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> Having spent so much time in the horse world I wonder if it's about the expenditure. If you spend a bunch of money on something, it's probably natural to get

> Having spent so much time in the horse world I wonder if it's about the expenditure. If you spend a bunch of money on something, it's probably natural to get more serious/nervous about it. (Though, for all I know, maybe rock collecting is expensive too.) Or maybe it's about how serious it is to a layman. Rocks are serious! Geologists write papers and hold conferences! Horses, stamps, model trains, people are passionate about them, but it's maybe a little funnier to the layman.

msrenee 6y ago
I've got a lot more money tied up in rocks than I'd like to admit. And I don't have any particularly nice specimens. I just buy what makes me happy. I pay $5-$30 per specimen. There's a lot of things I would like to buy in the $100-$1000 range, but they just don't make me that much happier than my little cheap rocks. Even just getting riding lessons is $30/hour in a cheap area in a low-cost facility. You can get a good horse for free, but board is $250/month, $500 for everything you need if you buy it used, plus vet and farrier bills. Definitely a higher initial cost and I sure don't buy $250 of rocks a month. But I don't think rocks are somehow more serious than horses. There's a lot to know about each and there's a ton of money to be spent on either. I honestly think it's just a culture thing. Horses come with status traditionally and rock collectors tend to just like rocks and then drinking a beer and talking about rocks. There's lots of down-to-earth horse owners and I'm sure there's some pompous asses in the rock collecting world. They just don't seem to be the majority.