NORTHERN ONTARIO MINING NEWS-Gowganda / Shining Tree emerging exploration hotbed

By Kevin Vincent
Overshadowed by perennial mining giants Kirkland Lake and Timmins, there’s another region that is attracting a lot of money, attention, and exploration in northeastern Ontario. That area is the Gowganda and Shining Tree region. It’s south of Timmins, west of Kirkland Lake and north of Cobalt, three of Ontario’s most historic mine-producing land masses.
The bellwether project in the region was last year’s approval by IAMGOLD to green light the Cote Lake Mine just south of Gogama, off highway 144 that runs between Sudbury and Timmins.
If you consider that Alamos Gold’s Young-Davidson Mine is also in the region, it makes for a very robust picture.
Companies exploring in the central part of Northeastern Ontario include:
CALDAS GOLD
Caldas owns 100% of the Juby project, an advanced exploration stage gold project in the Shining Tree area in the southern part of the Abitibi greenstone belt about 100 km south-southeast of the Timmins. Over 14,000 acres are controlled through the patented claims of the Juby Project covering 10 km strike length of the west-northwest trending Tyrrell Structural Zone in the Abitibi Greenstone Belt with IAMGOLD’s Cote Gold project and Alamos Gold’s Young-Davidson mine, both within 70 km of the project.
The company points out that the project has excellent access to infrastructure including a major highway, a power transmission line that passes through the property, and an abundance of water in the region. The regional geological setting at Juby is similar to that of the Kirkland Lake and Timmins gold camps and is largely underexplored.
Caldas Gold sees potential to infill along the strike of the TSZ to extend the existing Golden Lake and Juby zones, testing the higher-grade prospects associated with Big Dome and Hydro-Creek, and to follow up on other targets and trends identified in historical work programs.
BRIXTON METALS
The Langis Mine (past producer of high-grade silver) Project is located near Cobalt, 15 km north of Temiskaming Shores. Highway 65 runs through the property and many established secondary roads provide year-round access. Power, railways, mills, a permitted refinery, and assay lab are located at or near the site.
The Langis Project represents a unique opportunity in a silver district that is underexplored using modern techniques. The company says new discovery potential is high, and a strong possibility exists to generate mineral resources from extensions to historical workings and new exploration. In 2018 drilling hit new high-grade silver-cobalt.
Historically, the Langis Mine produced over 10.4 Moz Ag with a recovered grade of approximately 25 oz/t from shallow depths, and 358,340 lbs of cobalt.
Historically, the Hudson Bay Mine produced 6.4 Moz Ag at 123 oz/t, and 185,570 lbs of cobalt from 58,000 tons. Brixton says the Langis and the Hudson Bay Projects do not currently contain any mineral resources or mineral reserves. In December, the company announced it had drilled 3m of 647gpt silver at the Langis Project.
CANADA SILVER COBALT WORKS
Canada Silver Cobalt Works Inc. announced in May 2020, the results of its first NI 43-101 Mineral Resource estimate for the early stage Castle East Robinson Zone discovery in the heart of the past producing Gowganda Silver Camp, 75 kilometers southwest of Kirkland Lake. Castle East is part of Canada Silver Cobalt’s 100%-owned, 78 sq. km Castle Property also featuring the Castle mine. In late 2019, the company initiated a follow-up program to a 2011 discovery hole approximately two km southeast of the mine, and within two km of two other past producers, that returned a high-grade intercept of 40,944 g/t silver (1,194 oz/ton) over a core length of 0.45 meters.
CCW’s program aimed to delineate the extent of the high-grade mineralization within the Robinson Zone that shows very high grades in the form of native silver. The mineral resource estimate used four wedge holes and the four holes drilled from surface and one historical drill hole.
The resource estimate was independently prepared by GoldMinds Geoservices Inc. in accordance with National Instrument 43-101 (“NI 43-101”) and is dated May 28, 2020. The report outlines a combined 27,400 tonnes of material for a total of 7,560,200 Inferred ounces using a cut-off grade of 258 g/t AgEq. The company is quick to point out however that mineral resources which are not mineral Reserves do not have demonstrated economic viability.
GRAN COLUMBIA GOLD
Gran Columbia’s interest in the Shining Tree region stems from a $14 million investment in Caldas Gold, specifically to finance the Juby Project. Gran Columbia announced the investment in mid-2020, giving the Columbia-focused miner 75% (approx.) ownership of Caldas. Gran Colombia is a Canadian-based mid-tier gold producer with its primary focus in Colombia where it is currently the largest underground gold and silver producer with several mines in operation at its high-grade Segovia Operations.
RJK EXPLORATIONS
Glenn Kasner is one of northern Ontario’s most determined miners. The President of RJK Explorations continues to hunt for a central Ontario diamond deposit.

The company has uncovered a number of promising kimberlite pipes in the central northeastern Ontario region including the announcement of four new kimberlites in late 2020. “The discovery of a fourth kimberlite on the Bishop property, in addition to the Kon kimberlite discovered earlier in the year, is remarkable,” said Kasner. “All members of our team had a geology professor some 45 years ago named Dan Atchinson, who first told us about the Nipissing Diamond. It was his hope that a graduate would find the source kimberlite pipe. RJK’s management are all graduates of the Haileybury School of Mines (HSM), and so we have named this new discovery the HSM Kimberlite.”

 

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