Del Air member Dodd Roth asks:
Do you know of any gypsum mines that have colored rocks?
"Because You Asked" answers:
None that I know of personally, however, there are literally thousands of gypsum deposits around the world...stretching from Antarctica to the Siberian Steeps. Few are mined for anything other than industrial purposes but some collector specimens seem to be collected at a high percentage of them. Though the crystals are colorless to white, many deposits will have mineral associations that can color gypsum in an assortment of shades depending on what the associated minerals are. Mindat.org has a large gallery of gypsum photos from almost 100 locations that show several different colors. Massive forms (lapidary rough) of gypsum can also have a lot of color variation, probably more so than that of crystals. I do not know and can not find a list of commercial gypsum "lapidary material" locations, but If such a list exists it would most likely be a long one.
Thanks for asking!!
