Shree Minerals intends to progress to drilling later this year at its Lachlan Fold Belt Project in New South Wales after completing rock chip and soil sampling programs.
SHH is an Australian diversified mineral exploration and mine development company pursuing the exploration of prospective gold, base metal and iron ore projects with the Lachlan Fold Belt assets in NSW comprising the Rock Lodge, Turondale and Prince of Wales exploration licences.
At Rock Lodge, soil sampling has been completed over a detailed 100 x 20-metre grid over the northern anomalous area, generating 129 samples that have been submitted to the laboratory for gold and multielement geochemistry.
Soil sampling was conducted to improve delineation of gold mineralisation trends prior to a planned reverse circulation (RC) drilling program.
A rock chip sample of gossanous sediment taken from old workings in the northern IP anomaly area returned a maximum result of 7.3 g/t gold, with 6049 ppm arsenic and 446 ppm bismuth, indicating that high-grade gold is likely present at the site.
Rock Lodge prospect showing induced polarisation anomalies and previous rock chip sampling and drilling.
Drilling to commence next quarter
Shree will design a drilling program based on Induced Polarisation (IP) survey results, recent rock and soil sampling, and geological mapping. The southern IP anomaly remains untested by surface sampling or drilling and poses opportunities for future exploration.
A land access agreement has been signed with the landholder, while a drilling approval application was lodged with the NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment on September 10, 2021.
Approval is expected within 4-6 weeks with drilling to proceed in the December quarter. Shree has engaged Orange-based Rangott Exploration to assist with the drilling program and has been in discussion with various drilling contractors.
Rock Lodge sampling
The Rock Lodge Exploration Licence was granted in May 2021 for a five-year term. It’s 35 kilometres south of Cooma and covers 163 square kilometres. It is prospective for orogenic, Intrusion Related Gold Systems (IRGS) and skarn related gold mineralisation.
Historical exploration from 1988-2018 included diamond drilling, RC drilling, IP geophysics, rock chip sampling, stream sediment sampling, trenching and acquisition of IP data on a 3.5-kilometre grid.
Rock chip sampling by Southern Gold NL returned assay results of up to 21 g/t gold while diamond drilling in 1985 targeted historic works.
Diamond drilling intersected up to 8 metres of massive sulphide with recorded grades up to 4.28 g/t gold, 35 g/t silver, 0.79% copper and 13.5% zinc, while another hole intersected 12 metres at 1.2 g/t gold, 9.8 g/t silver and 0.2% copper.
Six RC holes were drilled beneath old workings by Alt Resources in 2018, with results as follows:
3 metres at 2.1 g/t gold, 3.7 g/t silver and 174 g/t bismuth from 17 metres and 2 metres at 2.7 g/t gold, 11.8 g/t silver, 300 g/t bismuth and 0.48% copper from 62 metres;
1-metre at 5.4 g/t gold, 55.6 g/t silver, 212 g/t bismuth and 0.11% zinc; and
2 metres at 1.6 g/t gold, 9.5 g/t silver, and 903 g/t bismuth from 19 metres, 1-metre at 1.4 g/t gold, 375 g/t silver, 163 g/t bismuth and 1.6% lead from 23 metres, and 1-metre at 4.8 g/t gold, 0.48% lead and 1.46% zinc from 57 metres.
Cross-section of previous drilling at the Rock Lodge prospect.
Exploration results for the Rock Lodge prospects have been reported by former owners and have not been reported in accordance with the JORC Code 2012, as Shree Minerals has not yet been able to confirm results with its own testing.