A Recent Franconia Field Trip

By Sonny Clary, March 05, 2005

I thought I would share some photos of our last Franconia meteorite hunting trip. I decided to go to Franconia to meet Larry Sloan. John Blennert was also there with some of his friends and his son JJ.

The first part of the day I spent talking to everybody and trying to figure out how to hunt with all of the new vegetation. This year the grass and weeds are up to a couple of feet tall. It makes it hard to look visually for meteorites.

The second day Larry & I tried some new hunting tactics and tried to look for extended parts of the strewn field. This all failed. But John and his hunting partners found a few small irons and Franconia chondrites. While Larry & I were up in a wash exploring a new area it was raining off into the distance (at least 10 miles away). When we returned down the previously dry wash it began to fill with rainwater. We still managed to get back to camp safely. The rain can sure change the desert in a heartbeat. It was sure fun sitting around the campfire that evening hearing John's stories from his Oman trip.

The third day we decided to try another new area. We decided to meet up with John's friends, experienced gold prospectors.(I tried to find out where their secret gold hunting areas were but their lips were sealed!)We parted ways and I decided to go to a different area in the field. I had been to this spot before but now it was overgrown with weeds making it difficult to swing a detector. After 15 minutes I found a nice 65 gram Franconia.

I decided to cross the train tracks to hunt the other side. After 3 hours I decided to head back to my ATV. About 40 feet from the train tracks I found a nice Franconia about 265 grams. I found it in a spot that was graded by a tractor many years ago. Maybe by railroad crews. This meteorite sat so close to the train tracks as you can see by my photo. I will have to spend more time in this area. The only problem is there is alot of buried metal, etc. along the tracks. I always photograph a meteorite in situ before I remove it. I started to take a picture and I heard a train coming down the tracks. I decided to wait for the train to include it in the picture. I was hoping the train conductor wouldn't see me and think I was some crazy person laying next to the tracks. As you can see the picture turned out really cool and the conductor never saw me.

Franconia is a great place to hunt meteorites. Because of all the rain we have had the vegetation and potential for snakes is greater than usual. After talking to all the hunters in the area we have concluded that the meteorites are getting harder to find but there should still be some nice ones hiding out there.It is always fun to meet new hunters in the field and hear their stories.
Sonny

An Additional Tail

By Sonny Clary, September 08, 2004

Here`s some pictures of one of the meteorite hunting trips this summer. While driving to the hunting area I noticed a Kangaroo Rat hopping across the road so I decided to get a few photos while waiting for my friends to show up. At that moment the Kangaroo rat ran under my truck and decided it was a cool place out of the sun. Not wanting to run this guy over I had to chase him from under my vehicle. Every time I would try to chase him off the little rat would run around the opposite side of the truck or tire.

This lasted about ten minutes or so. Boy I'm sure glad there were no other hunters in the area at this time, I must have looked pretty funny chasing this rat around my truck.The kangaroo Rat finally ran behind my rear tire and was looking around at me {almost like he was saying OK what is your next move buddy}. At that moment I jumped into my truck and pulled forward. I decided to make a circle and see if I had squished him when I took off. When I turned around to see if he was OK he was no where in site, but I could see him in my side mirror still chasing my truck for shade. But the truck was much faster than the little Rat .

We did find a couple of small meteorites after a full day of searching. Both meteorites were under 20 grams.
Sonny