It is nice to see some confidence from 'on-high' so to speak re director buying last two days.
Regarding grades and so on, the 1st reference in any ann that I could find that reported gold grades in conglomerates in terms of grams per cubic meter was 26th Sept last yr.
"A bulk sampling program of 52 test pits over a 750m x 750m area resulted in 48 of the pits returning appreciable pannable free gold and some platinum; one of these pits (Pit 200) returned 75.05 grams of gold and 8.71 grams of platinum from 125m3 of material, for a recoverable grade of~0.7 grams gold per cubic metre".
The 47 or so smaller pits with free gold in them must of exhibited significant variance in grade one would think...........There has to my knowledge never been anything grade related reported on these smaller pits (yet) except various quotes of "free gold" etc.
They have only reported grade on the larger pit to date where data was more 'reliable'/'representative' and that's fine by me........no point identifying your play as nuggety conglomerate and then expecting drill holes or small bulk samples to be representative imo. Releasing grade results prematurely might of caused them no end of headaches.
As an upshot of work done to date though....they have about 50mill cubic meters of gold bearing conglomerate material defined (which is open laterally).
Earlier ann's have eluded to the potential for increasing free-gold amounts as they go deeper toward the hard-rock basement....(a very good thing if it pans out that way).
But for now there's a conglomerate deposit measuring approx 50mill cubic meters composed of relatively easy dig and simple gravity process type 'ore'..........grading at?............(0.7g/m3 is the best one could manage with current data and that's a fraught idea at best)............
Anyway, as an idea of scale and potential......this could deliver a rather significant deposit if grades do start popping into or above the 2-3g per cubic meter type region....but don't neglect to consider the alternative either....(could always go the other way).
On another note we can't forget the possibilities for a "world class" porphyry type system at depth either...........
"The geology of the Abundance Valley discovery is similar to the Ok Tedi (PNG) deposit discovered in the 1970’s and still in operation today".....
And so far at Abundance Valley they have defined an "Outcrop exposure 1km x 850m, providing a large immediate resource tonnage potential".
"The larger quartz-pyrite veins show a close resemblance to rock float samples, collected from Crown Ridge prospect in EL1968, that returned assays up to 29.2grams per tonne Au"
However, again, we know little about variance of grade from surface to the hard-rock horizon with regard to the conglomerate hosted gold............and even less re the hard rock at Crown or Abundance which could be exceptional (or not) but certainly appears very prospective (see hole 005 notes below).
CRD005 DD hole at Crown was described as follows.....
"Visible gold has been observed in drill core at various intervals between down hole depths of 88m to 230m.....The gold is very fine in nature, typically less than 1mm.......Both crustiform and fine wire gold has been observed.......The mineralisation is in fine stockwork veins and discrete shears, as well as also in rock matrix.......From 230m to 398m CRD005 encountered visual mixed mafic volcanics with variable sulphides and quartz carbonate chlorite veining" (see 14th Dec ann).
Being a cynical type I'm only cautiously optimistic that the next few ann's will produce some serious 'food for thought'......
Phase 4 of conglomerate hosted exploration work was quoted recently as: "program is being used to identify higher grade zones for the Phase 5 pitting. Full assay results for this program are still pending and will be reported once the program is complete".
No estimates on completion date for 'smaller-pit' phase 4 work. But they are tipping phase 5 to start June so you might expect phase 4 to be completed and announced before they go online with 5.....
But even then will they release grade determinations from smaller pits if mgt feel they aren't representative?
Could be a bit of a long wait on comprehensive conglomerate data is my feeling. More scouting/geochem results and DD assays of hard-rock cores along with rock chip assays might come first.
Still the possibilities are outstanding and the geology is interesting to say the least.
GMN Price at posting:
11.0¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held
(20min delay)
