Locality: Horne Quarry, Red Hill, Moultonborough, NH
Specimen Size: 2 cm field of view. Weathered tan-colored pits of nepheline to 1 mm deep in field of white feldspar. Pit visibility enhanced by light source from lower left.
Field Collected: Tom Mortimer
Catalog No.: 1842
Notes: A good example of the differential weathering of nepheline in feldspar.
Locality: Red Hill, Moultonborough, NH
Specimen Size: 4.5 cm specimen of tan weathering nepheline in white feldspar matrix.
Field Collected: Tom Mortimer
Catalog No.: 1842
Notes: The nepheline at Red Hill is most easily spotted when on the surface of the nepheline-syenite rock, where it is seen in the weathered pits as shown here. The minor black mineral is hastingsite. Photo taken in natural sunlight.
Locality: Red Hill, Moultonboro, NH
Specimen Size: 1.0 cm field of view
Field Collected: Tom Mortimer October, 2004.
Catalog No.: e.g. 2174
Notes: Red Hill nepheline can be difficult to spot by the untrained eye. Red Hill hand samples appear as a mass of off-white and pale-gray minerals, some with the black amphibole hastingsite. LW UV easily distinguishes the fluorescent sodalite from the co-mingled feldspar and nepheline. All three of these minerals are present in this view. Thye annotated view identifies the three species. The nepheline has a glassy luster and is slightly pale-brownish.
The feldspar has been describes as "mesoperthitic". The mesoperthite happens when a solid solution of K and Na feldspars "unmixes" during slow cooling, and separates out the Na-rich feldspar (the albite) as little blebs or streaks within the body of the K-rich feldspar (usually orthoclase or microcline).
Locality: Red Hill, Moultonboro, NH
Specimen Size: Hexagonal crystal, 0.36 mm length
Field Collected: Tom Mortimer October, 2004.
Catalog No.: u492
Notes: The crystal was revealed from inside a broken hastingsite. A candidate nepheline crystal. Nepheline crystals are hexagonal.