276 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



a mile southeast of Bushes Corners, and is reached most con- 

 veniently from Croghan, the terminus of a branch railroad from 

 Lowville. Altogether four narrow pegmatite bands were noted, 

 each scarcely more than 1 inch wide, exposed on the face of a 

 sloping ridge for a distance of 25 feet. The flakes are relatively 

 coarse and will average from one-quarter of an inch to one inch in 

 diameter. Traces of the mineral are found at other points along 

 the same ridge. A hill of coarse red gneiss, one-half of a mile south 

 of Stifts schoolhouse, west of the highway, also shows its occur- 

 rence. The locality is one that seems to warrant more careful 

 search and possibly some exploration in the hope of uncovering 

 some larger pegmatite veins than those now exposed, which are on 

 the whole fairly rich. 



Perhaps the most promising locality of all in respect to actual 

 content of molybdenite in the ore is that on the Owens farm about 

 5 miles north of Peekskill. The place is just south of the Catskill 

 aqueduct on the west side of Sprout Brook valley. It is now a 

 part of the Stuyvesant Fish estate. The occurrence consists of 

 rusty gneiss which forms a hard ledge traceable for several hundred 

 feet and is made up largely of pyroxene of green color in fresh 

 fracture. The rusty color results from the presence of pyrrhotite 

 that occurs in scattered grains. The rock is of contact nature, an 

 altered limestone undoubtedly, but neither limestone nor granite was 

 noted in the immediate vicinity. It carries disseminated flakes of 

 molybdenite, and in one place so abundantly as to constitute a 

 fairly rich ore, that is containing 2 or 3 per cent of the sulphide. 

 The flakes are small and average scarcely more than one-eighth of 

 an inch in diameter. It would appear that the richly impregnated 

 zone that is now exposed is of small compass, probably only a few 

 feet in diameter. If a considerable body of the ore like that now 

 exposed in the ledge could be found, it would undoubtedly be of 

 commercial importance. 



NATURAL GAS 

 The decline in the production of natural gas that had been under 

 way in the preceding two or three years was checked in 191 6 when 

 a campaign of active exploration succeeded in bringing in some new 

 supplies large enough to counteract the material falling off in the 

 older wells. Although a considerable addition to the flow was made, 

 no very important discovery occurred that could be considered as 

 promising a material enlargement of the productive territory. The 

 last event of this kind was in 191 2, when the Orchard Park field 



