I am currently working on bavenite as next month’s Mineral Snippet for the Monthly Mineral Chronicles.
I have a specimen from Alpe Rosso, Orcesco, Druogno, Verbano-Cusio-Ossola Province, Piedmont, Italy, and it is labelled simply bavenite.
Now bavenite is present, on a quartz matrix with some green clinochlore. When I took a photo, I noticed a few crystals that didn’t fit. One blocky one, and a couple of thin bladed ones with pointed terminations. The former clearly not a quartz crystal, and the latter, not bavenite. Potential Hidden Collection additions!
I initially suspected that they could be other beryllium-bearing minerals. Mindat lists ten species: Bavenite, Bertrandite, Beryl, Bityite(?), Chrysoberyl, Hydroxylgugiaite, Meliphanite, Milarite, Phenakite, and Roggianite.
I figured the blocky one might be phenakite, and the bladed one bertrandite. So I consulted Goldschmidt’s Atlas der Krystallformen. There are 112 crystal drawings of phenakite, and 50 of bertrandite. No. 28 phenakite looks quite similar, and No. 16 of bertrandite. I have inserted those into the second photo below.
Below: Bavenite, Alpe Rosso, Orcesco, Druogno, Verbano-Cusio-Ossola Province, Piedmont, Italy. Width of view 3.75mm.

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