MINING INDUSTRY

Hokitika Guardian, 10 September 1929, Page 8

MINING INDUSTRY

(Contributed). 1 The gold saving system of washing the gravel, applied in dredge mining, may be said to be the most rational as well as most perfect metal-' saving method in present use, and as a result the concentrates from dredge tailings may ho expected to carry but a low value in gold.

Tho black sand of the beaches T epresents nature’s work of concentration depending upon the surf, is ever fitful and changing, forming a thin layer of almost pure black iron sands, occasionally quite rich in gold, also to some ■extent platinum may be found.

Black sands should be considered as the concentrates of the gravel deposits and may be compared with the concentrates obtained in milling the metalliferous ores to which they aie related and from which they are partly derived. Their treatment should in essentials, follow the standing rule that experience has dictated in the manipulation of gold ores. When fully understood and intelligently developed the heavy sands of the gravel and beacli deposits cannot fail to add much to the mineral wealth of New Zealand. It should, however, always he borne in mind that these comparatively little known and lately often misrepresented auriferous sands exist not as a natural product, ready f° r the miner, the investor or the speculator but must he brought forth by intelligent effoits of man, in this instance greatly assisted by the always present and ever active forces of nature.

Many attempts have been made to recover the gold from the black sand found on our beaches but few have been able to save much of the gold and none have been able to save all of it. Most of the attempts have been’ failures and for the man who at last solves the riddle will have an almost unlimited amount of material awaiting him. It is getting on for. nearly a year ago that the question of prospecting for gold and other minerals attracted the attention of those interested in the advancement of our mining industry in this locality. It is a matter of surprise nothing has been Rone by the Mines Department as prospecting will never be carried out satisfactorily unless more generous assistance is given, as the easily won gold is of the past and the prospector of to-day has to go back into the country.