dobbino's photos
Nature's textures iii - Mica
Posted by dobbino (Cape Town, South Africa) on 27 March 2009 in Plant & Nature.
This stone is from the "Mica family" - a group of sheet silicates that can be parted into flexible or brittle sheets. They have a layered or "platy" texture. Mica minerals make some rocks sparkle, because light is reflected on their flat surfaces. This is where the mineral breaks along its plane of cleavage (learned today that cleavage has another meaning lol!). They break so easily along the cleavages that some crystals have broken into many thin layers that look like the pages of a little book. Colonial Americans used the “pages” of large mica crystals as glass for windows.
Information courtesy of many different websites!
This is the final in the "Nature's textures" series. I wish you all a wonderful weekend. Now to find something to post for next week...
All comments, and especially constructive criticism is truly appreciated. Thank you for taking the time.
All images © Rob Minter, and licensed in terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 South Africa License
Canon EOS 40D
1/2000 second
F/5.6
ISO 200
85 mm