Herkimer Diamond Mines
Just what is a Herkimer diamond and how do they compare to a real diamond? Keep reading to find this out and how you can mine your own "diamonds".
About the Mine...
Tucked away East of Utica, NY is the town of Herkimer, NY. Here next to a KOA campground you'll find Herkimer Diamond Mines. With reasonable entry fees that are good for the whole day you can prospect for your very own Herkimer diamonds. So bring your hammers (or rent one from them) and your sunscreen and be ready for a day of smashing rocks and finding treasures. When you get hungry there are a few options for food, the Canteen Cafe has lighter fare and for dinner the Miners' Table is open. We ate at the Canteen for a quick late lunch before we left.
How do you find the diamonds?
An easy option for kids are sluice bags. These are pre-done bags that they sift through a trough "river" outside where you check in. Especially if you have younger kids that you don't want getting hurt or large groups like a school this is an easy, convenient, and fun way to teach them about mining.
The next option, and the one that Adam and I took, is to break open free standing rocks that you find everywhere around the mine. And I should mention you aren't going underground with a miner's hat and lantern when you go there. It's more like an open quarry. There are ways to up your chances of finding the diamonds like looking for specific types of rocks that they were formed in. Some we found had sparkly black pieces on the inside. Others to be on the lookout for have square quartz shapes in them. And you might be thinking....don't all rocks just look like rocks? But once you're in the mine for a little while you'll be able to tell one rock from another. This way of just picking up random rocks is also fun because you can find things like geodes, which from the outside look like a completely normal kind of spherical rock, but when you open them up they are filled with crystals.
Lastly, for people who are really into the mining scene, you can stay in a spot for up to a week before they make you rotate out of it. We did see some kind of operation going on in part of the mine that was taped off, but I don't know if this was the mine or something commercial. The mine is also first-come-first-served so it's recommended to get there early. They allow hammers up to 12 pounds, which is bigger than most people would bring to recreationally mine. You can also bring chisels, crowbars, shovels, and buckets.
A Few Safety Pointers...
These things are not required but will make things much more comfortable and safe for you on your mining adventure.
Safety Glasses
Gloves
Closed toe shoes
Sunscreen
How do Herkimer diamonds compare to a real diamond?
Both Herkimer diamonds and real diamonds are formed in the same type of way. Over millions of years of compression under many layers of sediment. However "diamond" is a misnomer to a Herkimer diamond as technically they are still a quartz crystal. One other very big difference is their relationship on the Mohs hardness scale. A true diamond rates a 10, the very top of the scale. This means it cannot be scratched by things that are lower on the scale than it. This includes the Herkimer diamond which comes in at a 7.5.
In Closing...
If you are looking for a fun daytime trip, and overnight excursion, or a week long adventure in central New York look no further than Herkimer Diamond Mines. We had a great time and did actually find a few diamonds! (Mostly because of Adam's eye for the "good" rocks.) One note is that you can still crush these with a hammer if you hit them, so it's best to remove the rock around the diamond and not hit it directly on, which we learned the "hard" way.
Keep following along with me on my journey and keep up with me every Wednesday when I put up a new blog post. You can also follow me on Instagram and check out what other interesting things I might be doing during the week. Thanks as always!
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