Rock & Fossil Show at Lowe-Volk Nature Center

Tom Kottyan

I visited the Rock and Fossil Show at Lowe-Volk Nature Center last Saturday.  They invite you to bring your own rocks for aid in identification.  I took mine and was able to meet Tom Kottyan, the expert identifier.  Being uninitiated in the realm of rocks and fossils, I don't know how much of an expert he is but I was definitely impressed!  Tom looked at my rocks and set me on the right course.  I will relate to that below.  Tom donated his Ohio minerals collection to Lowe-Volk on Saturday.  If you get a chance to visit the nature center, check it out.  It is pretty awesome.  He also gave a lecture on Ohio Minerals.  He is a retired science teacher from Bucyrus City Schools.  He spends his time in retirement collecting minerals from the Findley Arch an area in which 95% of Ohio's minerals are located.  He also, if I understood correctly, gives talks and leads hikes for hundreds of students on the topic of Ohio's Minerals and the Findley Arch.  Tom is also an Assistant State Director for Ohio of the Midwest Federation of the Mineralogical and Geological Societies.

Findley Arch

If I knew about this arch, I had forgotten.  The minerals are mined in this area.  Tom gets permission to visit the quarries on special days to extract the intact mineral crystals.  The "permission" is harder to obtain these days than earlier.  He has stayed up on the special training required for admittance to the quarries.  I was interested to note that part of the Arch runs through northern Shelby County where I grew up.  I remember they wanted to "prospect" on our farm for oil.  I wonder if that was associated with this Arch in any way.  I found Tom's talk very informative.

Now to the corrections.  The "feldspar" turns out to be flint.  The "unknowns" turn out to be flint.  The "hornfels" turns out to be flint.  The crystals grew in flint.  The rock unknown was also flint.  The "rock unknown" turns out also to flint.  The "concretion" may still be a concretion but it is in flint.  The "tekite" is mookiate.

I am sorry to have mislead you this.  I was just so excited about the beauty that I had to show them.  I wish I had access to Tom all the time.

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