Diamond drilling on Cow Mountain at the Barkerville Gold Mines Cariboo Gold Project in east-central British Columbia. Photo courtesy Barkerville Gold Mines Ltd.
Barkerville Gold Mines Ltd. [BGM-TSXV; BGMZF-OTC; IWUB-FSE] on Wednesday February 20 reported final 2018 drilling results from the Island Mountain exploration and category conversion program at the company’s Cariboo Gold Project in central British Columbia.
Recent highlights from the Island Mountain Shaft Zone exploration and delineation program include 9.72 g/t gold over 14.4 metres in hole IM-18-169 located 15 metres from surface within a modelled vein corridor.
Drill hole IM-18-176 intersected 32.44 g/t gold over 3.0 metres within a higher grade intercept 97.80 g/t gold over 0.50 metres.
“These results, [as well as other highlighted results in the company’s press release] demonstrate grade and widths within the modelled vein corridors amenable to successful resource conversion,” the company said Wednesday.
Vein corridors are defined as a high-density network of mineralized veins within sandstones. These corridors have been defined from surface to a vertical depth of 300 metres and remain open for expansion at depth and down plunge.
Barkerville shares advanced on the news, rising 4.65% or $0.02 to 45 cents on volume of over 2.3 million shares. The shares trade in a 52-week range of 30 cents and 72 cents.
Backed by Osisko Gold Royalties Ltd. [OR-TSX, NYSE] and Osisko Mining Inc. [OSK-TSX], Barkerville is moving ahead with big plans to develop an underground mine and milling operation on the company’s extensive land package, which covers 1,950 km2.
Barkerville President and Chief Executive Officer Chris Lodder said he envisages initial production of 150,000 ounces of gold annually from an operation that might cost between $300 million and $400 million to develop.
To help fund ongoing work, the company said it expected to process about 30,000 tonnes of ore in 2018, material that is being processed at a milling facility about 110 km from the mine site.
The Cariboo Project is located in a historic mining district near the restored gold rush town of Barkerville where the first gold discoveries were made in 1858. The project currently hosts 1.6 million ounces of gold in measured and indicated resources and a further 2.6 million ounces in the inferred resource category. Measured, indicated and inferred resources are contained in the Cow and Island Mountain deposits.
The underground mineral resource estimate incorporates the Cow and Valley Zones on Cow Mountain and Shaft Zone and Mosquito Creek on Island Mountain at a cut-off grade of 3.0 g/t gold.
Mineral resources in the Bonanza Ledge and BC Vein deposits on Barkerville Mountain are also included in the resource estimate, the company said in a press release on May 2, 2018.
On Wednesday, the company said current resource at the Shaft Zone deposit is modelled to an average depth of 350 metres. Barkerville is currently exploring down dip of the known gold mineralization on Shaft Zone with three drill rigs.
The company is also exploring on Mosquito Creek with two rigs, and testing targets on Barkerville Mountain, Williams Creek and Willow with an additional three rigs.
In addition to delineation drilling, the company drilled a total of 11 holes on Shaft Zone and Cow Mountain in mineralized vein corridors to collect material for metallurgical testing purposes.
“These drill results demonstrate the high probability to add significant resources to at least double the depth of our average depth of present resources,” said Lodder.
“This year’s drilling will continue to explore these areas to a depth of up to 650 metres and extensions for 2 km to the northwest and 4 km to the southeast of the defined underground resources,” Lodder said.