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We’ve visited the Long Lake Mine several times. Carefully selected, these pieces can be striking - offering lots of colors, with great coverage. We’ve turned a few of our pieces into very beautiful spheres.
The Long Lake zinc mine is located just across the US/Canada border in Ontario. It is filled with wonderful specimens if you’re willing to do a little sledgehammer work and spend some time digging - and make careful selections. We have heard several reports that the new owners are not allowing collecting any more.
Chondrodite = yellow
Diopside = blue
They were nicknamed "Yooperlites" which is derived from the name “yooper”. A yooper is a nickname for the Upper Peninsula natives and these fluorescent stones quickly gained fame. After data was published on these fluorescent stones, it was discovered that sodalite is the actual true mineral that is fluorescing orange.
365nm UV light is often called "blacklight". Before the advent of longwave UV LEDs, blacklight fluorescent tubes, (the kinds used in hippie days to light up psychedelic posters) were the standard longwave UV light for our hobby. They were not very powerful but they did light a large area.
Enter 365nm UV LEDs
First, an animation showing the difference between the UV flashlight we recommend (365nm filtered UV flashlight) versus unfiltered 395nm UV flashlights we see many folks carrying around at shows. So. much. visible purple light. We selected a bunch of rocks as a demonstration. Took pictures of them under his flashlight without the filter and then with the filter.
