| Sieving
Many collectors do not go in for sieving their samples,
preferring the sample to stay as originally collected.
Personally, I always sieve my samples, be they sand, crushed
sandstone or whatever. I do this to keep my samples uniform
and tidy. This also helps keep me within the guidelines I've
set for myself - nothing larger than 2.00 mm in size. To do
this I most often use a 2.00 mm sieve that came with a set
of three 300 mm diameter sieves bought from an online
supplier specialising in tools and materials for growing
Bonsai trees. For samples of fine sand, for example those
found in sand dunes, where the grain size is generally small
anyway but where the sample includes vegetable matter, I use
a cheap flour sieve bought from the local budget store. The
mesh size is actually smaller than 2.00 mm but near enough
not to worry about. As well as collecting sand I also
collect samples of sandstone and similar rocks which I then
crush with a hemmer to produce a fine sand. These always
need sieved to remove the larger fragments. The same goes
for the occasional sample of silt or clay. |
