FMF - Friends of Minerals Forum, discussion and message board

[Anton Potgieter]

What book or books will you recomend form bigginers i will have to get it on the web becous in South Afrca most of the books is about crystal healing and it does not give the info i whant. Eney advice or pointing in the right direction will help.

[Debbie Woolf]

Hi Anton

There is a couple of well known authors/collectors living in SA, Ludi von Bezing's book called Namibia is an A-Z of minerals & mines there, Prof Bruce Cairncross has a few books on the Kalahari Manganese Fields as well as several articles on various localities in SA & Namibia for the Mineralogical Record issues. Perhaps find a local mineral club in Jo'burg or contact Prof Cairncross via the university as he may have these as a few of my books came via him & it will be cheaper than buying from Europe or USA.

[Anton Potgieter]

Thanks Debbie i have 1 of Bruce Cairncross books Field Guid to Rocks & Minerals Of Southern Africa. But will see if I can get hold of him for more books. Thanks again.

[lluis]

Goeiemore, Anton

As book, well, it depends, in my point of view.
For systematic (I am....), a Dana would be great.
For clasification, I would use Strunz, nevertheless...To have quarz as a silicate, it makes me very uneasy (quartz a silicate? silicate of siliconium, maybe? ARGGGHHHH!)
And to have an idea of how pieces look like, the most comprehensive is to take a walk in mindat
So, I would suggest
-a Dana
-a Lapismineralenverzeichnis
A subscription ot Lapis and to Mineralogical Record. And if you have more space, to Rocks and Minerals. Nice photos, nice info, nice to hold for the ones that will follow us.

But I am chemist that likes to collect oddities and pieces with history....You know, chemist are odd.... :-)

With best wishes

Lluís

[Anton Potgieter]

Thanks will have a look