1.8" Phantom Quartz Crystal Cluster - Arkansas

This is a beautiful quartz cluster found in the Ouachita Mountains, Arkansas. Quartz from the Ouchaita Mountains has been known about ever since native Americans had first occupied the area and worked the quartz into projectiles for hunting and fishing, and has been commercially mined since the 1890's.

Silicon Dioxide, also know as SiO2 or Quartz, is the second most abundant mineral in the Earth's crust. Quartz crystals generally grow in silica-rich, hot watery solutions called hydrothermal environments, at temperatures between 100°C and 450°C, and usually under very high pressure. Quartz veins are formed when open fissures are filled with hot water during the closing stages of mountains forming, and can be hundreds of millions of years old.

The largest crystal has a nicely zoned phantom inclusion. Phantoms occur when more material floods into the hydrothermal environments, usually during volcanic activity, causing more crystal growth over existing material, which creates the look of a crystal within a crystal. The phantom is visible because of a difference in chemical makeup from the newer material.