Where to Find Jasper in Missouri

Standout jasper spots in Missouri

Hand-picked from the full list below, with the reason each one earns a trip.

• Lincoln

  Benton County County

  Lincoln sits at the heart of the mozarkite country in Benton County, the source of Missouri's official state rock, a multicolored gem chert that weathers out of the Mississippian Burlington and Warsaw limestones. Freshly broken cobbles show red, pink, purple, and green banding against gray, and the town hosts an annual mozarkite festival built around the material. It is one of the few places in the country where this specific gem chert occurs in collectible quantity.

• Daviess County

  Daviess County County

  Daviess County lies in the glaciated plains of northern Missouri, where Pleistocene ice sheets carried Lake Superior agates south from the Great Lakes basin and dropped them in glacial drift and stream gravels. Collectors work the area's creeks and the Grand River gravels for banded fortification agate, jasper, petrified wood, and fossils. The agates are tumble-rounded and frost-pitted, distinct from the local sedimentary chert.

• Gallatin

  Daviess County County

  Gallatin sits on the Grand River in glaciated Daviess County, and the river gravels here are a documented source of petrified wood, agate, jasper, and chalcedony reworked from glacial drift. It gives collectors a defined river-access point within the broader northwestern Missouri agate country. Petrified wood is the standout find, with pieces showing clear cell structure.

• Gentry County

  Gentry County County

  Gentry County in far northwestern Missouri lies squarely in glacial-drift country, where ice-rafted Lake Superior agates, jasper, and petrified wood are scattered through till and reworked into the area's stream gravels. It is one of the recognized northwest Missouri counties for agate hunting, alongside Daviess, Grundy, and Livingston. The agates carry the classic red-and-white fortification banding of the Lake Superior type.

• Grundy County

  Grundy County County

  Grundy County rounds out the cluster of glaciated northern Missouri counties that yield ice-transported Lake Superior agates, with mindat documenting Lake Superior agate from the county. Its creeks and the Thompson and Weldon river gravels rework glacial drift, freeing agate, jasper, and petrified wood. The material is the same banded, tumble-rounded agate prized by Midwest collectors.

• La Grange

  Lewis County County

  The Mississippi River gravels around La Grange in Lewis County carry gem-quality agate, chalcedony, jasper, petrified wood, and the occasional Keokuk geode, all concentrated by the river and reworked glacial drift. Older accounts of Missouri minerals single out the large gravel deposits near La Grange as a source of beautiful agate specimens. The mix of Lake Superior agate carried south by glaciers and local silica makes the river bars unusually varied.

Best counties for jasper in Missouri

Ranked by the number of mapped jasper spots. County links open the full rockhounding page for that county.

• Daviess County2 spots
• Benton County1 spot
• Gentry County1 spot
• Grundy County1 spot
• Lewis County1 spot
• Livingston County1 spot
• Madison County1 spot

Every jasper spot we track in Missouri

Sorted by county. Coordinates open in Google Maps.

Where else to find jasper

• Oregon36 spots
• New Mexico24 spots
• Utah22 spots
• Wyoming22 spots
• Texas19 spots
• California17 spots
• Nebraska15 spots
• Washington14 spots

More minerals to hunt in Missouri

• Pyrite36
• Calcite29
• Sphalerite24
• Quartz22
• Marcasite19
• Malachite18
• Galena17
• Barite14
• Chalcopyrite14
• Dolomite14