Orange Sea Glass

According to most experts on sea glass, orange is the single rarest color we sea glass enthusiasts might find out there.

Because I beach comb a lot, I have had the good fortune to find quite a few pieces of orange glass, over the years. For many collectors, though, a piece of orange will remain something they only hope to find, but it never actually shows up.

There are good reasons why orange sea glass is so rare. If you think about it, where have you actually seen orange glass, to begin with? It's not a color that was ever used for any "production" or "large scale manufacturing" of glass. There are no orange bottles, that I know of. Orange glass dish ware? Not something I have seen.

I have found that you can always get a good idea of the sources for older sea glass by making a visit to your local antique mall and looking at the old glassware and bottles the vendors have for sale. You really are not likely to find much, in the way of orange glass.

There are a few "known" sources of older "production" orange glass. A limited number of automotive turn signals on older cars from an era where such things were still made of glass, rather than plastic. Same with a small number of lens covers on "caution" lamps and lanterns used for road works barriers, for example.

Another source for orange sea glass is "Amberina" art glass, which was first made in the 1880's but still in pretty limited amounts. It was in production into the 1960's and is generally the source for "two toned" pieces of orange sea glass because it was a mixed red and orange.

But even when we can identify the source of a particular color of glass, we still have another factor to consider: What's the likelihood that glass will make it into the ocean?

Aside from the scarcity (or not) of the original glass, you have to consider the nature of it breaking and being discarded. Since colors like clear, brown and green tends to be "utility glass" it is also more likely to get broken and discarded as a natural part of use. And so, it will get thrown away... finding its way to dumps, some of them by the sea side. Or someone might enjoy a beer at a seaside picnic and toss the bottle in the ocean... and it becomes sea glass.

But people aren't going to have their orange Amberina glass AT the seaside. And if it breaks, out comes the superglue, rather than the trash can. And when an orange turn signal on a car, or a lamp at a road works barrier gets broken, it's going to be on a road somewhere, not on a beach. And that's where part of the rarity comes from. In order for that turn signal to become sea glass, it has to be swept up, put in the trash, that trash hauled to a seaside dump... and then pushed into the ocean, all of which has to have happened during a time before environmental protection laws made it completely illegal to push trash into the ocean.

Two-toned, from "Amberina"

So we have two rarity factors at work, when it comes to orange sea glass: One, orange is simply uncommon, as glass. Two, it's unlikely to be broken somewhere where it will even make it to the beach.

Mixed in here are some of the pieces of orange sea glass I have found, over the years. As you can see, true orange is extremely bright, and quite different from various "golden amber" tones that often get mistaken as being orange.

Finding a piece of orange is a "true treasure" for any sea glass collector.

Orange Sea Glass: The Slow "Extinction" of a Rare Color

Fall beach combing is always a bit of a mixed bag.

On the upside, fall means a couple of things, around here. One, "tourist season" is over, which means the pervasive "overpicking" of our local beaches slowly tapers off. Two, the season winds start picking up again after the doldrums of summer, and occasionally we get a good storm or two which will churn up something more than the top couple of inches on the beach. These are good things, for the sea glass hunter.

On the downside, low tides now occur mostly at "awkward" times-- like 4 o'clock in the morning, when it's pitch black outside. The "windows of opportunity" for the sea glass hunter become smaller and shorter every day, and will continue to shrink until the beginning of the new year.

A couple of days ago, we had a brilliant sunny autumn day, so I decided to "get out there" (for the first time in a couple of months) and take advantage of a retreating tide towards sunset.

As I wandered and started spotting a few pieces of sea glass, I became quite aware of the "truth" of something sea glass enthusiasts often say and hear: That sea glass is a "vanishing treasure." I wrote an article about this recently, but this beach walk really underscored the truth of this statement, particularly as it applies to the rarer colors.

For some years now, I have been blessed to live in a place where there was a nice volume of variety of sea glass-- including rare colors. What I notice most-- as the years roll by-- is the relative absence of anything "rare," these days.

Of course, orange has never been anything but a rare color. It is generally regarded as the single rarest color in sea glass collecting-- although this depends somewhat on who you ask-- and many collectors will beach comb for a lifetime and never find a piece. I've been fortunate to live in a place where I used to be able to find maybe 6-8 pieces of genuine orange sea glass per year.

But that was "then" and this is "now." Orange sea glass-- as well as other "rare" colors-- seems to have become all but "extinct."

As I got towards the end of my beach walk-- after about four hours-- what I noticed was that my bag contained a fair amount of clear, brown and green glass, with a scattering of seafoam... and very little else.

When this little nugget (it's only about 3/8" or 10mm long) suddenly caught the late afternoon sun, it was a very exciting moment. But it also made me realize just how long it had been since I'd found a piece of orange sea glass. And where were the other rare colors? I found no red, no teal, no yellow, no pink, no purple.

Sea glass IS a "vanishing treasure" because we pick it up... and none of it-- especially in "odd" colors-- is being replaced. To the small degree we use commercially produced glass objects, they are rarely made "in colors." These days, we mostly use plastics for such things... glass is reserved for things we can make in "huge volumes." Aside from which, environmental regulations keep most glass off our beaches, so it never really has the opportunity to become sea glass, in the first place.

I feel grateful that I have had the opportunity to be a sea glass collector for so many years... years that happened before it became "too late."

A Winter Day on the Beach

In the wintertime, I take my beach combing opportunities when they come. As they say, "beggars can't be choosers," and during January the days with low tides during daylight hours are few and far between. Yesterday was one of those rare days, and it even turned out to be a fairly clear day-- although pretty "frosty."

Bright teal green

Now, to say that a day is "good" for beach combing during January had to be taken with a grain of salt. What it actually means is that I get to leave the house around 12:30, make a mad dash down the beach (about 3.5 miles/5.5km) while the tide is still quite high, in order to spend a couple of hours at my favorite beach combing spot... before it gets too dark and I have to make for home, again.

It's nice when these January outings happen to come on a clear day, as it affords me at least an extra 45 minutes of daylight. On a rainy day-- or even a day with heavy cloud cover-- it gets too dark to see what I am doing quite early. I know some people beach comb with a flashlight, but I have just never had much success with that.

It turned out to be a quite rewarding outing, even though I had my doubts, for a while.

The beach presents an ever-changing landscape, around here. Frequent storms and tides that fluctuate up to 12 feet between minimum and maximum means that rocks and sand constantly get moved around. On my walk out, I found myself having to traverse slippery soccer ball sized rocks, most of the way... and there was a thick layer of washed up seaweed in places-- the result of recent storms. Large rocks and seaweed are a combination that rarely bodes well, when your objective is to find sea glass.

Fortunately, as I got closer to one of the areas where I usually find some glass, some sandy patches started showing between the piles of large rocks. As the tide receded, a long thin line of sand and gravel stretched out before me... and I knew it was going to be a good day!

As most beach combers know, every day has it's own "character." Yesterday was a "lots of glass but few rarities" sort of day. Had I been interested in doing so, I could probably have picked up five pounds of clear and brown sea glass. Which, to most people's way of thinking (including mine!) is a LOT of sea glass. However-- aside from very unusual or perfect pieces-- I am really not very interested in the "common" colors, anymore.

Nugget of Amberina orange/red, as found yesterday

It was not until the very end of my day that a couple of lovely pieces found their way to me: A very BRIGHT and perfect nugget of red and orange "Amberina" glass-- a considerable rarity-- caught the dying rays of the sun and lit up like a little beacon. I tried to take a picture of it, but the effect was impossible to photograph. And just five minutes later, I found a beautiful nugget of vibrant blue-green glass (pictured at top)-- a shade of teal I very rarely come across.

And then it was time to head home, in the murk of a winter evening.

It felt good to be out there... and I felt pleased that this first outing of 2012 turned out as well as it did. I then paused to remind myself that as much as I enjoy finding sea glass, walking on the beach has always been "a meditation" for me. I'd still be "out there," even if there were no sea glass. However, the sea glass does offer a nice incentive!