ASX-listed gold and base metals hopeful, White Cliff Minerals, has wasted no time in releasing a maiden inferred and indicated gold resource at its historic Reedy South gold project 40km north of Cue in WA’s resurgent Murchison goldfields. The company, which only completed the acquisition of the project three weeks ago, has already come out with a resource of 779,000 tonnes going 1.7 grams per tonne for 42,400 ounces of contained gold based on a combined 117 RC holes totalling 7,182m drilled by previous owners between 1984 and 2015.
White Cliff says the mineral resource estimate will now be used to help the company bed down the planning for its first RC and diamond drilling campaign – totalling about 3,000m – at Reedy South that is due to kick off in coming weeks.
The Reedy South project area spans 156sqkm and covers the historic underground workings of the old Pegasus and King Cole deposits. It also encompasses about 1km of strike along the prolific auriferous Reedy Shear Zone, or “RSZ”, which plays host to several high-grade gold deposits with vertical plunging mineralisation extending to depths of 500m-plus.
These include Westgold Resources’ producing South Emu-Triton underground gold mine at the Reedy’s gold mining centre about 800m to the north of Reedy South.
White Cliff Minerals Technical Director, Ed Mead said: “The company is pleased with the … ability to rapidly convert historical drilling into a maiden resource, including a portion of indicated resources. This was one of the attractions to the project and, coupled with the style and controls of mineralisation immediately north of us at Triton-South Emu gold mine, we believe there is scope to substantially grow the resource at Reedy South through drilling at depth and along strike.”
Previous RC drilling programs at Reedy South were carried out by Homestake Australia from 1984 to 1987, Churchill Resources in 1988, St Barbara Mines from 2001 to 2002, Wakeford Holdings in 2010 and Murchison Mining in 2015.
Reedy South’s gold mineralisation occurs in shears or shoots within the broader RSZ, and according to White Cliff, the deposit remains open at depth and along strike.
The company says historical exploration at the project mainly involved surface prospecting, soil sampling and wide-spaced shallow drilling that did not exceed 80m depth.
Given the deeper pedigree of gold deposits in the region, management believes there is a mother lode yet to be uncovered. To that end, White Cliff’s 3,000m RC and diamond drilling program will target depth and along-strike extensions of known gold mineralisation.
No doubt the results of this next drilling chapter in the Reedy South gold story will be keenly monitored in what is shaping up as interesting times for White Cliff in the search for a potential mother lode within its project terrain.
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