Shree Minerals Limited has identified the potential for lithium-bearing pegmatites in addition to the gold mineralisation targeted initially at the Dundas Project in Western Australia.
This has been identified in a review of RAC and RC holes drilled by Pan Australian Exploration Pty Ltd in the 1990s that intersected gold mineralisation associated with the remnant greenstone belts.
Many of these holes also intersected pegmatites but these were not the target of the exploration at the time and were not assayed for lithium or lithium pathfinder elements.
Along strike from Anna
Providing further encouragement for Shree is that Dundas is interpreted to be along strike from the Anna lithium resource of 14.9 million tonnes at 0.97% Li2O and 44ppm Ta2O5 on Liontown Resources (ASX:LTR) Limited’s Buldania Lithium Project.
Anna is within a greenstone belt at the southern edge of the Archean Yilgarn Block, 25 kilometres northeast of the Dundas Project.
Project location: Metal Hawk’s Viking Project that contains the Beaker prospect is 16 kilometres to the west and Liontown Resources’ Anna lithium resource is 25 kilometres to the northwest.
Offset faults and deformation at the boundary of the Albany-Fraser Province and the Yilgarn Block makes individual units difficult to follow along strike but it is possible the southern extension of the greenstone belt that hosts the Anna deposit lies within the Dundas Project.
Planned work
Planned exploration by Shree, including auger soil sampling and RAB drilling, will be designed to test the gold potential of the greenstone belts and the lithium potential of the pegmatites.
Where applicable, samples generated by this exploration will be assayed for a lithium pathfinder suite of elements in addition to gold.
The Dundas Project comprises three Exploration Licence Applications around 44 kilometres east of Norseman in the Albany-Fraser Province that hosts the Tropicana gold deposit 330 kilometres east of Kalgoorlie.
In gold region
It also covers the possible southern extension of the Boulder-Lefroy and Zuleika Fault Zones that host several large gold mines including the St Ives Gold Mine, the Fimiston Operation in Kalgoorlie and the Higginsville Gold Mine.
Dundas Project location plan.
Dundas is 16 kilometres east of Metal Hawk Ltd’s Beaker gold prospect where a shallow high-grade gold discovery was made in 2011. Aircore drilling traverses intersected shallow dipping mineralisation within the regolith profile above felsic rocks.
Beaker prospect is within the Albany Fraser Province illustrating the prospectivity of the Dundas area that is a poorly exposed and lightly explored greenfield area.