Flint Hunting

[IsaacTheKnapper]

Anyone know where to find flint/chert in Western Virginia??? If so, PM me! Also PM me if you have any general flint hunting tips! Thanks for your time!

[midas]

Hi Isaac,Welcome to the forum n my :campfire:
Sorry been in UK,Don't know your areea!But sure some of our members will.atb.M

[David_JAFO]

hello,
:welcome: to the NBC. I'm going to be drummed out of the NBC for this :oops: try http://bushcraftusa.com/forum/forum.php
Good luck with your search.
Regards
David

[IsaacTheKnapper]

Drummed out for what?

[midas]

Drummed out for what?

Don't worry Isaac,He's joking!!!
Being faceious !!Re recommending/mentioning another "site".etc.lol.

I don't think we'll take him out n shoot,him!!?

[midas]

Drummed out for what?

Don't worry Isaac,He's joking!!!
Being faceious !!Re recommending/mentioning another "site".etc.lol.

I don't think we'll take David out n shoot,him!!?We look after our "OLD" soldiers.!!lol
He's also on the usa site too!

[OakAshandThorn]

Hey Isaac :). As far as I know, you probably won't find flint of any sort in the US - it's all in Europe. You might be able to find chert, which is the closest thing we have to flint. Chert quality can vary state to state. Arguably the best comes from Oklahoma and Texas.
I do know that the Natives in my area used quartz and quartzite mainly for stone tool making, and both can be used like flint to strike sparks from a piece of steel. From personal experience, I can tell you that quartz won't always fracture the way you want to, especially if it has small cracks in the stone. Quartzite seems to me a better material, but dang that stuff can be tough as nails to fracture. It isn't always stubborn, though there are times I wished I had Mjöllnir in my hand :p. That said, the best places I've found for sourcing quartz and quartzite are streams, rocky trails, and sandy soil on a hill side eroded by water run-off. Sometimes you'll come across large crystalline quartz nodules embedded in boulders - these you have to knock/break off with another rock, preferably a chunk of granite.
If you want, I can send you a batch of red quartzite and white quartz nodules if you can't find any ;).

[DuxDawg]

Hey Isaac :). As far as I know, you probably won't find flint of any sort in the US - it's all in Europe. You might be able to find chert, which is the closest thing we have to flint. Chert quality can vary state to state. Arguably the best comes from Oklahoma and Texas.

Flints, Cherts, Chalcedonies and Quartzes can be found in most States here in America though the types, quality and abundance vary greatly. Texas Flints are hands down the best I have worked with so far. Connecticut has the second best Flint in the world - only English Flint is superior.

With a screen name of "IsaacTheKnapper" it seems likely that he is looking more for knappable stone than for rocks to use with F&S (Flint and Steel). If that is the case, I suggest buying it. While I have not stomped around in W VA, my travels in KY and TN as well as what I have read lead me to believe that the vast majority of knappable stone in the Appalacians has already been used up. The bottoms of glass bottles and "Jonstone" (porcelain from sinks and toilets) are popular knappable materials that can be found everywhere, usually for free.

If looking for rocks to be used with F&S, while technically Flint is a specific type of rock, the term "flint" is commonly applied to any rock in the Quartz, Chalcedony, Chert and/or Flint family. Any substance harder than the striker (60 HRC or higher) with a sharp edge will work in place of flint. Such as a carbide sharpener as the "flint", though this tends to nick the edge up quite a bit. The rocks I've used successfully as the "flint" component of F&S include Buffalo River Chert, Burlington Chert, Dolomite, Galena Chert, Granite, Keokuk Burlington, Lake Superior Agate, Jasper, Onyx, Texas Georgetown Blue Flint, Quartz, Sandstone, and many many other rocks I have not yet identified. I have used rocks gathered in CO, FL, GA, IA, IL, KS, KY, MN, MO, TN and WI.


I do know that the Natives in my area used quartz and quartzite mainly for stone tool making, and both can be used like flint to strike sparks from a piece of steel. From personal experience, I can tell you that quartz won't always fracture the way you want to, especially if it has small cracks in the stone. Quartzite seems to me a better material, but dang that stuff can be tough as nails to fracture. It isn't always stubborn, though there are times I wished I had Mjöllnir in my hand :p.

Absolutely. In my experience quartzes are usually tough to fracture and when they do, they crumble or crack in unexpected ways. Flints and Cherts have usually, though not always, behaved much more predictably. When I get a stable sharp edge on quartz it tends to last longer and yield the best sparks.


That said, the best places I've found for sourcing quartz and quartzite are streams, rocky trails, and sandy soil on a hill side eroded by water run-off. Sometimes you'll come across large crystalline quartz nodules embedded in boulders - these you have to knock/break off with another rock, preferably a chunk of granite.

Spot on about where you are most likely to find "flint". Also farm fields in Spring and Fall when they have been recently tilled or disced. Look for glassy (Flints), sparkly (Quartzes and Quartzites), white (chalky cortex on Flints and Cherts, also many Cherts are white or off-white) and, the most conclusive feature of a good rock, conchoidial fractures.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithic_reduction

It may sound like a non-answer, but getting a striker and trying it on rocks really is the best way to learn to identify suitable rocks in the field, whether for knapping or for use with F&S.

Another way to identify "flint" is by keeping in mind an interesting phenomenon with quartzes which is called by many names. Sparks or flashes of light are emmitted when two rocks with high quartz content (every member of the Quartz/Chalcedony/Chert/Flint family) are struck or rubbed against each other. This is the same principle piezo electric lighters work on. (No, you cannot ignite tinder with these sparks.) One useful application of this principle is identifying "flint" in the dark. Simply strike or rub any unknown rock against a rock that is known to be in the Quartz/Chalcedony/Chert/Flint family. If you see sparks, the unknown rock is now known to be in the same family.

http://www.classicgems.net/info_Triboluminescence.htm#information
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triboluminescence
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piezoluminescence
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mechanoluminescence

[OakAshandThorn]

Uh....how are you defining "flint"? - the geological structure here isn't right for it. The most you'd find are bits of flint from historical sites dating to the colonial times for muskets.
I always thought flint was a sedimentary stone with a micro-crystalline quartz structure, forming in nodules embedded in chalk or limestone. :confused2:

[DuxDawg]

Now you're going to force me to put my thinking cap on! Years ago when I was researching how and where to find flint I remember noting that it was asserted that the 2nd best Flint in the world was to be found in a certain part of Connecticut. Believe it was in the SE or SW part of CT. If I stumble upon that site again, I'll try to remember to post a link to it here.

On a side note, some of the geology and rock hound maps show a lot of various types of pyrites in CT. Have you found any? Used it with Percussion Fire (F&S)?

I leave the defining of rocks to the others. If they call it Flint, that works for me. In my previous post I made the working distinction between Flint (Note: capitalization) and "flint" (note: quotes). Flint is one of many types of rocks that are used for knapping. Flint and "flint" are both used for F&S. To me, "flint" is anything that yields sparks when struck by a high carbon striker or pyrite. Thus any rock harder than 58 HRC, carbide steel, etc qualifies as "flint". Whatever it takes to generate sparks that can form an ember in char or NUTs. Since most of the types of rock that I am aware of outside of the Quartz/Chalcedony/Chert/Flint family are softer than 58 HRC, those within this family are the ones I concentrate on.

When I speak about that family I am saying that any type of Quartz, any type of Chalcedony, etc will work for F&S. I'm not a geologist however IIRC, all in this family are microcrystalline (cryptocrystalline?) quartzes (quartzites?). Some say that there are no true Flints in North America. Not all of these agree that Georgetown Blue Flint in TX is a true Flint and the only exception. These people usually assert that all Flints in NA are actually Cherts. Flint is a specific subset of Chert, thus while all Flints are Cherts, not all Cherts are Flints. On the other hand, there are those who assert that there are Flint deposits in NA. I do not yet know enough to make an assertion about this. I just go with the flow and call certain rocks Flint or "flint" as seems appropriate. Much less egregious than calling ferros flints IMHO.

Most of the "flint" (including true Flints (if any) and Cherts) that I find here in the MidWest are smaller than my fist. Darn those glaciers! lol. By comparison, down South there are amazing deposits of sizeable knappable stone. The greater Austin, TX region has the best Flint that I have worked with so far. Southern MO and eastern KS have the second best that I have worked with. Everywhere else (except for the FL and GA rocks which I received in trade and therefore don't know much about the rocks in those States) has had mostly fist sized or smaller, frost fractured rocks, much of which were quartzes (quartz, granite, dolomite, etc) rather than Flint or Chert. Tough going for knapping, plenty that work with F&S.

The first link shows several locations that claim to have Flint deposits in CT. The other links may be useful to you.

http://www.mindat.org/min-6676.html
http://www.micromountersofnewengland.org/pdfs/Min-Loc1.pdf
http://geology.com/rocks/flint.shtml
http://geology.com/rocks/chert.shtml

Hope this helps. Thank you for your polite replies, much appreciated.

[Dreward]

Are there any Forgotten Trails that seem to be Marked by unusual clusters of Stones ?....This would suggest the Ancient Way of Navigating by Waymarks Denoted by Stones....There are Many Stone Circles that lead to Avebury and Stonehenge....where Flint is found in Abundance...

[OakAshandThorn]

OK, I see...those flint deposits are actually remnants of imports from England for making talcum powder. The remaining nodules were dumped into the harbour. Scattered bits and pieces could also be the "waste" of colonial knappers for muskets, as I mentioned before. I do know for a fact that Putnam Park in Redding has such remains, though of course any digging or artifact collecting is prohibited.
A friend of mine, a local geologist who specialises in the northeast, confirmed my suspicion. No flint embedded here :(. This also explains why most Native American artifacts (arrowheads mostly, occasionally knives) found in this area are made from quartz or quartzite. Chert would've been rare, though some tribes probably traded with neighbours in the south and north in Canada for chert, however.
BTW, you're right in that there are many definitions for "flint" ;). I've always used the word to describe the 'dark chert' which forms in chalk and limestone bedrock, though lots of folks use the word to describe almost any stone that can strike sparks from a piece of carbon steel (so a sharp bit of quartzite could be a "flint", as could some chert, agate, etc.).
Some more research is in order, perhaps a trip the local university to find out more - thanks for the "food-for-thought" :).

[Dreward]

If your going to research then Old Water Courses may be something to Cross-Reference with....One of the Essentials of Life....Water....

[DuxDawg]

Awesome OA&T. I'm sad for your lack of Flint yet happy to have a better understanding of the sites I've been reading. Many thanks!

[OakAshandThorn]

Awesome OA&T. I'm sad for your lack of Flint yet happy to have a better understanding of the sites I've been reading. Many thanks!
To us in the northeast, flint is like gold ;). No other stone is as predictable and easy to fracture. However, this has given me the chance to experiment with the same stones the Natives here once made use of...it's quite an interesting and humbling connection, to hold in your hand the same material they used on a regular basis, and shape it into a useful tool just as they did :).
I know Jack Mountain Bushcraft School up in Maine uses imported flint from Europe for stone tool classes, but it would be interesting if they also focused on locally available stones.