AR - yes my first effort at this post also vanished down a cyber shaft. Seems I was timed out, as Simon explains elsewhere. Naturally my first version was devastatingly brilliant and witty, and this less so as I wrote it in haste, although it seems just as long!
With respect to pick marks, shot holes etc. these are commonplace. You have many miles of passage with possibly millions of them. Collectors have only limited areas (sometimes very limited) with mineralisation, and even within those areas only a small proportion is likely to be of sufficient interest to merit getting the hammer out. Even then, it would take a lot of effort to obliterate all the features you describe. I have seen plenty of well-hammered faces with shot holes etc. still intact.
More significantly, you are making a value judgement here. You are unilaterally deciding that your interest in shot holes etc. should over-ride mine in minerals. I wonder on what basis you are making that decision, especially as it is clear that mineralogy is not your area of expertise? This just seems selfish and elitist. “My interest is more important than yours’, even though I don’t know much about yours’”. To declare that ALL walls etc. should be out of bounds because ALL shot holes etc. are more worthy than any minerals is outrageous. You are deciding that your interest should over-ride mine ALWAYS. I’m just asking for a little compromise. You can put your anorak on and go, “Coo” at the vast majority of walls and shot holes all you like, but please at least let us mineral buffs put our anoraks on and go, “Coo” at what we can rescue from those few places we can.
I am surprised that you cannot recognise a simple rhetorical device like “99.9%” which was never meant to be taken literally, but was merely to emphasise the point that most mine walls are not of mineral interest.
To pose another question, what would happen if a particularly unusual mineral was spotted in the wall of a top-notch coffin level like Fountrabbey sough? Would you then argue that the mineral should take priority as there are other coffin levels in the orefield?
I have repeatedly made it clear that there are situations where the historic remains are so unusual and exceptional that they should take precedence. Coffin levels were one such example (I might also have suggested prehistoric mines). In your example, it would have to be something extraordinary to justify extraction, and if the coffin level was as fine as you say then it ought to have National Monument status (if it has not such already), in which case any collecting would have to be after consultation with people like you with power of veto. I have no problem with that. I do NOT take the position that minerals always over-ride archaeology/history. Why can’t you be less dogmatic about the reverse?
NAMHO have established guidelines for us to work around when making decisions about when to remove or not
Yes and I can find fault with them, but will not do so here as this thread has deviated enough from the original topic.
but are there equivalent guidelines for the mineralogical organisations?
Yes, but as I use the random filing system for my notes I do not have them to hand to quote for you.
Furthemore, how many non-academic collectors record mineral in-situ the way we would with an artefact before removing it?
27.30289% plus or minus 0.000005%. :smartass: More seriously, does it matter? Mineralogy is a specimen-based activity. Most collectors are looking for the aesthetic, in which case the context is irrelevant, even undesirable when it consists of sticky mud. When the interest is scientific then context can be recorded if relevant. As the aesthetic material is rarely of scientific merit, and the scientific material rarely aesthetic, the two interests rarely conflict. On occasion the pursuit of the aesthetic leads to new scientific finds, in which case there is often enough context in the specimen (and in the finder’s memory) to suffice. If not one can always go back – assuming the mine has not collapsed in the interim!
On to collapses, we don't gamble, we take calculated risks about the likelihood of collapse
But you can never be sure, and you cannot state with certainty that a mine will still be open in 100, or even 50, years’ time. You are gambling and in the long term you will lose. You are up against the second law of thermodynamics – and that always wins.
Furthermore, given sufficient manpower and resources it is possible to clear any collapse. It might take time, but it's do-able. The reason a lot more collapses don't get cleared is down to the limitations on these two variables.
Well, as you acknowledge, there aren’t the time and resources. Even in the Nenthead mines, possibly some of the most cared for in the country, deterioration is slowly overtaking the diggers, as is clear from an earlier post. The longer a mine is neglected for, the worse it gets. And some falls are so severe they are NOT practical to clear. Even mining companies, reopening old workings, often prefer to tunnel around a fall than attempt to go straight through it. There is another problem. Landowners. Increasingly they are becoming concerned about liability and litigation. Just getting permission to go underground can be difficult enough, let alone digging out old workings. The long term prospects for old mines are bleak, so the argument that one should rescue what one can while one can seems more than just an argument. It is almost an obligation!
Regarding your comments about me as a mineralogist, perhaps you'd care to quote the post where I claimed to be one
As I never said you claimed to be one I am under no obligation to point to a post that I never said existed. I did say that you are not a good mineralogist, and that much is true, just as it may be true that I am not a good archaeologist.
At this point I must thank Skippy for giving a good explanation of secondary minerals and thus saving me the trouble.
my problem is with anyone who feels like it digging where they like because "they have an interest”
Then all those chance discoveries, whether mineral, historical, archaeological or otherwise, that have been made by people digging in places the professionals would never have bothered, because they wanted to, would never be made. To take an example from your profession, the Hoxne hoard.
With respect to hillocks and their alleged archaeological merit, and toxic properties, I suspect there is an element of barrel-scraping going on here. You are certainly repeating your elitist attitude that your archaeological interest should over-rule my mineral one so that mineralogists cannot have access to these hillocks. Not even the industrial era tips? As for lead contamination, as I understand it (and correct me if I am wrong) the issue is with particles small enough to be blown about by the wind. Certainly the smaller they are the more likely they will get transported about. Tailings would therefore seem the most problematical. A rubbley pile much less so, yet it is the latter that is more likely to be of mineral interest, whilst the former will be attractive to rabbits. Now as I am innocent until proved guilty, the burden of proof is yours’. Where are the scientific studies, published in peer-reviewed journals, proving that digging in a tip for minerals will be as hazardous to stock as the rabbits churning up the fine, gravely tips nearby in an area where the soil already has naturally high levels of contamination? And remember, as we both agreed, the vast majority of these tips are of limited mineral interest, so we are talking about only a very few cases.
Also, as you acknowledge, the farmer owns the tips. If I have his permission to dig in them then I have an absolute right to do so.
No-where have I suggested that hillocks should never be touched, but if they are dug into it should be for bona-fide research purposes.
I'll conclude by restating my position - I don't object at all to collection of mineral specimens for research purposes
And for other purposes? Is collecting to be only by people with PhDs? You are being elitist again, and also excluding many ordinary people from contributing to mineralogy. Have you any idea how many discoveries are made in the course of non-research collecting? I suppose you’d ban metal detecting too just because of a few miscreants. Then all the wonderful treasures found by the responsible majority would still be corroding in the soil. This elitist attitude is actually counter-productive, and ultimately destructive.
as long as it's not at the expense of the historical interest, and I don't want to see anyhting destroyed by someone who failed to recognise the significance of it.
Once again you are deciding that mineralogy should automatically give way to “historical interest”. What if that “historical interest” is minor (just another drab wall with a hole left by a rotted stemple), but the mineral interest is great? With your attitude the minerals will be lost because you are failing to recognise their significance. Can you recognise the significance of a mud patch showing a few fragments of spar? Do you know what it may signify? Can you recognise the significance of the orientation of crystals in a vug? Can you recognise the significance of a lone vug in a normally compact vein? Can you recognise the significance of a post-mining coating on a wall? Can you recognise the significance of a patch of oxidised veinstuff even where vugs are not immediately apparent? Can you recognise the significance of lead veins oxidising in an environment deficient in carbonate? Can you recognise the significance of the presence of the minerals erythrite and annabergite in a lead mine? Can you recognise the significance of the yellow colour of some, and only some, smithsonites? Much that is mineralogically significant will be lost forever if anything vaguely historical is considered more important, or if only academics are allowed to collect.
This doesn't just cover mineral collectors
No, anyone who is not a historian/archaeologist. We should all bow to your interest.
Old mines need to be considered as a whole entity, not just through the prisim of a particular interest
Yes, and that means not just through the prism of your interest to the exclusion of mine. And that is why we need to have debates like this so we can see and understand better each others’ interests and needs. So far I have been disappointed by the lack of understanding on this forum of how minerals occur, why they need to be collected, and what happens to them if they are not.
but the most important factor is that they should be kept intact as much as possible so that the experience of them can be shared.
An experience that cannot be shared by those who cannot or do not go underground. An experience that cannot be shared if the minerals (or artefacts) are smothered in mud, buried, submerged … An experience that cannot be shared if the mine has collapsed, or the hillocks been cleared.
As for keeping them intact, decay and collapse are not doing that. Besides, the mere act of keeping them open by digging, shoring, bridging etc. changes the environment, likewise the extraction of specimens. A certain amount of rearranging has to be tolerated. If one was not allowed to change anything then little would be learned and all would be lost when the end came.
Sheesh, I need to go for lunch now, I'm exhausted after that!
Me too! :lol: