Historic Exploration and Discovery
This “first time” resource estimate defining a new deposit in Kerrs Township is the culmination of numerous exploration ventures beginning in the early 1960’s with the prospecting discovery of high grade glacial boulders sitting on top of the Munro Esker assaying up to 3 oz./ton Au near East Ford Lake. Notable exploration companies such as Dome Mines and Noranda carried out major exploration programs from 1979 to 1988. During that era, Noranda carried out systematic RC grid drilling which identified two up-ice basal till and esker geochem anomalies which were followed up with core drilling fence programs [15,024m] located west and south of Jam and Bell Lakes. The discovery hole K-87-16 intersected significant gold mineralization – 0.073 oz/ton Au over 34 feet (2.50 g/t over 10.4 m – core length) – within intervals of silicification and quartz-green carbonate altered volcanics. No work was done on the property between 1988 and late 2004, at which time Sage Gold Inc. had taken ownership via Newmont. Exploration work was resumed by Sage Gold Inc. in 2004 to 2007 and carried forward by Sheltered Oak Resources in 2008 to 2010 focused on the initial discovery holes near Bell Lake. During the phase 1 program, a significant breakthrough resulted in the understanding of the stratigraphic and structural relationships of the gold-bearing quartz-carbonate breccias with respect to a regional mafic/ultramafic contact. With this knowledge, a traditional economic geological approach was applied in the five successive drilling campaigns to prove up a deposit. The encouraging drilling results from these campaigns have defined the “Kerrs Quartz Green Carbonate Breccia [KBX] deposit” which is postulated to be the “up-ice glacial source” for the East Ford Lake boulder train.
The Munro Esker Complex is likely controlled by a major graben structure trending at Az 160, also coincident with the major ice transport direction. The axis of the graben structure also may be coincident with the dominant anticlinal fold axis transgressing the Kerrs Property along the east side of Jam Lake. High grade gold-quartz glacial boulders, recovered down ice from Bell Lake, ~1.5km south of the Kerrs property, have been assayed for gold / silver and analysed for multi-element ICP. Results show background levels of arsenic, copper, chrome and boron with enrichment of lead, consistent with typical analyses returned from the green carbonate breccia mineralization encountered in the Kerrs gold deposit which trends @ Az040o. High grade visible gold in this boulder sample assayed 91.5.g/t Au which is also similar to the higher grades observed in K-05-01 which returned 33.4 g/t over 0.44m and 20.9 g/t over 1.5m at vertical depths of 220m and 290m respectively. There is compelling evidence that the “East Ford Lake gold-bearing boulders” were glacially eroded from subcropings of the Kerrs Gold Deposit, possibly below and on strike of Bell Lake.
Geological Setting and Mineralization
The 3D geological sectional model defined by 41 holes including 3 historical holes, illustrates that the Kerrs quartz carbonate breccia deposit is stratabound occurring at the contact of a thick mafic pillow flow sequence overlying an ultramafic, magnetite-rich flow sequence. Also, quartz feldspar porphyry sills are spatially located above and below the breccia zones. This stratigraphy is draped on a shallow dipping synclinal fold structure varying from 350m to 425m below surface. The drill hole density has been systematic in all five drilling campaigns maintaining a 100 metre drill fence spacing arrayed along 9 sections with hole spacing ranging from 50 to 100 metres between pierce points along the cross-section plane. Seven holes were oriented orthogonal to the northeasterly strike direction of the deposit trend in order to define the boundaries of the mineral resource below Bell Lake. No major cross-faults were observed, however 2 cross-cutting mafic dykes locally bifurcate the breccia trend. Gold mineralization occurs as pyritized quartz vein breccias enveloped by quartz fuchsite carbonate vein breccias averaging ~10m and alteration envelopes varying up to 40 metres in thickness. Gold tenure is proportional to the pyrite content ranging up to 10% which is commonly disseminated and crystal aggregates in the sheeted, quartz vein replacement breccias. These breccias, averaging 31% quartz, exhibit reasonable correlation conforming to volcano-stratigraphic contacts as well as moderate to good continuity in grade correlations at the lower and upper boundaries of the vein breccia and alteration envelope assemblages. Anomalous concentrations of trace elements such as molybdenum, lead and barium are found within the replacement breccias and to a lesser extent in the green carbonate breccias which envelope the quartz-pyritic vein breccias.
Resource Estimation
The Kerrs Gold Deposit resource estimate is supported by 34 drill holes arrayed on a grid layout on nine drill fence sections with zone correlations involving 37 composite zones. A 3D solid model was generated from the cross-sections with interpreted mineral outlines which served as the basis to perform geometric and geostatistical calculations.
- The inferred resource defined to date comprises 7,041,460 tonnes at an average grade of 1.71 g Au/T and contains 386,467 troy oz of gold. These resources are reported at a base case cut-off grade of 0.5 g/t gold.