GEOLOGICAL SURVEY

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1539, 7 September 1912, Page 14

GEOLOGICAL SURVEY

The annual report of the -Geological Survey-Branch of tho Mines Department 'states that detailed field work has been under way in the-Buller-Mokihinui and Aroha subdivisions. The completion of the first-named survey will occupy Ihe greater part of another field season. Dr. Allen Thomson, palaeontologist, commenced work on the fossils collected by the old geological survey under Sir James Hector. He has been working mostly witli the collections from the late cretaceous and tertiary strata. Selections from the-palaeozoic nnd mesozoic fossils- have been forwarded to various specialists, who have volunteered assistance. Exploratory work by the Wcstport-Stockton Company has shown that an area within their jeaso considered barren by Cox and Denniston is in great part coal-bearing. On tho other hand workable coal appears to be absent from a. considerable area mapped as coal-bearing, N.E. of Millerton, although the coal horizon is present. Alluvial gold has been found at many places within the Buller-Mokihinui subdivision, but there is no possibility of alluvial gold .being found in quantity in the area examined, though small patches of a few ounces may be discovered at any spot on or near exposures of the Greenland rocks. The auriferous quartz veins also seem disappointing. A discovery of tertiary fossils in' the Weka Pass stone is of some geological interest, as Park had recently thrown doubt on their presence, although it had never beeu a matter of doubt to Haast, Mitton, Hector, and Mivay.