I found this one day while on a little rocky beach. It was yellowish and rusty looking until we washed it, it came out quite shiny.
Has anyone seen something similar to this? Could it be hematite?
Looking forward to any input!
It looks more like steel foundry slag to me, esp with the yellow and rust covering. Just my wild, nonscientfic guess.
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It looks like some type of metal slag to me. It could be steel but depending on the type of water that it was found by…steel would oxidize and rust in salt water quit rapidly. Silver would also turn. You could take it to a metaluralgust (sp) at the local collage is your best bet. And have it tested. Some community collages have the ability to test it for you.
All the best,
Otter
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Could it be the remains of a piece sacrificial zink used on a ship?
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Thank You! That is also a new term for me and I googled it and you could very well be right! Any guess works for me, yours is as good as mine I am positive!!
I live on the St.Lawrence River, surrounded by salt water. This piece I found at low tide on a rocky beach.
We have no local college, I live in an isolated town with just a school to sec.5. I have found places online I can send samples to but I have so many I am not sure which I should send…
Thank You for your help!!
Tommat has the best one yet. Zinc sounds darn close and being on the The busy river that has shipping like you do it makes for a good fit. It has been a Long time since I have been in that area and all of the goodies that can be found on the shores amazed me. I mad some pretty cool sculptures and sea glass jewelry long before it was popular. Well long before the internet was a thought. I do remember finding all types of metals, wood, Bakelite and plastics. Yep I’m that old y’all. Such fun finding treasures. Have fun finding yours.
All the best.
Otter
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It is amazing here with many different treasures! I live on the coastline right under the Labrador Border with Quebec. Right across from NFLD Island… The beach combing, view and if you look at the isolation in a positive light, it is quite unbelievable…
We also prospect a lot further inland. There is much to be found around here I think!!
Back to basics … looking at the above responses, if the material is steel it would be attracted to a magnet (unless it is stainless steel as some stainless steels are not attracted to a magnet; however, if it was stainless steel, it would have not been corroded).
Next, take the Specific Gravity as that can possibly nail what the material is or at least it can tell you (separate) what it cannot be.
There are 5 materials that naturally exhibit botryoidal structure: Azureite, Azuremalachite, Fire Agate, Malachite (none of those even look like your specimen), and Hematite. Now Hematite sometimes is not magnetic, it can have gray metallic luster, and it can have botryoidal structure. The streak test for hematite is almost always reddish and the SG is nominally 5.20 I found a photo of hematite with botryoidal structure in the public domain and shall attach it below. Enjoy.
