Catalyst Metals Limited (ASX: CYL) has achieved “a major breakthrough” in its push to find the extensions of the rich Bendigo Goldfield, with drilling returning multiple occurrences of visible gold in eight diamond drill cores from the Boyd’s Dam prospect within the Four Eagles Gold Project in Victoria.
The new Iris Zone is situated about 150 metres beneath the shallow mineralisation at Boyd’s Dam, which underpins the current resource estimate. The Iris Zone lies within a near-vertical shear zone striking almost north south and containing abundant quartz, often laminated with arsenopyrite and native gold.
This is a pivotal breakthrough in our hunt for the extension of the Bendigo Goldfield,” Catalyst Technical Director, Bruce Kay, said.
“We have always suspected that there would be stacked gold zones below the shallow Boyd’s Dam mineralisation but previous drilling has not been done with the optimal orientation.
The Iris Zone appears to be very consistent and visible gold is always exciting.”
To date, Catalyst has identified a number of high-grade areas of mineralisation within close proximity to one another (Boyd’s Dam, Hayanmi, Pickles, Cunneens, Eagle 5, Bullock and Iris Zone). These areas of stacked, repetitive mineralisation have the potential to change the project’s economics and could eventually all be mined from the one access tunnel.
Four Eagles Gold Project
The Four Eagles Gold Project is situated along the Whitelaw Gold Corridor, 70 kilometres north of the historic Bendigo Goldfield and is considered a major structural control of gold mineralisation north of Bendigo.
In Victoria, Catalyst manages the entire Whitelaw Gold Belt and has interests in 13 Exploration Licences and two Retention Licences which extend for 75 kilometres along the Whitelaw and Tandarra Faults north of Bendigo and in other areas north of the Fosterville and Inglewood gold fields.
The structural framework of the mineralisation known at Boyd’s Dam has been demonstrated to be borne of a west-dipping ‘reverse’ fault, which has focussed and introduced gold-bearing fluids into receptive locations along a shallow horizon of the host anticline.
This structure (the Western Shear) is but one of an array of structures, and to date, multiple parallel faults have been identified with multiple diamond drillhole intersections bearing quartz development and in parts anomalous to significant gold grades.
The newly discovered Iris Zone lies on one of these steep western shear zones and seems to mostly occupy the western limb of the Boyd’s Dam anticline.
The historic Bendigo Goldfield reportedly produced some 22 million ounces of gold since discovery in 1851. The success of this goldfield is attributed to the unique style and scale of faulting which resulted in the repetition of mineable orebodies at depths well beyond one kilometre.
To date, exploration of the Whitelaw Gold Belt to the north of Bendigo by Catalyst has demonstrated keen similarities to the Bendigo Goldfield such as visible gold in quartz, high grade gold assays, strong arsenious haloes, and close relationships with host rock fold hinges.
The discovery of the Iris Zone has provided a significant, highly sought-after element to the prospectivity of the Whitelaw Gold Belt; the occurrence of a linked, but discrete high-grade mineralised body at depth beneath known mineralisation.
Diamond drilling continues at the Four Eagles Gold Project with the focus placed on targets in the vicinity of the established Boyd’s Dam mineralisation.
