"B" is the letter for today's subject

Welcome to the Blogging A to Z Challenge.  The idea behind this challenge is to blog for 30 days with Sundays off and using the letters of the alphabet as the inspiration for your subject.  For instance on day one of the challenge you blog about something that starts with the letter “A”.  Day two you blog about something that starts with the letter “B”, etc. until you get to the end of April and the letter “Z”.   

I am a jewelry designer and maker and I chose the subject of gemstones and related subjects.  Hopefully I will be able to come up with 26 related topics from “A” to “Z”.  Right now I have a couple of letters that I still need to get a topic for.

Today’s topic starts with the letter “B”.  Beryl is the simple name for beryllium aluminium cyclosilicate.  It is composed of hexagonal crystals which may be very small or several meters in size.  Pure beryl is colorless but colors are due to impurities and can be green, blue, yellow, red and white. 

Beryl can be found in granitic pegmatites but also can be found in the Ural Mountains in mica schists and in limestone in Colombia.  Beryl can also be found in Brazil, South Africa and the United States.  New England has produced some of the largest stones found including one stone that measured 18.0 by 3.9 ft with a weight of 18 metric tons.  It is also the state mineral of New Hampshire.  The largest known naturally occurring crystal was from Madagascar weighing in at 380,000 kilos. 

Aquamarine is a variety of beryl and was the subject on April 1.  Emerald is another type of beryl famous for its green color.  Beryl can also range in color from pale yellow to brilliant gold which would include heliodor as a greenish-yellow shade.  Moganite is a pinkish beryl.

Beryl, Aquamarine, and Heliodor

Other beryl stones will be discussed on the appropriate letter day so be sure to come back and visit to see what other stones I will be talking about.

Thanks for stopping by and please come back to see what the letter "C" will be about.