Mount Skinner

General description

Located in central British Columbia 260 km west of Williams Lake by road, the 16 km2 Mount Skinner property hosts a one mile long system of en-echelon intrusive-hosted shear-controlled gold-quatrz veins and lenses, is prospective for additional gold systems of the same nature, and is also prospective for large-scale disseminated Cu-Au deposits.

Exploration history

This advanced exploration property was discovered in 1990 by the current owners. Work to date consists of prospecting, geological mapping, geochemical and geophysical surveys, hand and mechanical trenching, diamond drilling (15 holes totalling 939 metres), and underground development and bulk sampling (773 tons of ore averaging 1.674 oz/ton Au). Almost all of the current cumulative exploration expenditures on the property ($785,000) have been spent on the investigation of the westernmost extremity of the system, where the discovery vein (the Victoria vein) is located . Work on this property was suspended in 1997 due to the deteriorating economic conditions in the BC mining industry at the time, and the property has been held as inventory until now.

The Victoria Vein

The discovery vein (Victoria Vein) strikes at approximately 55 degrees and dips to the north at 55 to 75 degrees. It has been exposed intermittently for 130 metres by hand and mechanical trenching. To the northeast it appears to feather out, while to the southwest it is talus covered. At surface it exhibits pinch and swell characteristics, with widths reaching a maximum of 1.4 metres. Grades throughout are variable, with a composite of all available trench assays over a strike length of 59 metres averaging 0.836 oz/ton Au over an average wodth of 1.05 metres.
A total of 15 diamond drill holes were completed on the Victoria vein over a horizontal distance of 85 metres. All holes intersected the shear zone structure hosting the vein. The best values are found in a central ore-shoot with a strike length of 45 metres, drilled to a maximum depth of 55 metres; in that section, a total of 9 drill intersects gave vein widths ranging from 0.21 metres to 1.16 metres, and gold grades ranging from 0.171 oz/ton to 1.820 oz/ton. The Victoria Vein is open at depth.
Two bulk samples were extracted from the central ore-shoot on the Victoria Vein. The first one, taken in 1992-93 from a surface open-cut 5 metres deep and 20 metres long, gave 190 tons of ore grading 1.949 oz/ton Au. The second one, taken in 1995-96 from an underground decline reaching 25 metres below surface on the shoot, gave 583 tons of ore grading 1.585 oz/ton Au.

Additional targets

The Victoria vein is located at the westernmost extremity of a one mile long gold system of sub-parallel veins striking approximately 55 degrees within a shear zone striking 70 degrees NE. The other veins and lenses in this system have not been investigated to any extent, other than by limited hand trenching and sampling. Furthermore, the property essentially covers the entire geologic unit (the Mount Skinner Intrusive) hosting this gold system, and apart from the vicinity of the Victoria Vein, has not been prospected at all; therefore additional high-grade gold systems of the same nature can be expected. And because of similarities with the geologic environment of the Fish Lake deposit (now renamed Prosperity) 20 miles to the southeast, the possibility of finding large scale disseminated copper-gold deposits on the Mount Skinner property should be investigated.

Sources of further information

Assessment Reports
AR22007 (prospecting, 1991)
AR21396 (geochem, 1991)
AR22342 (drilling, 1991)
Ar23527 (drilling, 1994)

Extensive and detailed information on this property is available by following all links on the www.mountskinner.com website.