Geo-pic of the week: Siliceous Oolite

Ooids are tiny grains that are typically composed of CaCO₃ either as calcite or aragonite.  They precipitate from seawater in concentric bands around a nucleus (for instance a fragment of rock or fossil) in turbulent shallow conditions. 

Once ooids form, they can accumulate and be cemented to form a sedimentary type of limestone called oolite.  The above picture is a magnified and tumbled piece of oolitic chert collected fromgravel on Crowley’s Ridge in northeast Arkansas.  The difference between this and typical oolite is that it came into contact with silica(SiO₂)-rich ground water after it formed.  The SiO₂ then replaced the CaCO₃ the rock was initially composed of.   The polished surface provides an ideal view of the internal structure of the spherical ooids.

Geo-pic of the week: Mineralized Vug in Chert

Pictured above is a mineralized vug (approximately 3 inches long) in chert.  A vug is a void or open space in a rock.  Many vugs are filled with minerals after water that is saturated with a certain mineral flows through the rock. This mineralization can happen in multiple stages. The vug above was initially filled with silica-rich fluid therefore quartz precipitated out of solution and lined the walls of the vug.   Afterwards calcite precipitated, as is evident from the larger crystal on the interior left of the vug. 

This vug is present in a section of ornamentally banded chert.  Chert is a sedimentary rock made up of microcrystalline quartz.  It can be a variety of colors or banded and quite beautiful.  The chert above is Devonian age (416-359 million years ago) from northwest Arkansas.