May 2005 Newsletter
Ramblings of a rockdealer who sits on the other side of the world. I pondered the following thought just this morning. To become a great thinker, become a good thinker. To become a good thinker, do more thinking. This sound quite simple but it is just how life works. This month we cover the following What is happening at Kuruman? What is happening at our store Mineral of the month : Brucite The Kalahari Manganese fields Some interesting facts on platinum A great free tool that every webdesigner should install. I have one on my site. Be blessed as you read this newsletter. Gerdus

What is happening at Kuruman? I now live in Kuruman at the heart of the Kalahari Manganese fields. There are several mines in the close vicinity that are all specimen producing mines. So we have access to these when they come out. Many people ask me if it was a good move. Yes I believe it was. Here are my reasons. 1. If you live 500+ km away from any site you struggle to get the top specimens when they surface. 2. The cost of travelling takes a lot of your profit.  3. You can pick and choose when the stock gets to you.  4. Dealers get to know you for providing good quality all the time.  The negative aspects here are the infrequency of a good find. So how do we deal with this. We buy up large quantities when something good comes up. I recently sold 85 flats of minerals to a dealer who wanted stock. This is the only way you get the best stuff is if you become the most aggressive buyer. The risk is when you do not get a buyer for the lesser goods. You may run out of cash. The other negative aspect of Kuruman is the slowness of the postal service. Parcels travel from here to Cape Town. They then go on a commercial flight to Johannesburg and then they leave the country. We have discovered that parcels take a week longer to get to our customers from here. You will get your specimens, it might just take longer. At Hartbeespoort we were close to the hub. OK so what has surfaced. 1. Sugilite is scarce, real scarce. I did not get much because there are other dealers who only specialize in sugilite and who has the advantage on the buying side. 2. Sturmanite in cm large crystals on black manganese. They look like small six sided wheels. Very gemmy, excellent luster. I love this stuff. Bought a lot of it and sold a lot of it. I still have some better specimens that I will be taking to France next month. Make an appointment with me if you want to see these. 2. Brucite. Cute blue and golden spheres with good luster. Looks like precious pearls. These are great in a collection. I had the pick of the crop. I still think that these will become classics. I am bringing some of these to France also. 3. Poldervaartite and sturmanite on breccia. I manage to get some good ones before they blasted the area. There is some gemmy poldervaartites in a fault above these and the miners were after these. They blasted and collected there so I guess we will get better poldervaartites soon. I bought some classics from Pieter de Bruyn. Some of the classic finds of yesteryear. I placed these in my own collection. These can be viewed at www.bronnrocks.com The prices are steep but remember I paid a premium for these classics. We send a box full of the finest minerals to our store at Hartbeespoort every week. The phone number there is =27(12) 2531396. Speak to Alan. We are quickly becoming known as the place to get Kalahari Manganese Field minerals. I have many local collectors who can not wait for the box to arrive. Remember that Kuruman is 600 km away from Johannesburg and that it is difficult for people to travel here so it is much easier to buy at Hartbeespoort. We are off to Namibia on Monday for specimens, I am after some real unique stuff. I will come back with some really good stuff. I will keep you posted.  Gerdus

So what is happening with my business. We have looked at our business plan and decided to do some new and exciting stuff.  1. Gerdus changed the look of the website and also the average quality of the specimens he sells on this site. We upped the requirements. If it falls in the top bracket of what is available it can be listed. Time is such a precious commodity. We all have the same amount of time and if you use it all on low quality goods we feel that we have wasted the time. Goods will thus be available on the website or for sale at our premises in Kuruman or Hartbeespoort. We have a 100% return policy, no questions asked. No reason need to be given why you have decided to return something. We will even cover the freight cost of the goods. We feel very serious about moving into the sector where a specimen purchased from us will enhance your collection and not degrade it. All items listed on this site will be without damage. Nobody should buy a damaged item for his collection. This site can be visited at www.mineralgallery.co.za 2. We started giving a lot of the better commercial quality goods to our son to sell at www.bidonrocks.com He has just paid his own airticket to join me in France at the Ste Marie Aux Mines show. We promise to write an article on this and give you our experience of this great mineral event on our return.  3. We created a website for our personal collection. This was a lot of fun and we have already photographed some of the items and listed these. We will add to this as we get time. The specimens here is in the higher bracket and we decided to make these available as well. I sold a large portion of my collection in 2004 to finance another venture. This website can be viewed at www.bronnrocks.com 4. We started packaging some of the commercial minerals and these can be seen at our shop. We will also sell these at wholesale prices to anybody interested. 5. Our monthly list will now have a much better quality mineral at prices that is great for resale. Many of the items we use to sell on the www.mineralgallery.co.za website will now only be offered on a list. 6. Have a look at our return policies on the private collection website. www.bronnrocks.com 7. Our store is also getting a face-lift. The top room will be for high end collectors. We are getting two great collections one of these days and we will have the top room ready soon. The lower section will be for the general public. 8. On the 16th of June 2005 we have our yearly sale of minerals. This will run for 4 days. On day 1 most flats will cost R 100($ 16) per flat. On day two the price drops to $ 10 per flat and day four it drops to $ 6 per flat and the last day all flats will be only $ 1.50 each. OK so what does this mean. It means that the first comers can pick the best and that the guys who come the last day will pay the lowest prices. I am sure you all know how this works. The 16th day is a holiday in South Africa. It is the day when they run the yearly Comrades marathon. This is a murdering road race for 90 km. OK enough about us. Oh yes just one last question. Would you rather shop in US$ or Euro. It makes no difference to me. I can just change it again. I need some feedback on this to change it. No feedback, no change. It is so great to communicate with you all.  AND then there is the bulkrough. We decided that we were stretching ourselves too thin and stopped doing bulkrough for a season. I did sell 60000 tons last month but it consumes too much time. Gerdus Mineral of the month    www.mineralgallery.co.za Minerals A-E Brucite Name Brucite Chemistry Mg(OH)2 Uses As a mineral specimen Color- Commonly beige or tan, seldom blue and greenish Hardness 3 Specific gravity 2.5 Crystal system: Hexagonal Accompanied by: Ettringite, Calcite Fracture Uneven Luster Vitreous Cleavage Good to indistinct. Streak White Similar to: Dolomite, Mica, Magnesite Brucite derives its name from the American mineralogist A. Bruce. Brucite occurs at Wessels and N'Chwaning I and II mines, as soft platy aggregates, usually beige, tan or cream colored, recently some sea-green and blue specimens was found at Wessels. Some display foliated rosette-like structures. Terminated, hexagonal barrel-shaped crystals are also known. It is normally found as platy masses. Brucite is often found in hydrothermal veins in serpentine, in chlorite or dolomitic schists, or in crystalline limestones as an alteration product of periclase. Brucite is currently coming out as cute round spheres in blue and golden colors. I have some of the finest available. Just contact me.

The Kalahari Manganese fields. We are grateful to Christian Weise for permitting the translation of this article from the original Lapis German text. The manganese deposits of the Kalahari manganese field are located just south of the great Kalahari Desert on the vast plains of the Northern Cape Province of South Africa (fig. 1). Despite its remoteness, the area has become an important site of pilgrimage for mineral collectors and economic geologists alike. The economic geologist is attracted by the astonishing size of the deposit, which contains more than 13 billion tons of manganese ores, corresponding to about 80 percent of the world's resources of minable manganese ore (Cairncross, Beukes, and Gutzmer 1997). The mineral collector, in contrast, is attracted by a host of spectacular and rare minerals that have been recovered from the manganese ore, including many of the world's finest specimens of rhodochrosite, hematite, hausmannite, sturmanite, and other species. Location The Kalahari manganese field is located approximately 60 kilometers northwest of Kuruman, a small but beautiful town and one of the few economic centers of the Northern Cape Province. Kuruman is also the preferred home for some of the miners who work in the manganese mines, but most tend to live in the mine villages of Hotazel and Black Rock. These were established by SAMANCOR (South African Manganese Corporation) and ASSMANG (Associated Manganese Mines of South Africa) respectively, the two major mining companies exploiting the manganese field in the immediate vicinity. Thus, manganese mining has brought money and employment into the region, where cattle and sheep farming are the only other important sources of income. This has resulted in lasting development of modern infrastructures and services to the people of this part of the province. The climate in this southernmost part of the Kalahari Desert is semiarid and distinctly continental, with temperatures that range from +45 [degrees] C during hot summer days (December to March) to winter night temperatures that can be well below -10 [degrees] C (May to August). The name of one of the miners' villages -- Hotazel, a contraction of "hot as hell" -- is self-explanatory. Rain is scarce (less than 300 mm per year) and often restricted to violent thunderstorms that pass quickly across the landscape and cause ephemeral rivers to rise rapidly, leading to devastating flash floods. The landscape of the southernmost Kalahari Desert is that of a sand-covered inland plateau, with an average elevation of 1,100 meters above sea level. Rising above this plain are isolated, north-south-striking chains of rugged hills composed of rocks that are more resistant to erosion. The desert sand supports a meager vegetation of low thornbushes, grass, and isolated acacia trees. Through this cover of windblown desert sands and calcrete only one single natural outcrop alludes to the wealth of manganese ore hidden below, a hill aptly called Black Rock that rises less than 100 meters above the plain in the northernmost part of the Kalahari manganese field. It was this outcrop that was described for the first time by Rogers in 1907, erroneously identified as an outcrop of ferruginous manganese ores of only minor economic importance. It wasn't until the 1940s, during an intensive exploration campaign in the area surrounding Black Rock, that the giant manganese ore resources of the Kalahari were discovered. Today, the Kalahari manganese field supplies more than 20 percent of the world's requirements of manganese ore for the production of steel. Four mines are currently in production, namely, the Mamatwan open-pit mine (the largest manganese mine in the world) and three underground operations: Gloria, N'Chwaning II, and Wessels. These four mines are operated by the two South African mining companies already mentioned: ASSMANG and SAMANCOR.

Some interesting facts on platinum
Platinum Platinum is a young metal: the first mention of it occurred in 1741 when it was referred to as a :platina del Pinto" coming in grains and nuggets from New Granada, now Columbia. Platina is a diminutive of Plata, Spanish for silver, the name being undoubtly given to the metal in allusion to its silver color. Rio di Pinto is the name of the stream, a tributory of the San Juan, in whose gravels it was found as a placer mineral. In nature, platinum is never pure but is alloyed with other minerals of the platinum group and contains small amounts of gold, nickel and copper. Platinum which today has so many uses in the arts and sciences and is associated with objects of great value, had a lowly beginning. It was known that the specific gravity of Gold 19.3 would be lessened by the addition of any other metal and that adulteration could thus be detected. However, if platinum with a specific gravity equal to or greater than that of gold were added to gold, it could not be detected. As a result, it was reported that late in the eighteenth century the King of Spain ordered the platinum mines closed to prevent the fraudulent adulteration of gold. Although Colombia continued production, Russia almost immediately became the world's major producer, a position it held for one hundred years. For a short while Russia, unable to dispose of its newly found metal, used  it for coinage. However, as new uses for it was found, it gradually increased in valu, and by 1835 the bullion value of the metal exceeded the face value of the coins and they immediately went out of circulation. The most recent finds of native platinum have been in South Africa. In the Waterberg in 1923 and a year later in the Bushveld Igneous Complex. In 1929, Percy A Wagner in the preface to his book The platinum Deposits and Mines of South Africa made the prophetic statement:"The Transvaal, that marvelous storehouseof mineral wealth, has become of recent years, an important producer of the platinum metals. She is destined to become the world's leading producer of platinum. By 1953 this has already happened. The platinum-bearing layer now called the Merensky Reef is a thin sheet conforming to the pseudo-stratification of the enclosing rocks, and composed of norite, chromite and pyroxenite. The platinum occurs mostly as the native metal but some sperrylite, as well as chalcopyrite, pentlandite and pyrothite is present. It is from this horizon, near Rustenburg that 400,000 ounces of platinum are produced each year. From the striking mineralogical similarities among the major producing localities, it may be safely concluded that platinum genetically is associated with dark igneous rocks rich A useful free tool that I discovered on the net. When establishing a Web business, you have to be sure that your most important e-business tools are high-quality, dependable products and services.  But if you're like many new online entrepreneurs, you're probably curious about various free tools and resources you may have heard about or discovered yourself when surfing the 'Net for information. And you may be wondering if it's worth your while giving them a try.  My first word of advice on free tools and resources is this: Always be cautious. Free tools can be unreliable or come with hidden "catches," like requirements that you display certain advertisements.  However (now that I've told you the downside), there are a number of very good (and reliable!) tools and resources available on the 'Net that are FREE. And these can be excellent ways to complement your existing tools at no cost, helping you to make your site stickier and more user-friendly, make your keywords more effective, keep an eye on your competition, find potential business partners, and more...  Of course, you should still take care in the "free" world, and always be aware of what you may have to give up (like reliability) or give over (like advertising space on your site -- and potential customers). But the following tool can be effectively used to give your online business that extra edge you need to stay ahead of your competition.  -----------------------------------------------------------  1. Free link partner evaluation tool  -----------------------------------------------------------  http://download.alexa.com The Alexa toolbar is one of the most useful tools around for businesses on the 'Net. Alexa provides a free, downloadable toolbar that opens in your web browser whenever you're online.  The most useful feature is a "site info" option. When you click on this button, Alexa lays out all the details of the site you're on, including...    * The traffic ranking of the site (this is also listed right on the toolbar itself)    * A list of related links (two or three of the most popular links also appear on the toolbar)    * The number of other sites that link to the site    * The contact information of the site owner    * All site/user reviews  This is the exact information you need when you're researching high-traffic sites in your industry and considering link partnerships or joint ventures. Use this information to...    * Decide how much you're willing to pay for advertising    * Make educated decisions about the worth of a joint venture partner    * Determine the credibility and the perceived value of the site  The list of related links -- which also has its own button on the toolbar -- is an excellent way for you to find other popular or similar sites that might be good linking partners or joint venture partners.  Use this list to determine other popular sites that your target market visits -- start by looking at your own site with Alexa's toolbar, and see what related links are suggested!  The toolbar also contains a Google search option, so you can jump directly into a search without having to leave the page you're on.  If you prefer not to download the toolbar, you can still take advantage of these features right from Alexa's site:  http://www.alexa.com
UPDATES	To see what we have been up to today please visit the following page and press the updates page button. www.mineralgallery.co.za/updates-min-gallery.htm Or visit our auction site where you are sure to get some of the best deals available anywhere. We have over 50 auctions running at the moment. My son has now started listing under Rockhound. He is 16 years old. His mission is to put enough funds aside when he goes with me to France next month to buy his own stuff, so he has been raiding my stock for good money value stock for you. We just sold a few nigerites, ajoites and sugilite spheres. You can also sell your own minerals here for free. It definitely beats the high cost of e-bay at the moment. We have some fine active buyers using the site. Try it out for yourself and then give me a buzz. www.bidonrocks.com or write to me at gerdus@mineralgallery.co.za Gerdus Brönn