| Original Message: Re: This looks like the material that is routinely commercially called "picture jasper." |
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It is very similar to Biggs jasper and similar to a few others but this jasper is not found in volume to allow modern commercial beadmaking. I worked for a lapidary stone miner and we would mine 250,000 pounds at a time from huge deposits in Oregon. The jasper deposit is drilled and then blasted and excavated with trac hoes and loaded with a front loader onto open topped big rigs. It is sorted lightly then packed in shipping containers for shipment to China. The exact same rough that Americans pay $10 to$30 a pound for is sold for about 2 dollars a kilo.Exactly the same is happening with Canadian jade. Large scale bead production of the wonderful Moroccan agates was scheduled to begin this year but covid probably stopped it as the investors were old Americans who would have to travel to supervise and train people in Africa .
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