Customer Reviews

Minerals (Barron's Nature Guide)

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This field guide to mineral deposits is one of the best I have used. It is easy to use and it provides clear and easy identification of minerals. With over 500 color photos, the book is arranged by color streak and includes the degree of hardness, density, streak description, color, chemical formula, cleavage, crystal form, tenacity and crystal formation. Other features include a list of similar minerals and where the mineral occurs, i.e. in pegmatites. The author also gives advice on where to find minerals and the kind of equipment needed to retrieve them. Also useful is the information on how to organize a collection. The paperback format lends itself to tossing the book into a backpack for easy reference when mineral "hunting" in the field. This is a "must have" for any adventurer's personal library.

I use this book as one of several rock and mineral field guides in a lab exercise in which college students enrolled in a physical geography class have to identify 15 different minerals. The lab groups that use this guide are always the first to complete the lab successfully. Unlike the Peterson's Guide and some others, this guidebook doesn't require you to carry a chemistry lab in your back pocket to successfully identify common minerals. Instead it is organized around the most basic and easily done field test techniques: streak color and hardness. Would be nice if it had a rock section in it as well.