We recently made a small purchase of Barrel Cactus Moss Agate from the William Johnson Claim located near Barstow, California.
This moss agate was discovered by William’s wife Janna when they were on a walk in an area that wasn’t known to have high-quality moss agate. Janna wanted to get a picture of a barrel cactus and when she found one, she saw agate in the area and eventually saw some nice moss agate. This area would become the location of their first claim, the Barrel Cactus claim, and their nearby claim named Janna’s Gem claim.
As far as we know, William and his wife Janna currently only offer this beautiful moss agate on Facebook. I was able to contact them through their Facebook page “Moss Agate from the Barrel Cactus claim”
First, I want to share what a pleasure it was to work with William. William made my first purchase enjoyable and he really went the extra mile to make sure I was happy with my purchase.
The agate was offered for a reasonable price and he had a small amount of premium agate left that I was also able to purchase. The premium agate was twice the price of the other moss agate.
The package arrived quickly and I was pleasantly surprised as there was more agate in the box than what I had requested.
At first glance, the agate didn’t really look all that remarkable. Few patterns could be seen on the surface and the material looked like something the average person might pass by if they saw them on the ground.
Viewing the rock wet and in the sunlight revealed some amazing-looking moss agate that I couldn’t see at first glance. The material seems to be highly variable so it’s going to be fun to cut up and see what we got.
There was some amazing material sent in my first order. Although I ordered some premium material it was difficult to tell what was premium and what wasn’t because there was so much nice rock in the package. There was one face-cut piece that I would definitely consider premium but there were also a couple of other pieces that will likely be just as nice once they’re cut.
My favorite pieces before cutting are the ones that have white agate mixed throughout. There are also some pieces that would be difficult to distinguish from Maury Mountain Moss Agate.
Click here to see what the slabs cut from this beautiful material looked like.
