Rock Collecting

Rock collecting is a hobby anybody can enjoy. Rocks are found everywhere and the variety is huge. Rocks can be displayed in many ways. From rock gardens to neatly kept showcases, rock collecting can be a highly versatile hobby. Some people use rock collecting to save inexpensive mementos of places they have visited. These collections consist of saving pretty rocks from different places and keeping them as a souvenir. Large rocks can be used to line the driveway or small rocks can line a windowsill. You can even label them with a fine point marker to include the date and location the rock was found if you want. When rock collecting, you will soon find out that rocks can be put into one of three categories. A sedimentary rock formed when sediments were pressed together. Sand or mud is pushed together under the pressure of their own weight or the weight of water and eventually becomes solid. An igneous rock is one formed by great heat. The third type of rock is the metamorphic rock. It is a combination of sedimentary rock changed by heat like an igneous rock. The souvenir type of rock collecting does not require much scientific investigation, but you may want to explore a little deeper to be able to distinguish between rocks and minerals. The different types of rock can many times be differentiated easily. Sandstone is a common example of easily classified sedimentary rock because it looks like particles glued together. Sedimentary rocks also sometimes have visible flat layers. But rocks like metamorphic rocks sometimes have layers too. Only they are hard to see because they have been bent so that they are no longer laying flat. Some people who collect rocks also collect minerals, gems, and crystals. Pure minerals even though technically not the same thing as rocks, fit well in rock collections. Minerals include things like pyrite(fool's gold) and quartzite(which looks almost like a diamond). When rock collecting, the igneous rocks make some of the most exciting finds. Obsidian is an igneous rock that looks like a broken piece of black glass. It is shiny and hard, and was used by the Native Americans to make arrowheads. Pumice is another interesting igneous rock which is porous, making it so light that it will float. This stone is used for cleaning and rubbing calluses off feet. When rock collecting, you will find that different regions of the world have different types of rocks. In the American Midwest, for instance, there are many sedimentary stones, but metamorphic and igneous rocks are less common. In the Appalachians, on the other hand, you will find metamorphic rocks in abundance and less sedimentary. Wherever you live, though, you are sure to find rock collecting a hobby that's hard to resist!