Hordes scour the Lake Superior shore for agates. But some of the best searching grounds lie in Central Minnesota, thanks to the glaciers that dropped them here.
HOLDING TOWNSHIP – Ed Opatz spotted the agate first.
Look for it, he encouraged. It's got purple bands. Red bands. A perfect example. Four of us stood in a tight circle, but only Opatz saw the agate.
He released it from the dried grass binding it to the moss-covered, rock-strewn ground. Admired it. Eventually dropped the thumb-sized stone into the worn camera bag with the rest of the day's finds.We'd been exploring the concave cut of a small, privately owned gravel pit overgrown with weeds dried beige and rattling in the wind. As we headed back to the vehicles with ankles full of prickers and a couple of finds, we were wondering how many generations of kids had combed the site.Opatz was still looking.Opatz, 55, who runs an excavating business out of Holdingford, is always looking. On days like this one, he'll spend a few spare hours walking a farm field, inspecting a dirt pile, checking out the long-abandoned, shallow pit. Sometimes he'll arrive at a job site an hour early to hunt agates……..Read rest of the story..http://bit.ly/RXAvQB+
