KAWARAU GOLD HUNT

Hokitika Guardian, 23 September 1926, Page 4

KAWARAU GOLD HUNT

|t CHAIRMAN EXPLAINS DELAY. “VYc have to wait until at least May, 0 1927. before the gates can be closed again ; therefore the directors have docided to cut down expenses to a mim,s mum ‘■The amount of gold won this year .7 will be comparatively negligible “Owing to the increased spring discharge from the tributaries, little virgin ground has been uneovered “It is .not reasonable to expect to get much gold until the ‘overburden’ has been removed, a process which entails considerable preliminary work “Owing to the short period of work which could be guaranteed, very few practical diggers could be induced to operate. .... “Only a superficial examination of l" ilie main river-bed was possible, and very little, if any, unworked ground was uncovered : ‘ Those are some of the statements made to si ia re hoi dors of the Consolidate' | ed Kawarnu Claims, Limited, by the chairman of directors, Mr A. P. Harper ju a report following the recent closing of the new dam. near Queenstown. for the first time. “The first news that came through the newspapers was pessimistic and expressed disappointment at the effect, lof closing the gates. Opinions, voiced by observers who had • little, if any. practical knowledge, were hastily formed. and published without proper consideration of the factors governing the position,” he writes. “Let me say that I have had experience in alluvial mining, both as digger, prospector! and investor, at intervals during the last 35 years, and that after > 1 an examination of the whole river and personally panning off prospects on many of our claims, my opinion coincides with that of my co-directors, namely, that we have more solid facts upon which to base our optimism than we. had before the gates were closed. ' In short, what was then an admitted “gamble” is now proved to be a legitimate mining venture. “Owing to various delays, upon J which criticism is with-held, the dam was not completed until the end of An- ' gust, or nine months after the estimated date, and by that time the spring | thaw was not- only raising the lake, hut also swelling the tributary streams; therefore for the purpose of effectively working uio Kawarau bed, the gates ‘ were clased several weeks too late. Thus, instead of a practically dry riverbed, the Kawarnu was carrying, from the tributaries alone, almost as much j. water as would he found in a normal winter before the clam‘was built.”