Page 33 - gmj147-Apr-Jun-mag-web-neat

Finding solace in Solis

Drilling at Caprice’s Solis prospect in the Murchison region

by Fraser Palamara

hares in Caprice Resources Ltd jumped almost 10% in
Smid-March after the emerging gold explorer identified a
1km-long anomaly in the Murchison.
Maiden drilling at the Island Gold project revealed the anomaly
at the Solis prospect remains open at strike to the north-east
and south. Caprice shares were trading at 13c at the time of
print.
Solis is situated at the southern end of the historic Lake Austin
mining centre and rubs shoulders with major gold deposits
and processing plants within a 50km radius.
Those in the area include Westgold Resources Ltd’s Great
Fingall 1.8 moz deposit, Tuckabianna 1.2 mtpa processing
plant and the Big Bell 4.8 moz deposit, as well as Ramelius
Resources Ltd’s 1.7 mtpa processing plant at Mount Magnet.
Caprice managing director Andrew Muir said despite the
proximity to such successful gold plays, Island Gold still had a
lot to offer with vastly undrilled ground. The follow-up programme will use one rig across 1,500m of
“The Island Gold project has been in private hands for the last ground on a schedule that could be completed in less than
20-25 years,” Muir told GMJ. “There’s some historical mining a fortnight.
on what we call the ‘Island’, but the ‘Island’ component itself The aircore drilling at the Lake Austin portion of Island Gold
only covers about 25% of the project as a whole.” also returned rock chips grading as strong as 26 g/t, 8.4 g/t
Aeromagnetic results of interest initially sent the Caprice team and 1.7 g/t. Those grades, alongside the anomaly, give Muir all
running over with the aircore rig and the findings have since the more reason to be excited for the next phase of exploration.
left a smile on Muir’s face. “Fingers crossed that goes well, we’ll then have an RC
“It’s not until you drill it that you actually get a feel for what’s programme afterwards,” he said. “We’ll do some RC drilling
going on and we came back with a fantastic anomaly,” he said. on the island itself.
“We had more than a gram [of gold] in one of the holes which “We did a big programme there in July-October last year. We
was very promising considering it’s an exploration programme. got some really good results, 7-8 high-grade prospects that
We’re absolutely ecstatic with it…it’s quite a robust anomaly.” require follow-up work. Most of them are still open at depth.”
Caprice’s exploration in the Murchison has been funded by Most of the historical drilling at the Lake Austin area only goes
a $2 million placement in February which was supported by as deep as 100m, leaving the Caprice team very curious to go
institutional, sophisticated, existing and new shareholders. deeper.
Follow-up aircore drilling on the anomaly is planned for the June “It still has a lot of areas to test,” Muir said. “So, that’s another
quarter, which will narrow down the company’s understanding thing we’ll be doing.”
of the anomaly before taking a more aggressive approach.
Despite only a slight bump to the company’s share price of
“It’s just a matter of being cost-efficient,” Muir said. “We could 8.3% after the aircore drilling results at Solis were released
go straight in with a RC rig but that wouldn’t be the most cost- in March, Muir is appreciative of the market recognising the
effective approach and we could be drilling in the wrong spots. works in progress at Island Gold.
“With the aircore programme, we’ll infill between the holes. “We were pretty chuffed to see people recognise and
The whole idea is to really tighten up on our understanding of appreciate the results, albeit very early stage aircore,” he said.
the anomaly with a view to generating RC drill targets down “There’s still a lot of work to do.”
the track.”

Page 33