Ultimate Guide to Dalmatian Stone (What It Is And Where to Find It)

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Dalmatian stone, sometimes called Dalmatian Jasper, is a creamy white stone that’s riddled with black spots. The end result is that it looks quite similar to the dog it’s named for, especially with the whiter variations. It’s been a favorite of casual rockhounds for a long time, but what is it?

Let’s take a closer look and we’ll see if we can’t decipher some of the mysteries in our guide to dalmatian stone.

What is Dalmatian Stone? Is It Really Jasper?

Dalmatian stone is a black and white spotted rock. It appears to come out of Chihuahua, Mexico and it’s a favorite for some rockhounds. I’ve seen it most often as tumbled pieces, although slabs pop up once in a while. It’s often called a jasper, and it’s easy to see why.

dalmation stone jasper specimen

But No, Dalmatian Stone Is Not a Jasper

It polishes well, cuts without chipping, and is generally pleasant to work with as a lapidary material. A lot of materials like this end up being called jasper for some reason. 

Think about rainforest jasper for a moment, it’s just a really nice rhyolite that cuts and polishes well, but you simply can’t convince many people it’s not actually a jasper.

To my eyes, it’s never quite looked like a jasper but I never thought about it too much since I only ever cut a few pieces as custom cabochons when folks wanted it. Jaspers tend to have a certain look to the rough pieces and are a bit of a specialty for me. It was still uniform in hardness, if a bit soft.

I had just assumed it was a diorite variant. Indeed, when chunks wash up on the beaches around where I grew up diorite was often called dalmatian stone. Diorite is a coarse-grained stone with a composition that’s the same as the finer-grained andesite. It was obviously different than the stuff washing up on Santa Barbara beaches, but not by much.

Diorite is comprised of plagioclase feldspar, biotite, and hornblende with a smattering of other minerals found on occasion.

I had actually assumed that would be the end of it for this article: “It’s not a jasper, it’s just diorite. Go poke around near continental shelves to find it. The good stuff comes from Mexico”

It turns out that I wasn’t quite on the mark there, as I did more research on the subject.

Everyone Had a Theory

As I poked around, I realized that not many people seemed to have any idea of what it was.

Some people were clearly just throwing things at the wall to see if they stuck. I read more than once that it was a jasper with hematite inclusions, which seemed kind of odd considering the colors of most jasper are already created by iron oxides.

It also didn’t display a conchoidal fracture. I’d tried to make an arrowhead from a leftover bit of slab a few years back through knapping and it just kind of… broke. That ruled out any kind of cryptocrystalline quartz in my book.

The most common theory I saw was that it was a mixture of quartz and schorl. This makes sense to some degree, tourmaline is very similar to quartz in hardness. Most people dropped it there, I believe.

But, as the old saying goes, “Everybody has a theory until someone ponies up a few bucks for X-ray diffraction.”

A Definitive Answer

As it turns out, someone actually did that.

The folks over at RockTumbler.com actually sent in a few samples for lab analysis.

It turns out that dalmatian stone is actually comprised of albite (a plagioclase feldspar mineral), and quartz, and the black bits are a mineral with the unwieldy name of arfvedsonite.

Where Can I Find Dalmatian Stone?

As far as I can tell, the variety that’s sold as dalmatian stone is found in mines in Chihuahua, Mexico, and not anywhere else. Igneous rocks can be like that at times, where a unique combination of minerals just doesn’t show up anywhere else.

It’s superficially similar to diorite, which can be found on the margins of continents and washes up with some regularity on beaches.

But unless you’re headed down to Mexico and have access to a mine, self-collection isn’t something that you’ll be able to do.

Dalmatian Stone As a Lapidary Material

There’s always a problem when you’re cutting rocks, as opposed to more “pure” minerals like jaspers. The differential hardness of the materials can leave pitting and create issues for the lapidary who is working the material.

This particular stone actually cuts like a single mineral for the most part. Despite the arfvedsonite being a bit softer than the other minerals, dalmatian stone readily cuts without any issues. It also takes a great polish when you’re finished.

It has one more unique property to take advantage of as well.

Dyed Dalmatian Stone

I’m normally not a big fan of dyed stones, but there’s something fun about the bright colors that dalmatian stone is dyed. The material readily takes up dyes on its white-to-cream background and can be found in bright colors.

There are a lot of dyed stones out there, but most of them are some variation of agate. Agate also takes up color readily when it’s white, creating the borderline gaudy slabs you’ll see at shows and craft stores across the country.

Dalmatian stone is much easier to work with, and being opaque the dyes take to it strongly. Since it’s cheap and common, it makes sense to dye some of the material, especially tumbled stones and those used for beads.

While it’s not a jasper, as originally thought, it is a great material and you can get a handful of beads or tumbles with saturated color for just a few bucks. The perfect thing for home decor or to get kids interested in the mineral world!

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