We recently obtained a handful of choice, larger sized petrified palm slabs from Indonesia from the Beck family. My favorite among them is this marvelous, visually striking specimen! We've previously offered palm specimens from Texas, Lousiana, Wyoming and even Myanmar, but it has been several years since we've had a connection for big Indonesian petrified palms! Over the years we have seen several choice petrified tropical hardwoods available from this forest, but this is one of the better shaped palm logs we've seen from this island nation and amazingly enough the color pattern is similar to the black hearted palm wood found in Texas! The stone polished well because it's highly silicified, and the center has several fortification agate veins that formed in natural desiccation splits of the log. The stone also reveals pyrite/marcasite (a gold metallic mineral) in several areas - they look like metalic golden snowflakes in the stone! This slab was cut many years ago and while petrified wood from Indonesia is notorious for containing minerals that grow crystals out of the polished surface as they combine with air and moisture over time, this one remains almost entirely smooth and perfect with only a small number of the metallic inclusions exhibiting any pitting. It features more color variety than most palm anywhere, including Indonesia. Don't miss a chance at a large fossil palm slab with a world class polish!
If you're an established petrfied wood collector than you have almost certainly purchased pieces from Bob and Dan Beck, either directly or through the rockshops they supplied. They have been fixtures at Quartzite for decades and Dan was also regularly set up at the Tucson and Denver shows. Bob Beck began his Oregon rockhounding career about the time I was born, back when Kennedy was still President! Like most rockhounds, he began casually and his first piece of equipment was a rock tumbler that he'd bought for his daughter. He soon found he loved it more than she did. He followed the passion and by the time his son Dan was in high school, Bob already had a small commercial operation producing lapidary art and jewelry pieces. His son was quickly enlisted in the nascent family business where the bug also took hold. When Bob decided to pursue lapidary full time, Dan said he'd help for a year to get it going. That year stretched to 45 and the family became one of the great anchors of Pacific Northwest petrified wood lapidary artists. It's hard to say for certain, but my guess is that these guys made more petrified wood bookends over the years than all of the other Pacific Northwest lapidary studios combined! Dan kept the business going on his own in more recent years as his dad's health and age limited his participation, but he recently retired from the business himself. Like most of the old breed rockhounds, they were some of the nicest and sincerest people you could hope to meet or trade with. I've purchased the bulk of his inventory including tons of rough raw material and a few boxes of premium finished pieces as well as several others in various stages of production. This piece is one that Dan produced and as you'll see, the quality of his work is every bit as good as those we produce here at Sticks in Stones Lapidary. Dan is the only lapidary I know that appears to be as completely, even obsessively focused on perfect finishes as I am. His shop utilized the same processes in the same steps that I use in my own shop. I can honestly say that there is nothing in my skill set that would make this specimen any better than if I'd started with it from scratch myself. It's a truly perfect mirror finish that just glistens to help make this fantastic specimen all it should be!
This nice specimen represents a complete, full round cut from the center of a good sized petrified palm trunk. The petrified wood from Indonesia is quite different from those I find here in the Pacific Northwest and as my own interests gravitate towards variety in species as much as locations you can imagine how exciting it is to be able to expand my collection in new dimensions! I hope you'll take this chance to do the same and obtain one of these nice museum sized slabs for your own collection! It takes a fantastic polish which really brings out every detail in the finely patterned cell structure which is easily visible to the naked eye. Palmoxolon (petrified palm) is readily identifiable from the unique spotted wood grain that looks like a bundle of spaghetti cut in cross section. This would make a wonderful start or addition to any petrified wood collection! Indonesian petrified wood often has minerals like marcasite ( a gold colored metallic mineral crystal) that are visible in the cut and polished face. Some of these minerals (not all) will react with air and the moisture in it over time to actually cause the crystals to grow. This can manifest itself as either a dust or, in some cases, larger crystal eruptions on the surface. It happens slowly if it happens at all and the good news is that this slab was cut years ago so it is unlikely to develop anything new, but it's always possible with Indonesian wood and something to be aware of as you maintain this collector piece. Any dusty is easily dealt with by wiping with a dry or even slightly dampened rag. If a larger crystal starts to grow my preference is to leave it alone or risk introducing a pock market or divot on the surface if you try to scrape it away. This round is complete, was sliced from the center of a log, and has some of the best color diversity you'll see in a palm. The polish is world class - just what you've come to expect when you buy from Sticks-in-Stones Lapidary! Don't pay too much for too little - only our shop can deliver the best polish you'll ever see on truly museum grade petrified wood and agates on every piece we sell! This piece measures about 16 3/8" x 12" across the polished face and is roughly 0.76" thick. Weight is 9.68 lbs. Stands sold separately.Sticks-in-Stones Lapidary is happily providing USPS & UPS shipping to greatly reduce shipping charges on large rock orders. We will combine all of your purchases from our shop to bring you the greatest possible value in fine Lapidary & stone collectibles!