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Colors of Mars     

I have watched with interest as the photos of Mars have come back from the Pathfinder mission. Every time there is a report of the sand or rocks, I have looked at my rock to see if it matches what has been seen on Mars. So far, it always has. My rock shows each of the different reflective types of materials, but one of the easiest colors to identify is the red that shows in some of the rocks, particularly Ginger. The following picture shows the rock Ginger with its very distinctive red spot.

Next is a picture of my rock, showing its red spot. Under these lighting conditions, my rock shows the gray color we see on Mars and then the shift in the center of the rock to the very red material. I can tell you from my observations, that the red material melts somewhat differently than does the red stuff.

One of the NASA experiments with Barnacle Bill was an effort to determine if Barnacle Bill is made of a single material (from a volcano) or is it a collection of materials that have been "pushed" together by outside forces. The spectra of Barnacle Bill, when taken from many different locations across the face, shows only two basic kinds of spectra: the soil-like deposits and the dark rock face. Since my rock is volcanic and seems to be the first cousin to Barnacle Bill, I will predict that Barnacle Bill is volcanic in origin. The sand from my rock would represent the soil and I believe shows all the reflective variation from the Martian surface that I have seen. The material of Barnacle Bill without the sand would represent the dark portion of my rock. But the really interesting color of Mars has always been red, and my rock is not only like Barnacle Bill, it has a red spot too. From what I have been able to discern about the information coming back from Pathfinder, my rock should give scientist a very complete representation of the materials of Mars. What is not included in the volcanic portion of the rock will surely be included in the sandy portion. As we look at the probable evolution of Mars, we come to understand that for at least a billion years, the finer materials of Mars have been spread more or less evenly over the entire surface of the planet. Therefore, any sand brought to Earth from Mars in the last million years would probably represent much of the Martian surface.

I have talked about the colors of the rock portion, but what about the colors of the sandy material? Here are some pictures of the other colors of Mars.

No body seems to believe me that I found this rock over 25 years ago, and recognized it as a meteorite that probably came from Mars. But I have been making this claim for all of these years, and isn't it interesting that my rock also shows the red color that is so prevalent on Mars. It now looks like this kind of high silicon rock may be one of the predominate rocks of Mars. I don't understand how someone could look at the pictures above, and not want to test this rock to see from whence it came.