Can I get some help on crystals?

[BigJohn]

Hour Glass asked:
I've recently taken an interest in crystals and I have a few questions. Here they are:

1. What are some good starter crystals?
2. Where can I safely buy authentic crystals online?
3. How can you tell real crystals from fake crystals?

If you go out in to the mountains, etc. you can find a lot of jewels. I literally have over 1 ton of these gems. The hard part is trying to find beautiful specimens. Sometimes I have to do a lot of work to find a beauty. Silver is probably the hardest to find because it is hard to recognize in its natural form.

For example, try finding a perfect 12" double terminated quartz crystal with no inclusions may take a life time with no success. Go into a store and you might see that exact item on display. How can that be?

What you might find is the crystal may be man-made - cast, polished or it could have been altered by heat as the case with a fair amount of Citrine that was formerly Amethyst Quartz.

If you look at certain pendants, they look like K9 crystal. Some manufactures will even acknowledge they use K9 crystal in such products as crystal balls, etc. But then, how many of us have communicated with manufacturers on this subject?

To get real stuff, I go out and find my own items. You can go to special markets and gem shows, but if you are not experienced you can easily get ripped of. I once was with a couple who brought a friend along who just graduated from a gem school. Under their friend's advice, the couple purchased a large specimen of amber. I was surprised the graduate did not pick up the amber was not authentic.