Amber is a hardened tree resin, consisting of compounds of terpenes,
alcohols, and esters. Trees produced it as protection against disease and insect infestation. The chemical composition of the resin acted as desiccant and
antibiotic which caused that animals like insects and non-insects (i.e. mosquitoes, flies, spiders, ants and their eggs and emerging
larvae) and lizards and frogs, when caught as inclusions in the resin, they were entrapped and preserved as dehydrated fossil amber
inclusions, but without the shrinking effect dehydrations usually causes. They were kept as fossil inclusions in such a way that their
cellular structure and even fragments of the DNA can still be found today. This fact gave way to the background story of Spielberg's movie
'JURASSIC PARK'Amber from the Dominican Republic is renowned for
the diversity of inclusions it contains. Amber lovers, scientists and collectors alike value Dominican Amber for
the three rare "treasures", which are scorpions,
lizards and frogs. Probably only 30 to 40 scorpions, 10 to 20 lizards and 8 or 9 frogs have been found worldwide.
A piece of Dominican amber was discovered in 1997 and valued at over 50,000 US$. Why? I contained a small frog,
preserved in a magnificent way. The occurrence of insects as inclusions in Dominican Amber is about 10 times higher than in
Baltic amber.
Enhydros (air and water inclusions) may enhance the colour effect and add beauty to a piece of amber, even dust
particles and stalactite formations might be interesting for scientists, jewelers and collectors alike. But inclusions like plants, insects,
worms or even small vertebrates are even more fascinating. Most specimens are
rather small and large size pieces with rare inclusions are highly valuable. In addition, the visibility and the
position of the inclusion inside the amber specimen are important factors.
This is an (incomplete) list of amber inclusions that can be found in Dominican amber:
Insects, Non-insects and
Vertebrates
Plants and others
We have our main office in the Dominican Republic, directly at the source. It is our aim to povide a constant stream of interesting, sometimes extreme collectors specimens not many suppliers will have available.
You are invited to go immediately to our
or hang around and just look at some of our highlights.
As an example, in this extraordinary specimen of Dominican amber you will find trapped a menagerie of exclusivities.
Just as an example:
Yes, it is certainly a scorpion (buthidae). Not very large, but complete. Arms turned backwards, swimming to get out of the resin. Well, he didn't quite make it. But this is not all.
This is an interesting spider. A Harvestman or Harvest Spider - which basically is techinacally not a spider, but a 'arachnid' with eight legs. In this case more like a 'Harvestwoman'.
Very rare in amber.
And together with the scorpion in the same tomb.
Yes, these inclusions are in the same piece of amber.
Beside the very large termites and ants and other creatures.
This specimen was for sale at