GOLDEN MOUNTAIN
In October 2007 a Heads of Agreement (“HOA”) was entered into with an arm’s length private company, providing Tinka with the right to acquire an 80% interest in the 202 hectare Golden Mountain Mining Licence (“MIN4683”) located approximately 150 kilometres to the north-east of Melbourne, the capital of Victoria, Australia. The Mining Licence lies within the Exploration Licences that comprise the Company’s previously announced Strathbogie South project area.
Golden Mountain is a sediment – hosted gold project, with a hard rock and alluvial mining history of approximately 140,000 oz of gold production from operations that concluded in the 1920’s. Since the cessation of mining, the project has been extensively drilled, with a total of 177 holes testing the Meade’s Mine area between the 1950’s and 1980’s. One hundred and thirty two of these holes contain intersections in excess of 0.5 g/t gold. Significant intersections from drilling and trenching include:
• 86.9 m @ 3.6 g/t Au from 37.9 m in GMDDH1
• 37.8 m @ 5.6 g/t Au from 168.5 m in GMDDH12
• 39.0 m @ 3.5 g/t Au from 16.0 m in GMRC72
• 45.0 m @ 3.0 g/t Au from 181.0 m in GMDDH21
• 88.0 m @ 1.5 g/t Au from 0.0 m in GMRC18
• 20.0 m @ 6.0 g/t Au from 75.0 m in T1
• 24.9 m @ 4.5 g/t Au from 102.2 m in GMDDH2
• 52.0 m @ 2.1 g/t Au from 44.0 m in GMRC41
• 40.0 m @ 2.6 g/t Au from 32.0 m in GMRC74
• 74.1 m @ 7.8 g/t Au in trench TUD-22
• 8 m @ 16.8 g/t Au in trench TUD-4
Mineralization in drilling and outcrop defines a gold enriched corridor some 300 metres in length, 150 metres in width and to 300 metres in depth.
During January 1998, an historic resource was completed for Golden Mountain, using an ordinary kriged block model based on two sets of structural domains. The reported historic resource using a 0.7 g/t Au lower cutoff was:
• Measured 830,000 tonnes @ 1.5 g/t Au
• Indicated 248,250 tonnes @ 1.6 g/t Au
• Inferred 391,750 tonnes @ 1.8 g/t Au
The quoted resources are based on the report, “Resource Estimate for the Golden Mountain Project. Unpublished consultants report” by N Hanson of Visionary Earth Science dated January 1998. These data are historical in nature and were compiled prior to the implementation of Canadian NI 43-101 reporting standards. Tinka has not completed sufficient exploration to verify the estimates and is not treating them as National Instrument compliant resources or reserves verified by a qualified person and the historical estimate should not be relied upon. The Company believes this historical resource and the data used to compile the estimate – which represent the most recent estimates and data available – are generally reliable and relevant.
Gold mineralization is developed within a sequence of Devonian – age metamorphosed sedimentary rocks close to the contact with the Strathbogie Granite, most commonly within the nose of a steeply north plunging anticline where it is associated with dip-slip and oblique slip faults. Gold is fine grained, associated with pyritic alteration, and concentrated in ferruginized joints, fault pug and disseminated within psammitic sedimentary strata. Vein quartz is generally absent or poorly developed.
Petrographic studies of drill core and outcrop samples demonstrate the gold is non-refractory, contained typically within electrum and calaverite (AuTe2) which are present as fine grained (15 μm) disseminations in the host rocks. Preliminary metallurgical test-work indicates the ore is amenable to conventional CIL techniques.
The Company was pleased to add a project of the merit of Golden Mountain to our Australian property portfolio, where Tinka now holds 58 kilometres of the prospective granite - sediment contact with more than 75 gold prospects already defined in the Strathbogie South project. The area of MIN4683 has been held under continuous tenure since the area was discovered during Australia’s first gold rush in the 1860’s. The Mining Licence contains many significant intersections of gold mineralization, the follow up of which will be the initial focus of exploration, as will the numerous untested surface geochemical anomalies that are known from within a few kilometres of the drilled area. Resource development work is required to define the structural controls, grade distribution and metallurgical properties of the gold mineralization, in addition to potentially expanding the resource at Golden Mountain and the surrounding mineralized areas.
Pursuant to the terms of the HOA, Tinka may earn an 80% interest in MIN4683 by making a cash payment of AUD$55,000 to the Vendor on signing of the HOA and issuing 200,000 common shares upon TSX Venture Exchange acceptance. Tinka must incur a total minimum expenditure of AUD$900,000 within a four-year period, including a minimum of AUD$100,000 expenditure in Year 1. The Company will pay a bonus of 500,000 common shares should Tinka define a gold resource within MIN4683 in excess of 1,000,000 ounces of gold in the proven or probable category as defined in the JORC code. The Vendor will also retain a 1% NSR on any production from MIN4683 which Tinka has the right to purchase for C$1,000,000.
The Company will collate all of the historic work undertaken within the areas and undertake a detailed stream sediment geochemical survey of the licence areas. Tinka has entered into a contract to undertake diamond drilling at the project. The program will consist of approximately 600 metres of confirmation drilling within the footprint of previous drilling.
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