Little Pine Garnet Mine

May 05, 2007

The Little Pine Garnet Mine is a great place for collecting almandine garnets.  You will find many garnet, some the size of baseballs, if you go into the back of the mine. The crystals are well formed and embedded in a soft matrix. You'll need a head lamp, rock hammer, chisel, ear plugs, and sturdy shoes. There's not much light in the back of the adit, so you need the head lamp.

We made our way down from Virginia towards Smokey Mountain National Park. This was a stop we made on our way. It took us a hour or so to find the place.  There was a really nice local couple that pointed us in the right direction and contacted Jackie Ball for us. We found out about the book Rock, Gem, and Mineral Collecting Sites in Western North Carolina By Richard James Jacquot, Jr. during our trip.  This is one of the best rock collecting guide books for Western North Carolina.  It would have saved us hours of time if we had it before our trip. We met Richard at the rock show in Franklin at the tail end of our trip.  He is the founder of Mountain Area Gem and Mineral Association, (M.A.G.M.A.), a true rockhound, and very nice guy.

The mine, actually an adit, is located up the hill from the parking area.  It's a easy walk up a gravel road, maybe 5 minutes at the most. There is a picnic table and port-a-john near the entrance to the site. There's a small creek running next to the road leading to the mine. There's a spoils pile that can be searched for kids and those not wishing to venture into the mine.The mine entrance is large and easy to find. The mine goes directly into the hillside with a slight upward grade. The pocket layer is a about a 45 degree angle from the from of the mine. Most of the good digging is at or near the back of the mine, again head lamps required unless you can see in the dark. Since the mine floor is sloped at 45 degrees and covered with tailings and dust, sturdy shoes and careful walking is necessary. I was wearing L.L.Bean Costal Clogs (aka Crocs), which was not the appropriate attire. I almost took a couple good spills walking through the mine.

There are support pillars located through the mine as you go in which have material. Please DO NOT mine the support pillars. It is tempting since they're located in the light, but this undermines the support and saftey of the mine. At the back of the mine there is a lot of material readily accessible. There is a tremendous amount of garnet in the mine that can be extracted with a bit of work.

Given it took us a while to find the mine, we only had about an hour to dig. We brought hammers and chisels, but no head lamp. I had a small flashlight that made it very difficult to work much deep in the mine. We brought ear plugs which proved to be invaluable while hammering and chiseling. The bull point chisel was the most effective at removing the matrix to get the garnet crystals out. Having the hand guard was really nice when you miss the end of the chisel. The matrix is soft enough that chiseling is fairly easy and could be done by children. The garnets are fairly easy to spot in the matrix and range in size from a die to softball. We didn't make it to the back of the mine, since we didn't have head lamps, so we found mostly golf ball sized garnets.


Little Pine Garnet Mine
Marshal, NC
828-649-3464 - Jackie Ball
10:00 am - 4:00 pm
$25 /person
Google Map / Directions

Note: To coordinate a trip, call Jackie Ball ahead of time. You need to stop at his office at the Sandy Bottom Trail Rides, which is about a mile from the mine. They also do trail rides.

Other sites about Little Pine Garnet Mine

• Mountain Area Gem and Mineral Association, (M.A.G.M.A.)
• Georgia MineralSociety