Nearby mines to La Montanita and their potential

NEARBY MINES TO LA MONTANITA AND THEIR POTENTIAL

When Alder Resources bought La Montanita they must have had good idea of the potential of the property. Several sources tell us that the property was interesting for many companies, but Alder won the rights to buy it. To make some predictions about the property and its potential can be made from small fractions of information, as done in several articles before on the blog. We can also investigate other companies and their properties surrounding La Montanita. Two of them with similar geology, is the Gramalote property owned by Anglogold-Ashanti/B2 Gold and also Buritica property owned by Continental gold.

La Montanita Map

Map from MarketWire.

Gramalote Ridge deposit:

This property is located some 40 kilometers east from La Montanita and contains a 43-101 compliant deposit of 2,4 Moz with grades of 1 gram/tonne in average. There is a total of 74.4 million tonnes of ore and the grades have been calculated with a cut-off of 0,5 grams/tonne. The Gramalote property is approximately 85,500 hectares in surface area and is owned trough a joint venture between Anglogold-Ashandi that owns 49 percent and B2 Gold that owns 51 percent of the property.

The deposit is contained within tonalite (intrusive rock type that was created when magma slowly cools below the surface of the earth) and granodiorite (also an intrusive rock type, but much darker than tonalite). These two rock types are abundant in the Cretaceous Antioquian Batholith where Gramalote and La Montanita is located. The mineralization at the Gramalote property consists of intrusive hosted, structurally controlled quartz and quartz-pyrite veining and stockwork associated with carbonate-sericite, quartz-sericite and potassic alteration.

Anglogold-Ashanti drilled at Gramalote in 2007 and B2 Gold completed drilling in 2008 and 2009, totaling approximately 35,000 meters of drilling to establish the 43-101 compliant resource.

The Gramalote Ridge deposit is one of several interesting drill objects on the property and in 2009 B2 Gold commenced rigorous field surface work to establish knowledge of which objects to be explored first. All of these targets have similar geological, alteration and mineralization characteristics to the Gramalote Ridge. B2Gold plans to follow up these targets in 2010 with a view to expanding the resources at Gramalote.

If summarized, we can see that Gramalote Ridge deposit with the same geology as La Montanita contains at least 2,4 Moz of gold and B2 Gold hopes that this is only one of several similar size deposits in the area around Gramalote Ridge deposit.

Link to B2 Gold.

Buritica:

This property is located approximately 70 kilometers northwest from La Montanita and is being explored as we speak. The Buritica property is fully owned by Continental Gold and is situated near the small town of Buriticá. The surface area is approximately 18,000 hectare of land.

Buritica is contained within the Canas Gordas Formation which is built up by deep water flysche-type sediments and basalts. Later, the formation has been intruded by a tonalitic Batholith. The Buritica complex consists of dioritic intrusions with some intrusive breccia (intrusive metamorphic rock type, large crushed segments in between a paste of calcite or quartz, almost like conglomerate). Some heavy alteration is present in the complex. This is not the same type of complex as the Gramalote and La Montanita complex. Mineralization is mainly composed by high grade veins and mineralized breccias.

Some drill cores has now been released and there is gold grades between 3 and 1430 grams/tonne, within small high grade veins. For example:
 
“Drill hole BUSY-131 tested the central Veta Sur system and intersected 17.9 metres @ 113.82 g/t gold and 112 g/t silver including 1.2 metres @ 1432.35 g/t gold and 625 g/t silver. This hole was an offset of the previously announced BUSY-79 which intersected 14.3 m @ 446 g/t gold and 166 g/t silver”.

From late 2007 through early 2010 Continental Gold has conducted surface and subsurface geological mapping and sampling, ground magnetometry and reconnaissance scale induced polarization geophysical studies, a 2000 sample soil grid, preliminary metallurgical testing,  17,787 meters of surface and underground core drilling in 93 holes, and more than 1200 meters of underground development.

An ongoing soil sampling program has provided numerous anomalous areas and float which indicate the potential for several more parallel veins on the property. The work plan for 2010 calls for a minimum 22,000 meters of surface and underground drilling with four drills down to 350 meters of vertical depth. Underground development will continue on the San Antonio and Centena veins and detailed channel sampling on those structures will aid in resource calculations. More detailed metallurgical studies will be completed on each of the significant ore bodies and preliminary engineering studies will be undertaken to determine mining characteristics and future process plant options.

Link to Continental Gold.



Map from MarketWire.