Rice Lake Gold Belt, Manitoba - Dunlop Option

Location
The Wallace-Dunlop Option is located on the west side of Wallace Lake approximately 25 km east of the San Antonio Gold Mine at the town site of Bissett in southeastern Manitoba. Access is by an all weather gravel road (PR 304) that intersects the southern part of the property. Boat access on Wallace Lake is also possible. The property consists of 121 Ha of the Con 1 and Con 2 claims and 240 Ha of the Garner 2 claim, located further south at Gem Lake.


History
The area has been under claim by various owners since the early days of exploration in the Rice Lake Gold Belt. Early work on the CON 1 and 2 claims is summarized below:
 

Abundant visible gold in hand samples has been reported in grab samples from the Conley shaft/trench with values over 1000 g/t, according to old newspaper reports. Follow-up work has not been able to duplicate the high-grades. Silver and minor copper have been reported as well as minor amounts of gold. Drilling of the iron formation sequence ‘exhalite’ for base metal targets by Esso Minerals in 1979 did not intersect significant copper or zinc mineralization.

Numerous gold occurrences were identified by Bill Conley during early prospecting in the area north of the CON claims. Most of these are in quartz veins and resemble some of the veins in the San Antonio Gold Mine. At the Conley ‘shaft’/trench on the Dunlop Option, the high-grade gold occurs with a carbonate-silica unit that can be traced in a number of trenches for some distance along the hinge of an open fold.
 

Geology of the Dunlop Option
According to reports by government workers the rocks that underlie the Dunlop Option are the same age and composition as the Balmer Formation in the Red Lake Gold Camp. These have been referred to frequently as the “Balmer Equivalent rocks”. The rocks consist of a basement of felsic volcanic and felsic intrusive rocks that are overlain by mafic and felsic volcanic rocks, oxide-carbonate-sulphide-iron formation and younger mafic volcanic rocks and clastic sedimentary rocks. Pillowed flows have been reported by several geologists.

The ‘Balmer Equivalent rocks’ have been folded into a large open fold in the central portion of the Dunlop Option. These structures are well-defined by oxide iron formation that is closely associated with a ‘carbonate silica-rich’ rock that has been variously described as dolomite, ‘limestone’, calcareous iron formation and ‘alteration’.

The sequence faces southwards, but it is uncertain if it is downward facing or not. Most units are near vertical and observed tops are towards the south or southeast; early isoclinal folds have not been observed in this area.

A major shear zone cuts through the area along the south boundary of the Dunlop Option and immediately south of the trenches on the CON 1 claim. This structure has been traced by federal and provincial government geologists and interpreted to be the same structure that cuts through both the Red Lake and Pickle Lake gold camps.
 

Current Exploration Activity
To provide a geological framework for subsequent exploration the Company undertook geological mapping on the Con 1 and Con 2 claims. A northern area of felsic sedimentary rocks was documented flanked to the south by predominantly gabbro with inliers of mafic volcanic and sedimentary rocks and iron formation. At the contact of these two lithologic sequences there are beds of chert and graphite representative of chemical sedimentation.
As an innovative approach to geochemical exploration for gold during the winter the Company undertook the collection of 233 snow samples on the CON 1 and 2 claims in 2007. Soil geochemical surveys were also undertaken in the summer of 2007. A total of 183 soils were collected and analyzed.

The results to date on the property are indeterminate and additional sampling will be undertaken to assess some of the 2007 responses. These surveys will be undertaken subsequent to drill results obtained from the adjacent Lesavage North property.