February 15, 2007 Round Mountain’- We only had six vehicles travel out to Round Mountain to look for fire agate and geodes. I led the group out to the corral and water tank where we all got out of our vehicles to decide if we were going to continue to the washes opposite Round mountain or travel north about a mile to search for geodes near the top of another hill. We all decided on Geodes because they are a LOT easier to find than the fire agate. Last year the group had difficulty getting down to the geode parking area because of the deep cut washes do not mix well with long bed trucks. We sent the jeeps ahead and found that the road was passable for everyone. After parking, Dave Millis and I headed up to the top of the hill while the remainder of the group poked around the large wash and flat areas in front of the hill. Judy and Bill Ruddick arrived late and headed down the road past our parked vehicles to survey the far end of the geode hill. Meanwhile, Dave and I made it to the top of the hill where we had collected the geodes in the past. We found quite a few but not the nice large round ones as in past years. We decided to head over to the backside of the hill to see if there were any big round ones.. We found more geodes than ever before in this area. There seemed to be several bands of geode beds across the back side of the hill. Every time I saw Dave he was either stooping over to pick up another geode or clutching a chest full of prizes while not trying to drop any. He told me later that every time that he dropped one he picked up the one he had dropped and another equally good one right next to it. We both came down the hill with all the geodes we could carry. [2005] We had ten vehicles make the trip to Round Mountain collecting area this year. The weather was still threatening and it did sprinkle on us as we departed the collecting area but the road in was very drivable. We decided to split up at the water tank with some of us going to collect fire agate ahead at Round mountain and the rest of us driving off to an adjacent hillside to collect geodes and whatever else we could find. The group at Round Mountain found one really nice fire agate specimen and several other keepers. We found all geodes that that we wanted to carry down the hillside and back to our vehicles. This must have been the location that the large geode that I had seen in the rock shop on my 2003 trip came from. We also found lots of chalcedony with hints of color but not a lot of fire - a speck here and there. [2003] This is a large site most noted for fire agate. There is a lot of agate pieces but not a lot of "fire" to be found. What you can find in abundance is chalcedony, agate pieces, and some small 2 inch or less geodes. At the rock shop in Lordsburg, I was shown a large 6 " geode with quartz crystals covered in a white coating. The owner said that the geode was found reticently at Round mountain. I didn't find any that size only real small ones. |
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 Picture taken from atop Round Mountain. My car is located near the center of this picture. [2003]
I worked the dry washes that snake up the hill on either side of my car's location. There seemed to be a lot more potential "fire" agate exposed in these dry washes. I found a few small pieces with marginal color. |
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 The Round Mountain Boys . . . Dave Millis, Ben Davis, and Roger Pittard |
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 Our vehicles at the bottom of Geode hill . . . |
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 Geode exposure. . . |
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 Close up of the ground littered with geodes. |
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 Geodes in matrix. |
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 The road back to the hardtop . . . |
