Newbie needs help from diamond prospectors, Haven't been able to find someone to positively identify Options

[TheRookie]

Okay, to start off with, this is my first post, here. I'm not from Colorado, and neither are the minerals I'm asking for help with. I hope that's not a rules violation. To make a long story short I was doing some gold prospecting in NE Illinois. Yes, Illinois. In with my black sands, which turned out to have some gold, but not enough to mess with, I found these:



After doing a little research, they look to be pyrope, I think. Let me know if you disagree.

Then I found a few rocks like this:




So, I extracted a bunch of the small crystals. Which look like this:




A lot of them still have a bit of the host rock still stuck to them, but, as is, I did a Specific Gravity test and came up with between 3.1 and 3.2 with less than lab-grade equipment. I'm working on cleaning them up some more & when completed in a day or so, will redo my SG test. I also did check the SG of the host rock and that came back at 2.5. My guess is that the cleaning will raise SG to 3.5, or so. The way I did my SG test was to weigh out a sample, then put them into a graduated cylinder half full of water to see how much water was displaced. Using water I had a bit of a problem with air bubbles that just were a bear to get rid of. Would it be better to use a light oil when I rerun my test? I've also subjected them to scratch tests up to mohs 8 (beryl). I don't have any corundum to check further, unfortunately. I've also soaked them in strong, hot acids, and also in lye, none of which has any affect on them. The only thing I've done that had an adverse affect was to heat a couple of them over an open, natural gas flame, 'til they were red-hot, which turned them an opaque white. I've taken these to jewelry shops, rock shops, and a lapidary museum. So far, no one has been able to positively identify these crystals.

[ASTROBLEME]

TheRookie,

I don't know about how holding the target stone would affect the reading on diamond testers so I won't venture an opinion other than you're thinking the right way in trying to solve the puzzle. Keep up the effort until you know what the crystals are for sure.

There is a meteorite impact crater near Coloma WI that is not well studied. The original impact may have cratered with a diameter in excess of 13 miles but the present surface trace is only about 5 miles in diameter. This means that lots of erosion has occurred and that size of crater can bring diamonds to the surface. I've been called crazy for proposing the relationship between diamond deposits and large impact craters but the experts are moving more and more towards my way of thinking. There is a multi-ring dike structure that I think is an impact near my diamond finds. I'm pretty sure the structure is an ancient crater but I don't have access to the central core area where evidence would most likely still remain. Anyway, something had to trigger an emplacement of numerous kimberlite pipes in the vicinity and cratering is the most likely event at Stateline Mining District.

Do you know the direction of the glacial drift from the Glover Bluff Crater? If the drift is towards your prospects, then that would explain the indicator garnets and would be a good place to search for diamonds in my opinion. Let em' think your crazy... that will keep the crowds down!

[TheRookie]

TheRookie, I don't know about how holding the target stone would affect the reading on diamond testers so I won't venture an opinion other than you're thinking the right way in trying to solve the puzzle. Keep up the effort until you know what the crystals are for sure. There is a meteorite impact crater near Coloma WI that is not well studied. The original impact may have cratered with a diameter in excess of 13 miles but the present surface trace is only about 5 miles in diameter. This means that lots of erosion has occurred and that size of crater can bring diamonds to the surface. I've been called crazy for proposing the relationship between diamond deposits and large impact craters but the experts are moving more and more towards my way of thinking. There is a multi-ring dike structure that I think is an impact near my diamond finds. I'm pretty sure the structure is an ancient crater but I don't have access to the central core area where evidence would most likely still remain. Anyway, something had to trigger an emplacement of numerous kimberlite pipes in the vicinity and cratering is the most likely event at Stateline Mining District. Do you know the direction of the glacial drift from the Glover Bluff Crater? If the drift is towards your prospects, then that would explain the indicator garnets and would be a good place to search for diamonds in my opinion. Let em' think your crazy... that will keep the crowds down!

As far as I can tell, from the maps I've looked at (and I'm no expert) Glacial drift from Glover Bluff Crater would've ended up a bit west of me. As to people thinking I'm crazy, if these are diamonds, after I have enough of them, I'll be eccentric.