We spent a day looking for Septarian Nodules in and around old mostly abandoned mining claims. We followed the directions in the "Gem Trails of Utah" book to find massive excavations as deep as 50 feet that had been dug by track hoe into gray, poorly indurated and weathered shale.

We went from hole to hole looking for fresh signs of digging and leaverites. After half the day had gone by with no luck, we found a hole that looked good (relatively fresh signs of digging and plenty of leaverites scattered around).

I took a few whacks into the bottom side of the excavation and uncovered the end of a large Septarian nodule (geode) that Chrissy is pointing to below.

This one looked like it had part of one side broken off by the edge of the track hoe bucket; you could see right into the interior pocket lined with yellow calcite crystals - lucky me! I used pick, shovel, chisels and prybar to liberate the 8" diameter geode from the wall. The following are a couple pictures of the cleaned up specimen.