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 “Half-assed!”

“What do you mean?”

“Perfunctory. Desultory. Slap-dash.”

“Slapdash?”

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“Your choice of equipment,” he said, gesturing at my bucket and stubby shovel. “No thought, no purpose, and frankly no function. You might as well bring a beach towel. That shovel looks like it came  from Dollarama, the kind sold with a plastic rake in a kid’s sandcastle set. “I use this shovel because it’s short and fits in my backpack,” I protested. “I’ve been at this for years. My setup works. Bottom line: I find good crystals.”

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“You do,” he admitted. “But good crystals are about as good as it’s gonna get for you, and             with your sad little kit, the most likely scenario is mediocre. I get great crystals.” His chest puffed out and his eyes gleamed with challenge – check out my cabinet – he had a point. Outdo him? Nearly impossible. Mark consistently pulls museum-quality pieces. I’m still trying to decode the secret recipe — a mix of skill, discipline, effort and a strange kind of tool-based alchemy.  

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I settled into my chosen fissure and spent the day hacking through roots, widening my pit, and sweating into the dust. Small apatites turned up, a broken titanite shard, and a heavy lump I figured was mildly radioactive. Mark squatted at the edge of my trench, smirking as he rolled an immaculate transparent feldspar through his fingers. A small bag of his finds — the kind I almost never see — rested beside him.

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“This spot will pay off deeper down,” I assured him.

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“Think you’ll ever get there?” He wasn’t wrong. With my blunt, undersized tools, I was removing soil at one-third his pace. And in our territory, the real treasures usually don’t show until four feet deep.

 

 “We’ve got guests coming next weekend,” he said. “You can’t greet them with this half-ass approach.

 

We’re Dark Star — we lead by example. Your kit makes us look unprofessional.”

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“I’ve got a bucket, a shovel, a chisel, and a hammer. What more do you need?”

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“Your problem is you’re trying to go cheap and portable. That’s fine for scouting new ground, not for digging proven crystal veins. Pick tools suited to the work.”

Left: crowbars I grumbled something unintelligible.

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The following weekend, Mark arrived with a gift: a mini Fiskars pick. 

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“Let this be the start of your evolution".

 

"Evolution?"

 

"From caveman to proper rockhound."

 

Good tools are part of the formula.”

 

Not a moment too soon — my Home Depot mini-shovel had just split. Wooden handles do not belong at extraction sites, and the    bargain-bin shovel before that had bent within fifteen minutes. Fiskars, on the other hand, comes with a lifetime guarantee. Take your broken shovel if you ever find a way to break it, slap it down on the counter and they’ll hand you a new one right there and then. It’s Finland’s contribution to rugged, unbreakable design.

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That little pick quickly became my prized implement — perfect for roots, perfect as a wedge, perfect everywhere. But out of habit (and cheapness), I still hauled my motley heap of dull, half-broken tools each time.

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Under Mark’s guidance — our unofficial Chief Extraction Officer — we  began reinvesting in proper gear: Fiskars steel-shaft shovels, 10- and 5-pound sledges, chisels from one to four feet long, serious crowbars. A real supply chain.

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I decided to “get ahead” and bought my own crowbar — a five-foot monster I imagined was indestructible.

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 “You’re screwed,” Mark noted as soon as I pulled it from the car. “That thing will bend the minute you try to use it. Cheap Chinese steel. You need North American or Finnish metal. I got mine off my dad 30 years ago – it’s the only quality for us.

 

He wasn’t wrong. I put my frustration into a mighty heave  and as predicted, I felt the bar begin to soften and warp. It reminded me of warm taffy in a sugar shack. Surreptitiously I tried to set it down before he noticed. But he noticed and like a pumpkin gashed on Devil’s night a  crafty grin appeared beneath his mirrored  glasses..

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“I told you!” he roared triumphantly. “Princess Auto — only place worth buying crowbars these days In fact it’s one of the few places that you can buy quality tools at all! We gotta stop there on the way home. I believe there’s a place in Barry.

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I’d say a 2 foot crowbar is pretty useless for rockhounding. You need at least 5-6 feet of bar for any serious work. Two 6 foot crowbars employed by determined rockhounds can move boulders of over 1000 pounds and the “pinch point” variety can also be inserted into narrow fissures and used to widen them and expose crystals that may and often do grow in such pockets. Ask us how we broke into a nearby tremolite exposure. Initially it was just a flat rock face and with the judicious use of crowbars we walked away with a kings ransom of beautiful deep green gem tremolite. Mark just recently got a 3 foot bar with a rolling head (an over-hook at one end). It works with incredible efficiency to open a crack.

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Tool selection, I learned, boils down to three rules:
1) Choose the right tool.

2) Choose the right size.

3) Choose the right quality.

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At first, I thought a shovel, hammer, and chisel were enough. But with experience, I learned the value of specialized tools — especially in awkward crystal pockets. For example, I now carry a cheap plastic shovel from the dollar store specifically to avoid scratching crystals (yeah – really). My heavy digging shovels are Fiskars — unbreakable and efficient. The little garden shovels, also Fiskars, vary in scoop depth: shallow for tight fissures, deep for moving soil fast.

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Shovels do most of the early excavation. But once you approach crystal level, mud-covered cobbles start appearing — and those clods often hide treasures. Many rockhounds miss spectacular crystals simply because they don’t brush their finds. At Hubbert’s Hole, a 40-foot trench yielded over 200 titanites, and at least half were discovered later on the tailings pile because early diggers didn’t clean their “nothing rocks".   

 

Brush types matter too. Long-bristle brushes are best for clearing hollows without scratching glossy crystal surfaces — I use my bristle brush almost as much as my shovel.

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Then there’s the sieve. Some rockhounds work in pairs — one  digging, one sifting — which can be incredibly productive, especially in pocket-rich terrain. Forget pasta strainers: the best sieve I’ve seen was a wire mesh nailed to a wooden frame, abandoned at our site by some anonymous genius – thanks whoever, everyone uses it.

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Our south claim is full of narrow pockets that trap crystals where fingers can barely reach. For that, a poker — a simple rod with a handle — is essential. It feels through soil without carving up your knuckles or tearing fingernails. Use it delicately. I gingerly poke until I feel a surface and then it’s down to fingers. Kevlar gloves help, though bare fingers remain unmatched when delicacy counts. Motocross gloves also protect the knuckles when working in narrow six-inch fissures. See how long it takes your bare knuckles to loose their skin and become a bloody mess.

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How often have I approached a solid rock excavation with a tiny hammer and several hours later quit as my hands are nothing but peeling skin and blisters. Blisters tell their own story: usually that someone brought a 4-pound hammer to do a 10-pound hammer’s work. I once hammered uselessly for hours at Fissure City, then borrowed Mark’s 10-pound sledge and broke through in minutes.

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The iconic Estwing rock hammer? I bought one years ago. They are useless for extraction - too delicate. Several have been abandoned around our claim by disappointed newcomers. The hammer is not enough to make an impact and the pick end is soft and easily blunted by use in prying in which I often think I’m going to break the hammer. With the Estwing and a Tilley hat you look the part, but that’s about it. The hammer won’t help you find crystals or extract them.

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Handle types on sledges matter too. Fiberglass handles concentrate weight  at the head and cushion vibration, but can break with an over-swing. Wilton hammers, with steel-core handles, are nearly unbreakable but heavier. Even sledge technique affects efficiency — sliding your grip back mid-swing generates more head-speed. With a flattened striking face a sledge transfers kinetic force to a surface. The head of a sledge might taper on its back end (engineers hammer) and this concentrates the force to a specific spot on the strike face. Sometimes this works better for breaking the upper layers of a large calcite.

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Chisels come in multiple lengths, and in hard rock, tungsten-carbide-tipped chisels are essential for keeping a sharp edge. The 3-foot chisel is popular for working deep cracks, though we’re now seeking safer methods than the classic “one holds, one hammers” technique.

 

Then Brian introduced us to “crane technology” — block-and-tackle  systems that can move enormous boulders with ease. But big moves introduce big risks. Once, a boulder didn’t hit the man moving it — a nearby tree did, after the boulder knocked it down. Thankfully, only a  glancing blow. Still, inspired by Brian, Dark Star bought its own block and tackle for forty bucks. The rope wears out within the year, but the possibilities are incredible. It’s a new and highly effective approach to rochhounding where the boulders exceed your ability to move them.

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So in summary, crystal hunting isn’t just about effort. It’s about  choosing the right tools, understanding the  principles of extraction, and above all, staying safe. Wear appropriate PPE. Think before you swing.

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The preceding information covered some basic equipment to be used in amateur extraction. Going pro means generators, drills and jack hammers, but used judiciously the afore mentioned hand tools are highly effective and in no short  amount of time some serious excavation can be accomplished. This coming spring we will be back at our assessment monstrosity (were told it will take at least 5 years), but if this information helps in any way we are pleased to have been of service. Remember, its not always just the effort that counts. Picking the appropriate tools and also understanding the arcane principles of crystal hunting (we provide education to our guests) will take you a long way in the right direction. But all is for nothing if you get hurt so consider your actions carefully and wear the appropriate PPE.

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​So in conclusion, you’ll never see high class specimens unless you invest in the proper equipment.

When it comes to equipment, don’t be half-assed. Poor choices lead to poor yields, and our goal is to have you be successful. If you can’t afford it all, Dark star has some of the bigger equipment on site for our client’s use (good shovels, chisels and sieves) – just ask.