Tourmaline (var Fluor-elbaite)

A crystal section of fluor-elbaite tourmaline, displaying a rich mix of greens and pink. This specimen comes from one of the only places in Canada to produce such crystals, the Leduc Mine in Quebec. The crystals form within a lithium-enriched granitic pegmatite. They are very hard to break out of the quartz host-matrix and so generally don't have terminations and almost always come out in split sections. Perhaps this is for the best as the exterior coating is a very dark green, almost black. Having the crystals split in this way allows us to see the colourful and glassy interior of the precious stone. This one displays the pink core quite well!