Gem trees: how logs in the Arizona desert become crystals

In the United States there is a unique forest, the trees of which are composed of gems sparkling in the sun with all the colors of the rainbow. You will not see such a miracle anywhere else on the planet. We are talking about the Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona. It is here that you can see a lot of fallen fossilized logs consisting of amethyst, opal, chalcedony and other minerals.

About 220 million years ago, the desert area of eastern Arizona with rare, hard-to-plant plants looked completely different. In those days, the climate here was humid subtropical and giant coniferous trees, ancient cypresses resembling palm trees, and relict ginkgo covered the earth. However, a series of major disasters tumbled down trees and scattered them on different sides. Earthquakes, tectonic shifts and eruptions of a whole chain of volcanoes led to a change in climate and covered the area with a thick layer of volcanic ash and rocks, among which quartz prevailed. Gradually, the trunks of uprooted trees turned into fossils, consisting of quartz and its varieties.

The wood hidden at great depths was not subject to decay, and for thousands of years it slowly but surely rose to the surface, one day exposing its fantastic cores transformed into purple amethysts, rainbow opals, yellow citrines and chalcedony. The first to discover this sparkling beauty were the local Indians. They began to use fossils to create tools, weapons, and even dwellings. When Europeans learned about gem trees in the 19th century, they began to massively export them abroad, until in 1962 this site was declared a National Park and taken under protection.