Opal of the World - Mexico, Ethiopia, Tanzania - A World Tour of Opal, Part 2 

I’m so glad you mentioned Louisiana opal. I have a cabochon of it myself. Beautiful little piece.

FEW COMMON QUESTIONS Ethipoian Opal vs Australian Opal? Ethiopian opal is hydrophane which prevents crazing which in Australian is caused by drying out of the water content which creates hairline cracks. Ethiopian opal is more available and generally has a wider variety of color especially reds. Ethiopian Prices are lower and the sizes are much larger than Australian. Ethiopian opal is more durable resisting breakage better than all other opal including Australian. Ethiopian Opal Price Per Carat? The price per carat of Ethiopian opal ranges from 10-250 per carat based on the intensity, variety and patterns of color. Top quality gems will have color over the entire surface free of visible inclusions on the top surface of the opal. What is Value of Ethiopian Opal? What helps value? How is supply effecting the value? There is a large quantity of Ethiopian opal available which has kept the price low. Like most gems the top quality material is quite rare and commands a high price. The intensity of the color is what makes this opal valuable as the best Ethiopian opal have colors that are described as unreal looking like colored L.E.D. lights. How to do you care for Ethiopian Opal? How is the stability? Ethiopian opal once cut is highly stable. Being hydrophane it is absorbent and chemicals including hair products, dyes, oils and lotions should be avoided. Change in body color to more reddish orange in highly transparent slightly orange Ethiopian opal has been seen on rare occasion. What is a honeycomb welo opal? Honeycomb is a hexagonal pattern like the bees honeycomb. The reason it is valued is because the colors in the pattern are often incredibly intense. You can see a huge selection of Ethiopian Welo Opal here at OpalLust.com VIDEO TRANSCIPTION Hi, I'm Steve Moriarty from Moriarty's Gem Art in Crown Point, Indiana. We represent ourselves online as MoreGems.com. Today, I'd like to discuss with you a new source of opals from Welo, Ethiopia. Once in a decade, a new discovery of gems presents an opportunity to buy extremely high quality at very low prices. This has been the case in the past with many gems, including peridot from Pakistan in 2001, bicolor tourmaline from Brazil in the early 1990s, sapphire from Madagascar in 1997 just to name a few. When they are found, for a couple of years they are very inexpensive because of the quantity available. As with most finds, the quantity is finite and, as quickly as it is found, it disappears and the price inflates rapidly. This situation is compounded as we see more material on the market. The popularity increases because of this exposure to the public, and this demand also inflates prices. SEE OUR COLLECTION OF ETHIOPIAN OPAL HERE ETHIOPIA VS AUSTRALIA Today, we have one of those unique opportunities to buy extraordinary opal from Welo, Ethiopia, discovered in 2008. The quality is finer than any I have purchased from Australia, up until now considered to be the finest opal source. This Ethiopian opal is top crystal material, meaning it has high transparency, generally considered to be the finest quality opal. The transparency allows you to facet carve, or cab these Ethiopian opals. The colors are evenly spread through the entire gem, and the intensity of the color is unreal as they seem to float in the gem and project from the surface. The number of colors in a single piece is only rarely seen in Australian material, and occasionally we even see violet, which is so unusual in opal from any source. The color patterns are highly varied. The large sizes available also make this material unique. We have cut gems over 40 carats with the average stone well over five carats. BEING HYDROPHANE Much of the material is hydrophane, meaning it can soak up water. If placed in water, the material will become glass clear, and when removed, it will get milky, and after several days, the material will return to its original beauty. What this means is you shouldn't swim with it, while washing your hands will have little effect. The benefit of this material is that the riskiest part of traditional opal from other sources is drying out and cracking, called crazing, whereas this material will not craze from drying out. One way to identify hydrophane opal is the characteristic of feeling sticky to the tongue or your finger. This characteristic also affects the weight, which can change with humidity. The porous nature of Ethiopian opal has brought the charlatans out who are trying to change the colors of the opals through use of dyes and smoke treatments. We have seen violet colors from dying, and, although black opals occur naturally in Ethiopia, many are enhanced black color with smoke treatments. The color can and often is enhanced by enameling the back of the opal, which enhances the color of the Ethiopian opals that are highly transparent. This treatment is easily removed and has its benefits. This is an acceptable practice, assuming it is stated when sold. Toughness is another characteristic of Ethiopian opal, which outperforms other locations. Tests by the Gemological Institute of America has shown that this opal is capable of withstanding drops to concrete from four feet without damage. All other sources failed this drop test. Welo Ethiopian opal is unique, durable, and currently plentiful, and we highly recommend this gem as a best buy at this time. You can see our entire collection of Ethiopian Opal here. ----

I found Fire Opal in Sweden , red, orange, yellow. Never heard of any other findings here in Sweden.

Hi Jenny. What a wonderful world it is with Opal. Thankyou for your contributions to the Industry from a scientific perspective. Looking forward to further my skills in opal carving and tours in 2021. John M

Awesome vid and very educational. Thanks for producing these 🙂

Part 1 and 2 was so interesting and entertaining. Thank you for the information. I’m saving up so when the world gets back to normal I can come and visit you.

Wunderbare Nahaufnahmen!!! 🥰 Angenehme stimme während die Erklärungen schön kurz gehalten sind .. danke ein tolles Video

You are an encyclopedia of info on Opal! Thank you.

Love this video!

Extremely informative Thanks

A marvelous video!!! Dreamy

I hope the next part comes soon Thank you for this guys

Very nice pleasant presentation,i am from sri lanka wehave best gems in the world but i love opal rather gems.they are so remarkably colourful

Tks so much !!!!!! Very nice. video 👍👍

I have a boulder Opal 110 lbs. Came from a creek in Northern California. Has pink green gray orange yellow black with gold veins and also a root beer brown!

Very well done videos, super relaxing to watch. Hope to see a third part one day with opal from more parts of the world.

9:02 this is absolutely gorgeous! Such nice lighting on this video, kudos.

We call the teal or pink common opal casts Pastels around here. The miners all wear jewelry from their mines and it's not all treated. The opal and wood is a perfect fossil replacement sometimes skin to skin in gem quality black. Rarer than rare it is all mined by hand.

Great video love the Opal ❤️❤️💋🇦🇺

Good job 👏🏼

2:57 I have found the white in British Columbia Canada. I haven't found any color yet but 20 miles south they have in Vernon. I just found the seem area but am to weak to dig and explore properly as I am disabled now.

Hi! Thank you for watching. What was your favourite example of opal from this video? :)

No doubt in my heart that the Aussie Opal is the precious one. Greetings Kenneth Prospecting Norway.

How much is louisiana opal worth i found some in vernon parish and would like to sell mine but its so hard figuring out the prices as there are not alot of information out there and where would one go to sell it😭

How can i buy this opal stone...?anyone can help me?

Very interesting. What are the conditions needed for them to form?

You forgot about leopard opal from Mexico! One of my favorites

Can I ask please where in WA can I find Opal field

We have one we call flintstone, it is actually opal and chalcedony, have tried to find with precious opal but failed. I don’t give up cause there was an opal mine in Poland and it’s part of the tornquist zone, that goes through the area we’re I live. So hope is with me.

excellent video, thanks for the world tour. I went on holiday to the western usa and mexico and was stunned by some of the fire opal as i didn't realise how much it and [ parts of the western USA had] Some of my friends even had a small bucket of rough [white] they had found along a creek in California as a teen. Some large thumbnail sized bits of precious. The concentrations of opal in northern american can be insanely dense, like rocks on the ground; but the deposit areas are tiny and will be stripped fast.

Hi i want ooal stone how can i contact you ..

PAKISTAN's North is strewn with gems...still industry has to grow. River banks clifs dry ravians even among glaciers i observed such glitering stones during my trecking expeditions decades ago but i was unaware about the value. Anyway in comings years the explorers will definately dig out.

I came to see the Honduran opal since I'm honduran and a libra so my birthstone is opal ❤️

So she isn't really telling us, what makes Opal not lose water being unstable? How much of this Opal is stable? How much Opal is stable?

Nothing beats the Australian opal’s

I like the Ethiopaline.

Hi how are you we have to about opal if u are buying

Hi I watched your video. Very intruding things you showed us. I ordered a small ethiopian opal last week because I saw it in photo that it was clear as crystal and thought it was so beautiful. I received it last Saturday. It is exact what I saw in the photo when except its color is in frosty white. I was puzzled. I went to research and see why. I found out these people putting them into water and after that they selling them. They would become clear. Is there other way to make it clear like crystal and stay on forever?

Have you seen good specimens of stable opal similar to the amazing stuff you get in Australia. I've heard that there is some stuff coming from Brazil that is very stable.

INDONESIA OPAL 😎

Banten area of indonesia also have beutifull black opal....

❤❤❤❤

တွင်ထွက်ရတနာများစုံလွင်စွားပြသသောဗီဒီယို

Is it possible to find opal in Ireland

Can I get through US customs with opals that I found

You forgot to mention that Australia has the Opal card. No play of colour and a plastic appearance, which allows the wearer to travel on public transport.

Interested?

ຂ້ອຍມີຫີນເຈົ້າສົນໃຈບໍ່

Indonesia...?

i like black non treated ethiopian opal.would be nice to see some cut stones

I have a rock

Best opsl is Ethiopia

It is a little bit shame, that You tell nothing about Slovakian opals. In Slovakian mountains Slanske vrchy are located oldest and absoluteli first precious opals mines in the world. On location Dubnik - Cervenica are there more than 35 kilometers of mans mades underground tunells. Diggers stard colect precious opals here thousands and thousands years ago and gemstones from this locations you can find on crownes of kings and queens all around the world. And absoluteli news is, that a few kilometers from Dubnik is now world youngest place with abolutely world top quality jewelery gemstones (B. location). Now in 2021 is just exporing area status. But some 1000-2000ct opal nests from this exploring area are not camparable to nothing, what until now not looking mens eyes. Im pretty sure, that about this area you will heard many times in close future :-). (sorry for my bad english. Is not my native language).

Es plastico

You wrote thopia hahaha it’s ETHIOPIA 🇪🇹