#Mincup25 Teams #Calcite #Azurite #silver #chrysotile #okenite #wavellite #pollucite #nontronite #padddlewheelite #leucite #jeremejevite #zunyite #thortveitite #topaz #ikaite #sanidine
"The losing minerals are crossed out" - and cross!
www.mineralcup.org/2025/bracket
What to do?
We can... 1/2
Neither mineral excites me but I'll vote for #ikaite bc at lease it has a use "paleoclimate indicator for cold water in ancient seas"
#cuprosklodoskite is pretty but so radioactive that it has to be handled carefully and I couldn't find any uses for it. #MinCup25
A vote for #ikaite is a vote for dead Viking souls, or so it is said.
I-ka-ite!
I-ka-ite!
I-ka-ite!
It’s chemically the same as the BEST mineral, #Calcite, cruelly shit out in an earlier match! You can make the difference now, go VOTE #Ikaite!!!
#MinCup25
Viking ghosts!
Tough choice today, but I'm on board with the ikaite pillars.
Still time to vote!
#Ikaite
#MinCup25
Go #Ikaite go!
#cuprosklodowskite still holds over a 100-vote lead, but #ikaite is slowly closing the gap.
Can it make up the difference with just 4 hours left on the clock, or will it melt away?
Read this whole delightful thread then cast your vote for the utterly fascinating #Ikaite! #MinCup25
Noooooo! Team hedgehog, vote for #Ikaite
www.mindat.org/photo-544796...
I was gonna vote for cuprosklodowskite but then I saw all of the campaigning for #ikaite by @mikamckinnon.bsky.social and decided it needed my vote more
#MinCup25 #R1M14
Today was two minerals I don't know a lot about so we all get to learn today.
#Cuptosklodowskite vs #ikaite
Uranium versus calcium carbonate.
Who will win?
Leaning towards the green in this match. More info and pics below.
This whole string is making me reconsider my intentions to vote for #Cuprosklodowskite. I mean, #Ikaite turns into calcite and sometimes opal? It grows on cheese rind? It absorbs carbon, and thus helps with climate change? It’s the souls of vanquished Viking foes? So few easy choices in #MinCup25!
Ancient seafarers must have known about these submarine towers of #Ikaite.
This is what I imagined, reading children’s fantasy stories, that seahorses and mermaids and mermen wielding tridents lived in towers like these, just below the sea’s surface.
🔱🧜♀️🌊
#Ikaite
#MinCup25
“carbonate-enriched artesian groundwater… is forced up and out of the ground through fractures in the seabed…where it mixes with seawater. As the groundwater has a lower density…the groundwater seeps upwards, precipitating ikaite as chimney structures around the outflow.”
#Ikaite
#MinCup25
#Ikaite dissolution in association with sea ice melting could take up similar amount of air CO2 as primary production does…[M]ore research efforts should be made to assess the effect of ikaite dynamics on the seasonal carbon cycle in a warmer climate.#
#Ikaite
#MinCup25
#Ikaite forms “in environments ranging from –2° to 7°C in nature… At ambient temperatures (10°–30°C), ikaite transforms to…polymorphs such as calcite, aragonite, and/or vaterite. The ikaite and its following pseudomorphs act as paleothermometers”
Opalized pseudomorphs have been found in Australia.
I’m going to give big puppy eyes of pleading on behalf of #Ikaite. It’s a melting mineral so barely-stable that it only exists under the sea or in doppelgängers, and legends claim its enormous towers are the souls of drown invaders driven back into the fjords. It’s PERFECT!
(& losing badly)
#MinCup25 admin note:
#Ikaite will be unlikely to return if it crashes out in Round 1 AGAIN. #MinCup25 is its attempted comeback after an underwhelming showing in #MinCup22.
I love it, but I can’t justify not giving thousands of other minerals a first chance if it can’t rally a fanbase. 😭
#MinCup25
#Ikaite
1. is the melting mineral that disappears above the icy seas
2. is the ghosts of drown Viking invaders
3. whispers in the geologic record as oddly-shaped calcite & opal
4. hides on cheese rind & frozen shrimp
5. is a powerhouse of a carbon sink
#Ikaite, which is a pseudomorph of #Calcite is my (belated) pick for this round!!
Vote calcite (indirectly), vote #Ikaite!!!
#MinCup25
If you haven't voted yet in this round of #MinCup25 there is still time to set things right by voting for #ikaite. Calcium carbonate hexahydrate, so a close relative of #calcite. Long list of other virtues here.
When #Ikaite ran in #MinCup22, we learned that in Greenlandic folklore the columns are the souls of drowned invaders.
Source: ‘Eskimoiske eventyr og sagn', H.J. Rink (1866) via @eemuranta.bsky.social
Repost from:
Mika McKinnon @mikamckinnon.bsky.social
Prefer bio to geo? Thbbbpft, but also:
1. #ikaite towers are a globally-unique ecosystem with cool critters!
arctichub.gl/unique-mineral-columns-i... (includes video). Bonus: They’re currently doing ok […]
Repost from:
Dee Gardner @glacierpique.bsky.social
“They were able to identify the presence of two rather unique crystals on the surface of washed rind cheeses: struvite and ikaite.”
blog.murrayscheese.com/2018/08/26/paul-kinstedt... […]
Kanskje det er noen av dere som trenger å se en opal med ikaitt-opphav før de stemmer på #ikaite?
#ikaite
Why? Safety first! What fun are minerals/rocks if ya can’t lick them without your tongue melting off? 😏😁😂
La ikaíta no podría ser mejor.
Siendo un carbonato de calcio hexahidratado sólo es estable en ambientes de pH neutro y humedad alta como el queso.
Así que no solo se trata de cristales adorables. También son comestibles...
Votá #Ikaite en #MinCup25.
How about some norse settler ghosts from Inuit folklore? Vote #ikaite!
Difficult choice, but my vote goes to #cuprosklodowskite because:
1. It is a proper Lick-And-Die mineral.
2. Together with Joliotite, it is part of unique (as far as I know) set of minerals named after mother and daughter.
P.S. I was a bit disappointed that #ikaite was not named after ika = squid
