DREDGING PRACTICE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22987, 16 September 1936, Page 4

DREDGING PRACTICE

ro THE EDITOR Sir, —The recent survey of gold mining by the Minister of Mines, and his clear-cut statement that his department would assist a proved venture, is the right way to reassure the timid investor. The Otago Witness of May 25, 1910, published an interesting letter bearing on this particular aspect of proving ground. "Kotuku" wrote: — " Mr Cutten is quite in order when he laments the New Zealander's disinclination to prospect. They even carry this disinclination with them when they go abroad, as, e.g., in the San Juan del Rey expedition a few years back, which, unfortunately, occurred at a time when the interest of London investors was just beginning to turn towards gold dredging. With regard to gold saving, would Mr Cutten mind explaining how it has happened that in spite of the fact that, while different localities and classes of gold may require different systems of tables, the Philips-Holmes tables have been in almost universal use on the dredges designed by the writer's firm for over 10 years? The brutal fact is that, while New Zealand practice is little more advanced than at the date when the first New Zealand plans reached America, the Yankees have been busily trying to develop the machine both as an excavator and a dividend payer. The almost invariable ill-fortune—commer-cially speaking—which has been the portion of gold dredges of London origin may have something to do with the mental attitude of the investors who make ' inquiries from time to time in London for dredges of the American type.' Neither will the exhibition of such antiquated machines as the Hartley and Riley as emblematic of modern New Zealand practice tend to turn the tide." . . . The above is interesting in view of the fact that the two dredges—modern machines—now being constructed on the Molyneux are of London origin and capital. Do they measure up to the Minister's standard of " proved" ventures for such costly outlay? Was he consistent when he had the Mining Act altered to suit these ventures which have not been " proved " —by boring?— I am, etc., Alpine. Cromwell.