Seven-year-old boy goes viral after finding Australian sapphire worth thousands in Outback dirt just metres from his home
A seven-year-old boy has been praised online after finding a 14.5-carat sapphire worth up to $10,000 just 200 meters from his home.
Riley Betteridge discovered the precious stone in the middle of Queensland’s gem fields at Rubyvale, near Rockhampton, on Monday.
Riley, still in his school uniform, excitedly runs to his father Matt to show him the rare stone in a now viral TikTok video.
“That looks really good, buddy,” he tells Riley after inspecting it with a headlight.
“That’s by far your best rock yet.”
In the now viral footage, Riley – still in his school uniform – is seen excitedly running towards his father Matt to have him inspect the stone with a headlamp (pictured)
Matt and Amber Betteridge run their family business Betteridge Sapphires from the heart of the state’s mining region in Central Queensland.
They revealed that Riley had been hunting for sapphires since he was just three years old, when he saw a stone on his father’s shoulders.
“He has an eye for it,” Mr. Betteridge said Yahoo News.
“That’s about 300 yards, maybe 200 yards from home.”
Ms Petterson, who cuts and polishes the stones, said Riley’s sapphire appears to have no internal fractures and can fetch up to $10,000.
“The final color will make all the difference,” she said, explaining that brighter colors tend to yield more than darker shades.
The family has decided to leave the stone’s fate in Riley’s hands.
Footage of his incredible find has been viewed nearly two million times on TikTok, with many viewers leaving congratulatory messages for the seven-year-old.
“That sure gave him a day off,” one person joked.
‘I’m amazed he knew exactly what he was looking for! We’ve probably all picked something up, thought it was a rock and thrown it away!’ said another.
Amber Betteridge found the precious gemstone (pictured) on her property in Rubyvale
Mrs Betteridge was walking with her baby (pictured) this weekend when she and her husband made the shocking discovery
Matt (pictured), Mrs. Betteridge’s husband, regularly uploads Tiktok videos showing off sapphires
It comes just weeks after Mrs Betteridge found a sapphire worth $2,000 deep in the ground while carrying her baby daughter.
The eagle-eyed mother was seen in a TikTok video carrying her nine-month-old daughter Elise as she searched for the gems.
Using her fingers and a small stone she found nearby, she began digging the mineral out of the ground and discovered a 54-carat parti sapphire (a parti sapphire has two or more different colors).
She told Daily Mail Australia she was shocked when she found the stone.
“What we thought would be a little gem that wasn’t really worth anything turned out to be this sapphire with a beautiful piece of crystal in it,” she said.
‘It has an absolutely stunning parti colour’.
Mr. Betteridge collects the sapphires in their underground mine with only a pick and a shovel. He found an 834-carat sapphire worth an estimated $12,500 in the mud during an evening walk two years ago.
Australia is one of the few places in the world where parti sapphires are found after the gemstones were first discovered by prospectors in the 1850s.