oakland press

G O L D W W W . H I G H G R A D E . N E T
Oakland boss? 20-year itch
Kate Haycock, 26 May 2011
JUNIOR explorer Oakland Resources? very first drilling campaign
at its Boorowa project in New South Wales has provided an
early indication the company?s plan to revisit historical lead-zinc
deposits in search of gold could be a winner.
The company listed late last year, raising a modest $A3 million
to fund its exploration efforts in NSW targeting the Silurian
rocks of the Lachlan Fold Belt.
Mark Arundell has returned to Spion Kop at
Boorawa two decades after sampling the
ground for a past employer.
Managing director Mark Arundell, who?s previous roles included exploration work at
Northparkes and Lake Cowal in NSW, said this week the company was using a Canadian model
of volcanic-hosted massive sulphide lead zinc deposits which were also gold-rich.
?This particular model that we?re applying in NSW is to target rocks where historically people
have looked for lead-zinc. The Canadians have found these deposits can have a copper or gold
rich zone beneath them,? he said.
And in the last round of exploration in the region in the 1970s gold was worth $US30 an ounce
and a lot more expensive to analyse for, meaning that the precious metal was simply not on
the agenda for previous explorers, Arundell said.
The company?s two main projects are Boorowa near Yass, which includes the Spion Kop
prospect, and the Mullions Range area north of Orange. Arundell?s history in the region goes
back more than 20 years. In 1989 he was working for another company and took a sample
from an old lead-zinc mine which is now the Skion Kop project. Assays returned grades of
some 20% lead-zinc, 3% copper, 200 grams per tonne silver and 10 grams of gold but
Arundell was unable to follow this up before now.
?That just stuck with me for 20 years and Oakland is giving me the opportunity to do
something about that,? he said.
The junior?s first drilling campaign at Spion Kop has already turned up some evidence that its
exploration model could be a winner, with a peak intersection of 22m at 1.09gpt gold from
36m including 6m at 3.11gpt gold returned from first pass RC drilling.
?I was hoping for a result of say, 20m at 0.1gpt gold, I would have considered that an
anomalous result,? Arundell said. ?We?re doing shallow drilling and we?re not penetrating very
far into the bedrock, so to get something an order of magnitude better than I expected was
very encouraging. It made me feel good about what we?re doing ? we?re not complete idiots
after all!?
Arundell said Spion Kop appeared to be hosted in the same belt of rocks as Alkane Resources
and Newmont Gold?s vast, low-grade McPhillamy?s gold deposit.
?In terms of prospectivity I see this belt as being hugely prospective and the gold potential
has been ignored, but you?d have to view McPhillamy?s as a game changer ? it?s a multi-million
ounce gold deposit, and the only recent discovery of the last 10 years which is bigger than it is
Tropicana,? he said.
Other deposits in the region underscoring its prospectivity include Tri Origin Minerals? Lewis
Ponds and Woodlawn projects, both brownfields zinc-lead operations Tri Origin is attempting
to revive.
?Something like Lewis Ponds which has basically been sold as a lead-zinc deposit also has
quite a bit of gold in it, some 300,000oz,? Arundell said.
The model may be promising but the company?s bank balance is slender, however, Arundell
said the company was being run on the smell of an oil-rag, with low admin costs, and should
be funded for the next two years.
?We can put over a million into the ground each year ? of course if we get onto something
major that will need environmental studies we?d have a greater burn rate but for now we?ve
got enough money to do what we need to do,? he said.
This article was first published in www.highgrade.net. It must not be reproduced without
permission of the company.