Years of mapping, sampling and drilling may finally be paying off for juniors determined to make an economic discovery in the underexplored frontier of Quebec's north.
Two gold projects and an impressive diamond discovery have attracted industry attention to the multi-mineral potential of the region, although the market remains unresponsive to companies holding ground there.
The gold plays, including Eastmain Resources' (ER-T) Clearwater and Virginia Gold Mines' (VIA-M) La Grande Sud are located along the Eastmain and La Grande belts, two underexplored greenstone belts east of Hudson Bay. Recent discoveries have boosted the potential mineability of both properties, which contain established resources that have taken years to delineate.
Twin Gold's (TWG-T) diamond discovery in the Torngat mountains on the east side of Ungava Bay is even more intriguing because the project is brand new and has returned results that rival some of the early exploration work in the diamond fields of the Northwest Territories.
These types of projects are an endorsement of Quebec's support for companies willing to launch exploration programs outside known mining camps. In addition to one of the most generous flow-through share programs in the country, the government offers grants of up to $100,000 per property for exploration in remote areas.
"This year we are entitled to receive about $300,000 in grants," says Andre Gaumond, president of Virginia. "You can do much more work for the same dollar."
At Clearwater, Eastmain and Soquem recently uncovered several new high-grade veins by stripping surface outcrops. Results from channel samples included a 17.6-metre intersection grading an uncut 16.2 grams per tonne across the Tourmaline Zone and high-grade, visible gold in veins O, P and Q. These discoveries could add significantly to the known resource of just over half a million tonnes grading 11.3 grams gold per tonne contained in multiple, parallel quartz-tourmaline veins within the Eau Claire deposit.
"Westmin started in this belt in 1983 and work has been almost continuous ever since," says Don Robinson, president of Eastmain. "These results show that you can make a discovery on a project at anytime, be it year one or year twenty."
The project is a 50-50% joint venture between Soquem and Eastmain. The partners are planning to complete detailed follow-up drilling at 25-metre centres in order to evaluate the tonnage and average grade of the deposit.
At Virginia's La Grande Sud, till sampling returned a record number of gold grains and drilling intersected a mineralized zone averaging 0.5% zinc over 23 metres. The intersection lies south and east of zone 32, which contains a resource of 6.5 million tonnes grading 1.5 grams gold per tonne and 0.2% copper.
Cambior is earning a 50% interest in the project from Virginia by spending $7 million over six years. In January, the gold producer will launch a 300,000-metre drilling program to determine if the felsic volcanic- intrusive contact that runs through the property is as promising as similar geology in the Bousquet-Doyon mining camp to the south where Cambior operates the Doyon gold mine.
Compared with old timers like Virginia and Eastmain, Twin Gold is a newcomer to Quebec's remote north. The junior, better known for its advanced gold project in Idaho, became involved in diamond exploration in the Torngat Mountains of northeastern Quebec after identifying a cluster of kimberlite dykes on computer-enhanced aerial photographs.
An exploration team lead by James Bourne, a geology professor at the University du Quebec in Montreal, made the diamond discovery after staking ground in the area for Twin Gold in late June. Grab samples from one of the dykes yielded a total of 42 diamonds, including nine macrodiamonds. One of the macrodiamonds is an impressive 1.85 millimetres in diameter. The 1.5-km long dyke contains G10 garnets and is part of a cluster of 12 dykes.
The company will finance ongoing exploration through a recently announced private placement of special warrants, priced at 45 cents a warrant, to raise $3-5 million. The warrants will be issued in two classes. The first class allows the holder to acquire one flow-through share and half a warrant of Twin Gold. The other class entitles the holder to acquire one common share plus half a warrant.
There are other pockets of activity throughout the vast area between James Bay in the west and Ungava Bay in the east. La Grande Sud is the most advanced of Virginia's projects, but the company has several other gold and base metal prospects that warrant follow-up.
Among them is the Gayot property south of Ungava Bay, where Virginia recently increased its land position to 325 square kilometres after discovering four nickel-platinum-palladium showings. The property lies along a newly discovered ultramafic belt that is said to show geological similarities to the Raglan and Kambalda nickel belts. Zones of disseminated sulphides have returned 1.0-2.7% nickel and up to 0.4% copper, 0.1% cobalt and 1.18 grams per ton platinum group metals.
Virginia has a 100% interest in Gayot and will begin drilling there this winter after completing a ground geophysical survey to generate targets.
Winter drilling is also scheduled to get underway on Virginia's Duquet project, where Cambiex Exploration (CBX-T) and Soquem are earning a 33.3% interest. Duquet is a gold-copper-silver prospect containing massive sulphide lenses that have never been drill-tested.
Virginia will move the drills to the Chute-des-Passes and Payne Bay nickel prospects after the winter campaign is complete.
Also active in the region is Sirios Resources (SOI-M). The junior is taking till samples as part of a diamond exploration program in the La Grande River area and recently closed a deal with Soquem for exploration on the nearby Aquilon property. Souquem will spend $470,000 over three years to earn a 50% interest in the gold project.
Sirios and Soquem also plan to follow-up encouraging gold results from a till sampling program at their joint venture Tilly Centre property in the La Grande region.
And near Radisson, prospecting by Dianor Resources (DOR-M) has turned up six surface gold showings. Results from grab samples ranged from 2.83 to 66.99 grams gold per tonne.