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Amber is a stone where it is mined and what they do. Where amber is mined in Russia: amber deposits in Russia, types of deposits, places, methods and methods of stone extraction. Origin of amber: modern interpretation

Amber is a fossil resin of ancient coniferous plantations. Over time, the resinous formations have petrified, become hard enough to withstand external destruction, many of them have grown into sedimentary rocks and are found as inclusions in stones. Amber is known to man as long as people themselves exist on Earth. It is found at archaeological excavations of the settlements of primitive people.

Magical significance was attached to this light and beautiful pebble, different tribes considered it to be pieces of the Sun that had fallen to the ground, they treated ailments with it, they bewitched it with the help of jewelry, they made conspiracies against it. All this exists to some extent now, but the main purpose of this organic material is industry, medicine, electronics, and jewelry.

Ancient ways of extracting amber

Extraction of amber by the “scooping” method

Usually people collected pieces of resin on the seashore. Sea waves often carried them to the beaches, small fragments were found in large numbers on the coasts of the whole world. But over time, there were more and more hunters for amber fragments and people had to fish them out of the water on a boat. Such a fishery was called "scooping", since they caught resin formations with nets. To get to larger pieces, "gouging" was used. This was done with the help of pointed peaks in shallow water. And when the deposits at a shallow depth dried up, it was time for the "wells" - diggings, which were located on the beach area. In the 16th century, the first shallow quarries appeared and the extraction of stone became industrial.

Modern technologies of amber extraction

Currently, the development of amber is carried out in large quantities, large companies are engaged in this and use mechanized mining methods, this work has several stages.

Development by hydromonitor and dredgers


Hydromonitor blurs the top layer

This method is the main one and represents the impact of a powerful water jet on the overburden (the coating that covers the amber-bearing layer).

Water, together with the waste rock, forms a pulp, which is discharged into the sea through pipes with the help of suction dredgers.

The exposed "blue earth" is being developed by a walking excavator. With the help of a ladle, this mass, rich in amber contents, is folded into cone slides and the hydromonitor starts working again, turning this slide into a mud-like slurry.


Amber mining - walking excavator

Dredgers this slurry through the pipe system to the processing plant. Through these manufacturing steps, the precious raw material is subject to wastage - 10 percent of the material is wasted in this process.

Experts believe that the best production option is a method that excludes hydrotransportation. Technically, this is done like this: a bucket-wheel excavator selects the “blue earth” in the quarry and feeds it to the conveyor. According to it, all rock with amber content goes to the processing plant, where amber inclusions are extracted without loss.

The final stage of extraction is the sorting of fragments by size, color, content of inclusions, transparency, configuration.

Why can amber be colored?

Resin fossilized in sedimentary rocks can take on the color of surrounding minerals. Therefore, amber is not only yellow and golden, it can have different shades - green, brown, blue and even white. According to the refraction of light, the pebbles are divided into transparent, opaque, smoky.

The main places of extraction of amber

The main places of extraction of amber are the Baltic states, the Kaliningrad region, Western Ukraine, the Urals. There are deposits in Mexico, Japan, China, Romania and Sicily. But the main area of ​​occurrence of large deposits is the coast of the Baltic Sea. These stones are exported, their quality is valued all over the world. The remaining deposits are of no commercial importance.

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Amber has no practical use in application. Despite its good combustibility, it is used exclusively in areas that are useful to people for social reasons: jewelry, fragrance (when burning), furniture and haberdashery accessories. In addition, the mineral has a very interesting history. The name comes from the Arab culture, and - in fact - as the first studies of its deposits. The peoples of the south believed that amber is the result of dew crystallization. Despite the lack of scientific evidence, the theory was indirectly tied to the truth.

The fact is that amber is really the result of solidification of a liquid. Only not dew, but the resins of coniferous trees that have existed for a very long time. The scientific justification for this was confirmed only in the 18th century by the Russian researcher and scientist Mikhail Lomonosov.

In science fiction, amber was seen as a unique way to search for the DNA of ancient creatures. So in Michael Crichton's novel, scientists who found inclusion (an amber rock with an insect stuck inside) used the blood of dinosaurs that mosquitoes ate in order to extract DNA for cloning prehistoric creatures. According to ancient beliefs, amber is fragments of stones from the center of the world, where the throne of the world kingdom stands.

Deposits in the world and Russia

Historically, the deposits of this stone were located in places that were partially (or completely) washed by water. Until the middle of the Iron Age, "tears of the sea" were mined on the Jutland peninsula (in modern times it is the territory of Denmark). Then the search moved to another place, where one of the largest areas for the extraction of this raw material was born, and the gift of the sun continues to be mined in the same areas to this day.

The territory of Sambia has become a famous deposit (now part of the Kaliningrad region), where many deposits of amber were found. In those ancient times, it was considered an island, which also played in favor of the name "tears of the sea." According to historical sources, it can be judged that the Romans, who had a colony on the Amber Coast, mined sparkling stones there.

Despite the obvious belonging to the jewelry business and the comparative high cost of some amber products, the stone is not something overvalued. Although, in comparison with other minerals, it can cost buyers a substantial amount.

This is due to a large number of parameters, including their relatively simple extraction, and such a large number of deposits. There are places on every continent where the tears of the sea are found.

In general, all areas where amber mining is carried out are divided into two large provinces:

  1. Eurasian (here are the largest deposits).
  2. American.

Depending on the nature of resins, climate and other natural phenomena, these provinces are distinguished by different amber. Most of it is yellow-orange tones, but green and sometimes even blue ambers are also common. Red amber has been found in Spain and South Africa.

The largest deposits of amber are located on the territory of Russia. It is in the Kaliningrad region that the largest territory of amber manifestations has been created. Over 500 tons of gems per year are mined here. Then, when all over the world the number of raw materials extracted is approximately 800 tons.

The Baltic countries and Eastern Europe rank second in terms of amber mining.

Poland, for example, brings the weight of extracted materials up to 5-10 tons per year. Which is almost 100 times less than is mined in the Kaliningrad region.

Ural Gems

There are places in the world where various resources are often found, rocks rich in precious minerals. A similar case was with the Urals, where over the years of research, and sometimes just everyday experiments and accidents, there were various minerals, iron and ores. This is one of the most resource-rich regions of Russia.

It is also rich in reservoirs and rivers. It is obvious that amber in ancient times was washed out from the roots of trees, and could get anywhere, all over the world. That is why there are so many different small deposits of this value now. But the Urals, despite its productivity in the extraction of minerals, is not rich in amber. Among sea stones, iron ores and other resources, some found pebbles that looked like amber in all respects. But large deposits in that region were never discovered.

Many finds occurred in 1960-70. This indicates that the deposits of the gifts of the sun were not there as deposits, but simply by chance, back in ancient times, they came from other places, washed out by the change and flow of underwater rivers.

But for geologists and researchers, there is still a reason to search for large deposits of stones of interest to them. The Ural region is rich in various raw materials, and amber is often found in the most unpredictable places. Maybe in the future the search for amber in the Urals will be crowned with success.

Amber mining process

The earth is rich in this gem, so it is found all over the world. But especially large deposits stand out for a reason.

There are not so many places where you can find amber. They are looking for him:

  1. In the "blue land".
  2. On the beaches, dry ponds.
  3. In large accumulations of gravel, zinc.

Despite this small variety, amber is very actively mined. This is a good business, especially if the deposits are large. But even today, almost two hundred years later, since people began to mine gems for commercial purposes, the technology has not changed much. Modern equipment, motor boats, digging combines were added, but the main work still remained manual.

Amber is a very fragile mineral, so there is no point in entrusting its search and processing to machines.

Over the past two centuries, on the beaches and shallow waters where amber is mined, more than 60 million tons of amber have been collected by seekers. But this is a very limited way of searching, since there is almost no amber in these places, and it is almost impossible to find it just by walking along the beach. Therefore, people stepped forward and started catching the tears of the sea.

It was enough to understand that since amber is brought to the shore by sea waters, then somewhere there, in the depths, those stones, which for some reason did not hit the shore, probably also remained. For the extraction of amber from the sea, special nets (4-6 m long) were used, with the help of which they searched for amber stuck in marine debris and algae. This method still exists, but it is usually combined with others.

The largest amber deposit is located in the so-called "blue lands": the name does not come from the color of amber that is found there (usually green shades). This is a rock that has a lot of sandy material, which is mixed with clay particles.

There is also a lot of quartz and zinc, which often becomes a signal of the presence of amber. Deposits of this kind provide a large amount of raw materials, and the method of such extraction is considered the most rational. To do this, they dig large quarries (often somewhere up to 30 meters), with the help of powerful water pressure - the unnecessary is washed out, and the “blue earth” remains.

After washing and sorting, amber is mined from the blue earth. The found gem is sent to laboratories for study and processing, and then it goes to factories and plants. There it is given the desired shape.

After all, amber does not always look like it is on the shelves of jewelry stores. Yes, it is very often smooth, because for many years it was washed by water. But its shape, as a rule, is unnatural and uneven. It is the task of the jeweler to process the stone in such a way that it fits this or that piece of jewelry.

The largest amber deposit is located in the Baltic zone. Here is a large amber quarry, known throughout the world. It was he who made the Kaliningrad region the center of extraction of this beautiful gem. The village of Yantarny (formerly known as Palmniken) became the place where the world's largest amber plant is located, where amber mining does not stop.

Until recently, the only deposit of amber on the planet was considered to be well-known to many Baltic. However, about 200 more places of occurrence of this solar stone have recently been discovered and studied. Most of them are within Europe. But there are such deposits also in Asia, South and North America, Australia.

Where to find amber in Russia

In Russia, as well as in the whole world, the main deposit of solar stone is still Baltiyskoe. It is located near the village of Yantarny on the Baltic Sea. Hundreds of tons of amber are mined here every year. However, in Russia there are also small deposits of this stone in the Urals and Sakhalin. A very large field - Kolesovo-Dubrovitskoye - was discovered not so long ago in Ukraine.


To find out more precisely where to find amber, you should first of all study the layout of its deposits on the map. Sunstone deposits are located on Earth in the form of a grid of straight and broken lines. Below is the "amber" grid for Central Europe.



The richest amber-bearing vein runs on this map, as you can see, from the Yutlad peninsula through the Kaliningrad region and Finland. Further, it stretches towards the Kola Peninsula, and then passes through the Arctic Ocean towards the "Amber Crown" of the planet.

Can private individuals mine gems in Russia?

Free diligence in our country, unfortunately, is prohibited by law. You can search for gems and gold, but only after concluding an agreement with some large mining company. Although the authorities, for example, in some regions of the Urals periodically promise to allow free mining of gems by ordinary people, such a law has not yet been adopted at the moment (2017). Therefore, the information below is provided to the reader for informational purposes only. Of course, it is not worth engaging in black diligence before the adoption of the relevant law. This can result in a large fine or even criminal liability. In Ukraine, prospecting is also prohibited by law.

Features of offshore production

The simplest answer to the question of where to find amber is, of course, the Baltic Sea. In this region, the extraction of solar stone, in principle, can be carried out even simply using nets. In particular, there are many stones on the coast and shallow water appears during small storms. During this period, the water throws out a lot of solar pebbles. Silt and debris are picked up with a net. Further, they are simply viewed for the presence of amber. In this way, you can get quite a lot of stones, including quite large ones. Most of the amber in the Baltic was once found in those places where a lot of black mud was nailed by the sea.


Sometimes amber on the Baltic Sea after a storm can be found right on the shore - in the sand. Too much sun stone in this way, of course, you will not get. But with a certain amount of patience, it will still be possible to find several small ambers (and possibly large ones).

Mining on water pipes

This method of searching for amber is used mainly in Ukraine. Water pipes (mines) are located in this country along the banks of rivers. Finding them is quite difficult. But the thing is still quite doable. There are water pipes, by the way, not only in Ukraine, but also in many other places on the planet. In Russia, they can also be searched along the banks of rivers. By the way, in water pipes you can find not only amber, but also other gems and even diamonds. Such mini-mines can be hollows on the shore flooded with water, stone "rivers", etc. Experienced prospectors also determine the pipes by color (usually it is darker or lighter than the main rock). Such mines can be located both on the shore and directly in the water. In Ukraine, natural amber lies in them at a depth of about 5 meters. The companion of the sun stone in this country is always blue or blue clay.


Amber in the forest and near the river

Unfortunately, there is no reliable information about the finds of amber in the forests of Russia. However, it is known for sure that in the Zhytomyr region prospectors find amber right in the coniferous forests. In this case, their helpers are often, oddly enough, moles. Digging out passages, these animals "carry out" to the surface, including blue clay. And she, as already mentioned, is a constant companion of amber. Seeing blue clay in a molehill, prospectors simply dig a few meters deep in this place.


How to find amber in the forest, we found out. But sometimes this stone can be found just on the surface of the earth along the banks of rivers. In this case, it is better to search in the spring after a flood or after a heavy rain. At this time, the water washes out of the ground a lot of the stones in it, among which it may be. It is also believed that the best time to search is early spring. During this period, there is still no vegetation on the banks. And consequently, the stones are more visible.



The easiest way to find amber on the river bank is with the help of an ultraviolet flashlight. Such a device today can be purchased at almost any kiosk. Under ultraviolet rays, amber, unlike other stones, begins to glow with a very beautiful blue light. You can also distinguish sunstone from other minerals by weight. The stone is actually very light. By weight, it resembles, for example, the same rosin.

In this article:

Amber goes through a rather long way: from mining to getting on the shelves of jewelry stores. It is interesting to learn about how amber is mined for the owners of the stone, as well as for people who want to connect themselves with such a business.

Amber mining in the Kaliningrad region in the village of Nadezhdino

Cured resin deposits

Now there are both official and illegal deposits. This phenomenon is called "amber fever". The increased activity of black diggers is associated with an increase in stone prices. If it is legal to do business, then before mining amber, you should go through several stages: such as assessing the amount of amber in the soil in the territory, and the profitability of the mining business. Usually, the following terms are used:

  • Category A1 - stones that have passed all the mining stages, they can be safely removed from the soil. This is the so-called prepared stock.
  • Category A2 - sufficiently studied stones in the soil, which are suitable for mining.
  • Category B - reserves that can be extracted.
  • Category C1 - the intended location of amber.
  • Category C2 - promising deposits.

If we talk about the period up to the 80s of the XX century, then the miners considered only the Baltic basin to be an amber deposit. It was there that the industrial extraction of hardened resin was carried out. But soon scientists, in particular, Schlee, found out that absolutely any resin can be considered amber, which originated from the resin from a tree and has been in the ground for more than a million years. Therefore, now even amber from leguminous plants, which is mined in the Dominican Republic, as well as in African countries, can be considered a natural stone.

One of the classifications is even built on an amber deposit. Depending on the mining country, the stone receives a certain shade, impurities or inclusions, consistency and other properties. If we talk about deposits by territory, then today they distinguish:

  1. Baltic (which includes Russia, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Poland).
  2. Ukrainian.
  3. Dominican.

Slightly less known are American, African, Japanese amber deposits. In total, there are up to two hundred stone mining sites. But the search for frozen resin does not stop, and exploration and geological work is underway in less explored areas.

Mining process

The development is carried out by the screw-hydraulic method, it is absolutely safe for both the stone and the environment. With its help, several wells with a diameter of 80 centimeters are made. Amber can be obtained from such wells by drilling. In this case, the rock rises to the surface under hydraulic pressure in the form of a pulp, where it is then washed, cleaned of sandy-clayey rocks and amber is found. The maximum depth of the well after such an installation is 15 meters.

But this method is considered the most modern, and it all started like this:

  • In ancient times, amber was collected by hand on the shores of the Baltic Sea. According to historians, 60 thousand tons of stone were collected by this method.
  • A few decades later, people began to use nets with which they caught amber on the seashore. The stone was taken out together with algae.
  • In the 16th and 17th centuries, people were already engaged in scooping up stone from the seabed with the help of scrapers, pincers and other primitive devices. They also carried out harrowing of coastal zones. Amber tends to float in salt water. This is exactly what the miners were counting on, that after loosening the earth, the stone will float to the surface, where it can be collected. But at the beginning of the 20th century, it became unprofitable from an economic point of view to search for amber in this way.

raw amber

The thing is that if you destroy the deposits of amber, the stone will easily spread over the entire surface of the water or other territory. This is how redeposition of amber occurs. Therefore, sometimes a stone is found in places where the growth of coniferous trees and the formation of hardened resin were not originally expected. In the process of spreading over the surface with the help of water, amber rolls, loses its weathering crust, and also breaks into pieces. Therefore, the value of such a stone may be lower than that of amber mined in primary deposits.

Today, amber is mined either by auger-hydraulic method, or through the formation of open pits. In the open method, miners form a quarry, break waste rocks and expose layers of "blue earth". "Blue Earth" includes quartz, glauconite, as well as clay and amber itself. But this technique is dangerous because the upper waste rock is sent to the dump and over time a landslide can occur, which will fill up all the equipment and the opened "blue earth".

In this article:

The village of Yantarny in the Kaliningrad region is the capital of the sun stone. There is a plant where nuggets are mined. The Kaliningrad region contains 90% of the world's stone reserves. There are other regions where amber is mined in Russia.

The stone is found in the earth's crust in certain rocks. The structure of deposits is simple. They contain clay-sand and gravel deposits. If the placer turns out to be promising, they start exploration. Known deposits in Russia:

  1. Baltic.
  2. North Siberian.
  3. Far East.

The largest deposit is Palmnikenskoye. The old site has been mothballed, and development is underway on the other two - Plyazhny and Primorsky. Amber reserves of 300 thousand tons are concentrated in the Kaliningrad region.

Extraction of raw amber

The area of ​​the Primorsky quarry is 1.5 million square meters. Sand containing nuggets is located at a depth of 40–60 meters. Pieces of different sizes are extracted from the bowels of the earth. There are large specimens.

In 2016, a nugget weighing 2.7 kg was found on the territory of the plant. The largest specimen (12 kg) was found in the 19th century on the Baltic Sea.

In the northwest of the peninsula, fossil resin is found at a depth of 8–10 meters. In the Kaliningrad region there are deposits of amber of shallow occurrence. There are deposits of resin in the Urals and in the Primorsky Territory.

The plant is the only enterprise where the stone is mined. More than 100 million products are made from the raw materials of this plant. The company produces about 300 tons annually. More than 70% of the amber sold in the world comes from Kaliningrad.

There are rare minerals on the territory of the region. The history of the region is connected with the extraction of resin.

In 2014, the plant was transformed into a JSC. The company's shares were transferred to the Rostec Corporation. Profit increased to 143 million rubles due to the following transformations in the industry:

  • technical re-equipment;
  • technologies;
  • new shops.

The plant's products are raw amber. The fishing season starts at the end of March. Most of the products (raw materials) are shipped abroad. From the rest make jewelry and bijouterie. The subsidiary Yuvelirprom manufactures and sells its products.

Mining technologies

Russian amber is mined using machinery. They dig a pit, where they find "blue earth". Today the largest quarry is Primorsky.

A walking excavator extracts the "blue earth". Then they are poured into a cone and washed out with hydromonitors. Below are people who catch large stones with nets. To prevent theft, workers are prohibited from picking up fallen objects from the ground.

"Blue Earth" enters the plant. Production stages:

  1. Screening of stone through gratings.
  2. Selection of large pieces.
  3. The earth enters the sieve.
  4. Amber is passed through arc sieves.
  5. Raw materials are sent to the separator. Remains of wood flake off the stone.
  6. Drying.
  7. Sorting of material.
  8. Grinding.
  9. Some specimens are processed at t = 200 degrees Celsius. When heated, the color changes and the plasticity of the material improves.

Where is the mineral mined in an open pit? There are two quarries in the Kaliningrad region - Palmnikenskoye and Primorskoye deposits. The most efficient way of mining from open pits. In the village of Yantarny, development is carried out in this way.

If the layers are deep, rotary-hydraulic equipment is used, which consists of modules. The units are mounted on pneumatic and caterpillar tracks. The equipment is operated by three people.

With the use of modern technologies and instruments, the surface of the deposit is not damaged.

Amber catchers

Locals collect Russian amber in an ancient way. After a storm, the sea throws pieces of the mineral ashore. Then the catchers go out in search of nuggets. Suitable conditions are a small wave, sun and clear water.

The hardest thing about catching amber is the waiting. They work with a net. The found stone is taken out of the net, being in the water. Smaller ones are chosen on the shore. If you're lucky, you can collect one kg in a few hours.

The second option is to collect the mineral using special equipment. For this use:

  • diver's construction;
  • hook;
  • compass;
  • waterproof flashlight.

Stone hunters do this not only for money. These are romantics who hunt for luck. For them, finding a stone is a hobby. The more experienced dive for nuggets in scuba gear, but this is a dangerous trade. Cold water, the weight of the structure is 50 kg - these are the working conditions for divers.

Mineral hunters dive for it at night. The nugget glows at the bottom of the sea in the dark, so it's easy to find. The mineral is sought at a shallow depth - 3–12 meters.

The coastal nugget is larger. The average size of specimens is two to three centimeters. The stone has characteristics that are different from resins from other deposits. There are 250 varieties of the Baltic nugget.

Nature endowed Russian amber with colors and properties. In the hands of the artist, the inner beauty of the mineral is revealed. A variety of jewelry is made from fossil resin. There are often inclusions in the stone - insects.

Processing and assembly of mineral products is painstaking work. For a shift at the factory, 25 strings of beads are strung.

Amber fishers create small workshops. Equipment is used for such work:

  • cutting;
  • grinding;
  • polishing;
  • melting.

Only experienced craftsmen can work with the material at home. The stone is taken with unprotected hands and processed on machines. The disks rotate at a speed of two thousand revolutions per minute. There are more than 100 workshops in the Kaliningrad region.