Any idea where I can get some rocks (roughly softball size) in the local area? We always had a rockpile or two on our farm from clearing rocks and would have been happy to give them away willing some one would haul the rocks themselves. Our farm is 8 hours roundtrip and I'd rather find some nearby.

The soil in the Panhandle doesn't really produce rocks. About the best you could get would be caliche...really hard calcium carbonate.

I guess it depends on what you want, and what you want it for. There are a few caliche pits south of Canyon, and I know of a few outcroppings on roads south of town where you could pick up a few rocks. A pickup load might be a problem.

Give me a little detail on what you need and I might have a better idea.

I'm considering placing some rocks in the lowest point along the bar ditch in front of my lot and planting grass on each side. Take a look in the ditch in front of the First United Bank Center. I'm needing enough to cover the same width (3-4'?) and roughly 170' long.

Oh my, so you're talking about several truck loads, or at least one? If you don't mind caliche, I'd try getting in touch with some of the folks with caliche pits. I believe the Kuhlman family owns one, as do the Hale and Irlbeck families. I don't know what companies are doing the actual excavating, though.

No regular farm in Randall county has that kind of rock in their fields. Maybe half a pickup load per farm, and only one out of 1,000 farms at that. Most Randall county soil is eolian in origin.

It took me a while to figure out the United Bank Center. I still think of it as the WT place.

[This message has been edited by CanyonAg77 (edited 4/29/2007 10:26p).]

There are the Amarillo Mountains with plenty of granite.

You just gotta do a little digging through the sediment covering them up.

Seriously, if you look in the right places, you can find basalt thrown out from a volcano in central New Mexico. There is some in the Texas and Oklahoma panhandles and in western Kansas.

Don't forget Alibates. I hear they are kind of flinty about you taking it from there, though,

There are huge hunks of Alibates flint at the old Tech research farm building on the SW corner of Pantex. I suspect they were quarried before Alibates got federal protection.

I have a flake of Alibates that I found near a playa lake on a farm south of Canyon. An archaeologist who confirmed it was Alibates was very curious where I got it.

If you go out to the Amarillo landfill, there was a large rock crushing operation that was grinding up the caliche rocks from excavation. They might give you a few loads of rocks for cheap $.

Thanks for the help, guys.

Where exactly is the Amarillo landfill? I might give then a call to see if they have anything available.

The landfill is out west of town, just before you get to Bushland. Just look north for a big hill.

When I was a kid, I found a geode in a neighbor's pasture.

I had no idea what it was and so I carried it the 6 or 7 miles home on horseback.

I showed it to a geologist friend of the family and he told me what it was.