Epidote with Quartz

Think Green Monster Mountain, think Epidote!  This classic locality on Prince of Wales Island in Alaska, USA, is host to over twenty mineral species, but is famous among collectors for its world-class Epidote crystals.  Epidote is a calcium aluminium iron sorosilicate and at the Green Monster Mountain locality occur in a skarn.  Skarns are metamorphic deposits, usually rich in calcium-magnesium-iron-manganese-aluminium silicate minerals.  This splendid miniature is dominated by a chunky, double terminated dark bottle-green Epidote crystal measuring 4.3 x 2.8 x 1.6 cm with mirror-like prism faces and broad flat pinacoid terminations displaying chevroned growth patterns.  Much smaller acicular Epidote crystals of the same colour form clusters across some of the prism faces together with colourless acicular Quartz crystals.  This is a gorgeous example of Epidote from the superbly named Green Monster Mountain, a monster welcome in my mineral collection any time! This specimen is from the Dr Josef Clemente Collection.