What a fantastic thing to hear~ Be well

Thanks for your encouragement :D

Thank you ~ glad to be of service.

I'm glad to have been of service, and hope to bring more of the like to the forefront in the coming weeks~! Keep an eye out ;)

Thanks Jonathon

Thank you for your kind words~ and i'm glad that you enjoy my flavour of funny ^_^

I'm glad to be of service Jessica~ My goal is to make getting one's foot in the door more accessible to everyone. Feel free to reach out if you've got any questions on what I talk about in any of my videos :D

Thanks very much~ I hope it is helpful.

My Pleasure Sherry ~ thank you for your kind words.

Thank you for your encouragement Shawn. Keep an eye out for more~!

Thank you so much ~ i'm glad to have been of service.

Thank you ~ keep the world peaceful :D

My pleasure to share, Vanessa. I'm glad you enjoyed.

My pleasure Louise ~ glad you enjoyed.

Thank you ~ welcome to the channel!

I'm glad it's of service to you, Angel.

Thanks Robert, glad you enjoyed it.

@@GemologyforSchmucks Had an idea, maybe If intrested have at it. I believe we are living in the cusp of gemstones. As we deplete sources, the earth could never reconstruct formations as fast we unearth them. For instance: There will never be the formations of new amber. The entire planet is on a deforestation lumber harvest rotation. The saps that would or could form amber will never be produced. Slowly many minerals will become extinct. Alexandrite is becoming more rare. It was extremely rare to begin with. There's only so many Amethyst geodes once they're gone, the earth couldn't possibly form them as fast as we harvest. That said; Any new formations from now, will ultimately be tainted by pollution. (My daughters a bio chem enviro mjr has done some core sample studies, has her name of a few.) There is a layer of human created( primarily)aluminium few other metals that now covers everything. From deepest depths of oceans, to ice caps. I got to thinking; That aluminum other metals would affect future mineralogy. Could Mt Kilimanjaro become active again? Probably. Could new formations to create Tanzanite occure? Possibly. But what affects has man created to change that minerology? We've changed minerology of most of worlds water & liquids. It makes it less likely. Poss a new variant of Tanzanite w pollutants changing its properties be formed ? It may very well be gone for ever. If we could reach millions of yrs into the future, minerals may be quite different. We could be inadvertantly changing the chemistry of upper mantle right now. Its just a theory I have. I believe humans will whiteness the extinction of many of the minerals known today. The only mineral I see being unaffected would be diamonds. You understand why I'm sure. It would take a team of ppl far smarter than I to contemplate it. You might have resources to investigate it far better. If you're intrested in what that might look like? Have at it. I'm not a gemologist, nor a geologist. Enthusiast.

@@roberttyrrell2250 certainly a fascinating notion, and i've heard of similar studies that corroborate what you're saying. There are some crystalized minerals that have been found directly to have been resultant of human pollutants. The forces of nature are indeed mighty. One other thing for you to think about is how many areas are un-mined either because of government protection, or it's financially unfeasible to get there, get the stones and turn a profit on them. I shed no tears over that, and it gives me some hope that there are still hidden areas in the world.

Thank you Fiona ~ excellent news on the refractometer. Essential piece of kit for anyone investigating gems.

Thanks Leena~

Glad to be of service~

Thanks Ali~

My pleasure ~

My pleasure~

My pleasure to share. Yes, I was. Some of the best years of my life so far. Challenging, but wouldn't trade that time for the world.

You're not alone Zakir~ a lot of people get confused until you see enough gems. Transparency is how well light travels through the gem. Window is when light leaks through the stone, instead of reflecting and bouncing back to our eye. A highly transparent stone with no window will seem bright because light travels freely, and more of the light bounces back to us. Those with window seem dark or weak because the light isn't returning, but instead escaping out the back facets because of incorrect angles (connected to the "refractive index" or RI). I talk about RI in another video "How do you KNOW what a gem is? [refractometer tutorial]" kzfaq.info/get/bejne/m82gq6mH3NqygqM.html

Hi Kim!~ Most of the time gemologists stay away from fire, unless they're involved in treating gemstones. That said~ thanks to the Jewellery Kickstarter at Lucy Walker's studio, I have some experience with a few different torches. It depends on what size of work you'll be working with: if you're doing earings and light rings, you can use the hand held butane torches (think large creme brulee torch). The Smith (Smith Little for mixed gas{this is the torch I want!} and Smith Silversmith for a single fuel gas) and Seivert (single fuel gas) lines of torches are also great for anything heavier or thicker. Check out Lucy's material. She's launching her online classes and has a real gift for goldsmithing, and teaching both: lucywalkerjewellery.com/

I'm a total space cadet!~ A friend just mentioned that I may have (likely) miss-answered your question. Here I was going through the video calling the device a torch, but when I saw it written in your question, my mind immediately switched over into jeweler mode and I was thinking about fire. Anyhow! For torches (flashlights) there's a whole host of brands that are suitable. The main concern is that it is very strong indeed, so LED is great for that, and if you're dealing with transparent gems, its ideal to have the type that 3 types of light (white, yellow and UV) because those will all show you different sorts of information about the stone. Also, a tapered/narrower opening where the light comes out is ideal for viewing stones, so that the beam is focused in one direction and not so much in your eyes when inspecting stones. www.mehta.tools/collections/gemological/products/3in1 You don't have to buy this particular brand, but this near-exact model is offered by a whole ton of different brands and they're very common to see in the market.

This is exactly what I needed. Thank you

Hi Abdullahi, rough gemstones are hard. Even people with several decades in the trade with rough have to be verrryyyyyy careful. There are some things you just cant see till the stone is cut. If you want to deal in rough, you have to buy and get them cut before you’ll have real experience. There is no cheap and fast way that i have heard of.

@@GemologyforSchmucks hi peter I will love to contact to you either email or number because I will invited to you africa iam going January 30

@@abdullahihussein3034 Enjoy your time in Africa. You can email me at nazoannagems@gmail.com

I do indeed~ I also broker gemstones from the market for my clients. Send me an email if you’re curious about something. Thegemshepherd@gmail.com

Thanks for the encouragement Lady Bruce. On the inside, I suppose I always knew that I need to educate myself on the finer parts of hand-care. I'll look into curing my ignorance ~ Thanks again for supporting the channel, and the quest for knowledge~!