Douglas Island news., 1907-08-21
Hydraulic Mining.

that in recent times, probably post
 glacial, there was change in the drain
 age channels in British Columbia, and
 as a result the former river channels
 are not the present waterways. Most
 of the gold in the rich placer diggings came from these old river channels
 through concentration by the present
 streams and as they are low grade they
 can be best mined by hydraulicking.
 In the Yukon Territory, north of Brit
 ish Columbia, near the city of Dawson,
 the famous White Channel deposit is estimated to contain between S6O,OOO,- GOO and SlOOO00,OOO in gold, but it will cost several millions of dollars to con- vey water to it for washing purposes; this is being done by strong American mining companies.
 The gold nuggets in the rich shallow creek deposits vary In appearance in the different creeks of a single region, and it is possible for one with eXperi- ence to tell with certainty from what creeks they were taken. The nuggets from the upper portions of the streams are generally angular and large but they become smaller and smoother as they descend the stream owing to the increased wearing they receive. The gold found in gravel that is worked by hydraulic means is generally so fine that mercury is required to collect 1t. Gravel carrying 6 to . cents per cubic yard cannot be pro1tably worked in British Colum bia pnless provided with !! railroad facilities. Gravel containing 10 cents per cubj yard can be worked 1 at a small profit, the average value of hydraulic gravel in the Cariboo region is about 20 cents per cable yard. At a large mine in this region the cost of recovering the gold was about 8 cents per cubic yard which is about twice the cost in California, the difference being due to the greater cost of supplies and . everything else connected with the . work in a region remote from rail . road. Gravel as low as 3 cents per cubic yard has been protitably worked . in California and the same can doubt i less be done in British Columbia with . railroad facilities which will be fur nished in the near future. Many of the enormous banks of auriferous gray el in the Cariboo region are situated | favorably for hydraulicking. Where the gravel is fine it is liable to contain thin faky gold which is hard to recover. i In the ordinary hydraulic gravel, which . runs from 10 to 15 cents per cubic yard a person could pan all day and not get . a color, so it is necessary to use a "rocker" and thus wash or } cubic . yards to see colors of gold.
 Some bars situated on the Fraser River have been worked constantly dur i ing the last 10 years in exactly the same place; men are able to make wages !. of several dollars per day washing these bars from year to year, showing that the gold comes down the river annually 1 in the spring floods. All of the rivers iu the Fraser watershed have flood | season in the spring and an average rise of 50 to 50 feet above the lower summer stage is not an uncommon experience for the Fraser River itself.
 A miner can pan carefully only about 1 cubic yard of gravel day of 10 hours and therefore gravel below B or S4 a 1! yard could not be profitably worked in this way. Occasionally miner strikes an unusually rich gravel; one miner has been known to obtain about S900 from a single pan of gravel in the Cariboo region, the gravel being situated on, bed rock, and the succeeding pans aV- eraged from $500 to s4O0 This, of course, is exceptional, but it is occas' ional pans of this value that keep up the excitement of the prospector.-I From Mines and Minerals for August.
 S,;kI.o bo, IoFe toP yo;p b,,F ,oOu, tbayy