and Carbon Counties, the Copper Mountain area, The western half of the Bighorn Basin, of Bighorn, Hot Springs, Park, and Washakie Counties, the area between Labarge and Granger, Lincoln, Sweetwater, and Uinta Counties. Sign in to your account on ArcGIS Online. Here at Rockhounding Maps, we give you access and information to the best dig sites for crystals and minerals in Wyoming. Please take our survey about how you use and access the data we provide on our website. Please direct technical questions (including broken links) about this Web site to webmaster@wsmgs.org. google_color_bg="1B1B1B"; A single column may be searched using the blank field at the top of each column. See my hikes in to this area in the early spring, middle-summer, and late summer. Public access with nice walk in. Rockhounds have several excellent locations to choose from in Wyoming. The counties are alphabetized, and within each county the locations are . This area was explored by a South African diamond company briefly but nothing came of it. You can probably find it just about anywhere in the area, though I had good success looking along the eastern flank of Black Rock. (I do not live in the US right now.). Rockhounding Wyoming by Kenneth Graham. popular museums of interest to rockhounders, places to visit, and rockhounding sites for children and families. Check out the table down below to see where these specimens of sedimentary rocks are found in Wyoming. google_color_border="1B1B1B"; Zoom in for full list. BTW: Check out this amazing metal sign (Amazon link) which is perfect for everyone who loves rockhounding in Wyoming! When you look for it, it often just looks like ugly, whiteish or greyish rocks. Find local businesses, view maps and get driving directions in Google Maps. Thank you for sharing this! This region is full of mica minerals, phonolite, pumice, and Wyomingite in the Leucite Hills area. 15. I recommend accessing the area from highway 414 to the west, turning right just above Behunin Reservoir. No rockhound excursion would be complete in Wyoming without exploring Yellowstone National Park. TIP: A great deal of petrified wood is not suitable for rock tumbling or lapidary work because it has too many faults and fractures. As you can see, opals are found in many places in Wyoming, so let us dive into where to find chalcedony in Wyoming. ,