RICE LAKE PROPERTIES

Overview

OverviewGeologyExplorationOgama-Rockland Deposit

The Rice Lake exploration properties, totaling 53,804 hectares, cover the most prospective portions of the Rice Lake greenstone belt, part of the same belt of greenstones that includes the world-class, high-grade Red Lake gold district, located approximately 100 kilometres to the east in Ontario.

The Rice Lake belt is bound to the north along much of its length by the crustal-scale Wanipigow Fault, which also extends to Red Lake and is considered to represent a first-order control on gold mineralization, comparable in scale to the Porcupine-Destor Fault in the world-class Timmins-Porcupine Gold Camp.

Although the Rice Lake belt has been explored for gold since the original discovery at Rice Lake in 1911, previous efforts at systematic belt-scale exploration were hindered by a highly fragmented land position. In this regard, the Company’s consolidated land position – the largest ever assembled in the belt – represents an unprecedented opportunity to evaluate this under-explored district at belt-scale, utilizing modern exploration methods.

The consolidation of the Rice Lake district took place in stages between 2011 and 2017 through acquisitions by precursor companies, culminating in 2019 with the acquisition through ground staking of an additional 11,382 hectares of highly-prospective ground over the western and northeast portions of the Rice Lake greenstone belt, adjacent to the Wanipigow Fault.

The Rice Lake exploration properties include two large, highly-prospective, claim blocks referred to as Rice Lake and Central Manitoba, each 100% owned by the Company, and both including significant past-producing mines.

The Rice Lake property consists of a continuous block of mining claims and mineral leases totaling 43,895 hectares in the western and north-central portions of the belt. It extends for approximately 80 kilometres along the Wanipigow Fault and includes the True North mine – the most significant past-producer in the Rice Lake belt, with 2 million ounces of gold production.

The Central Manitoba property, totaling 9,227 hectares, covers the prospective eastern portion of the Rice Lake belt approximately 25 kilometres southeast of the True North Complex. The geological setting is analogous to True North and includes the historic Central Manitoba, Gunnar and Ogama-Rockland mines, which account for approximately 300,000 ounces of past gold production.

The Rice Lake exploration properties, located approximately 150 kilometres northeast of the city of Winnipeg, are easily accessed year-round via provincial road 304 and 314, which service the communities of Manigotagan and Bissett, providing ready access for cost-effective exploration.