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Red Chabazite – November 2019

This is the first of two Nova Scotia posts – I’ve added some excellent Wasson’s Bluff specimens in this Red Chabazite Update (click here).

In one relatively small zone at Wasson’s Bluff, the chabazite crystals are a particular dark red hue – more intense and lighter than a brown, and most are a bit deeper and darker than a brick red or deep orange. This zone has produced sporadically over history. Most often, days of very hard work in this area yield absolutely nothing, but a few isolated finds in recent years have produced a small number of excellent pieces – these specimens are from those finds. There have been no finds from this zone since 2017. The zone of interest is largely now gone and there has been no sign of continuing pockets or mineralization.

In historic times, these particular deep-coloured chabazites from Wasson’s Bluff were known as “acadialite”, named for Acadia (which is the English for L’Acadie, the colonial-era name for this part of Canada). The name “acadialite” is sometimes still seen on older collection labels, sometimes as a species name and sometimes as a varietal name. Under current nomenclature, these specimens are known as chabazite, with “acadialite” now considered a historical synonym.

Chabazite, Wasson’s Bluff, Cumberland Co., Nova Scotia, Canada – 5.2 cm