Timberline Reports First Results from 2012 Exploration and Drilling at Lookout Mountain
COEUR D'ALENE, IDAHO--(Marketwire - July 31, 2012) - Timberline Resources Corporation (TSX VENTURE:TBR)(NYSE MKT:TLR)(NYSE Amex:TLR) ("Timberline" or the "Company") today provided an overview of the 2012 exploration and pre-development program at its Lookout Mountain Gold Project, along with the first drill results of the season. Lookout Mountain is the lead project within Timberline's district-scale South Eureka property, located in Nevada's prolific Battle Mountain - Eureka Trend.
- Approximately 25,000 feet (7,620 metres) of drilling, with a primary objective of upgrading a substantial portion of the existing resource from the Inferred category into the Measured and Indicated categories.
- Continued metallurgical studies, including bottle roll testing and crush size analysis, to optimize gold recovery.
- Permitting activities, including geochemistry studies for waste rock analysis, acid base accounting, hydrologic studies, and geotechnical work, in advance of possible submission of a mine plan in conjunction with an operating permit application in the event of a favorable PEA.
Paul Dircksen, Timberline's Chief Executive Officer, said, "We continue to generate data demonstrating that Lookout Mountain has excellent potential to host a low capital, low operating cost, open pit, heap-leach gold operation. We expect this year's drilling to increase our Measured & Indicated gold resource substantially, providing a larger base of mineralization for use in the forthcoming PEA. Our objective is to continue moving the existing resource toward production while defining additional gold ounces at Lookout Mountain and across the district. Several members of our Board with extensive operational experience toured this project and expressed their support of this objective. We believe that there is excellent potential for additional gold mineralization at Lookout Mountain and at other project areas at South Eureka."
Recent drill results from Lookout Mountain include the following intervals:
Lookout Mountain Drill Results
Drill results demonstrate strong continuity of mineralization within the resource while also defining zones of higher grade mineralization. Holes 132, 138, and 139 assist with model refinement in a less densely drilled area and expand a 500 foot long zone of thick mineralization an additional 250 feet to the north. Intercepts in Hole 138, combined with previously-drilled Holes 039 and 061, indicate a northeast trending zone of higher grade mineralization that is open to the northeast. Similarly, Hole 143 expands, and keeps open to the east, mineralization along the southern flank of the same thick mineralized zone targeted by Holes 138 and 139. Hole 132 expands the resource to the west in this same zone.
The South Eureka property features three extensive mineralized trends and also includes a pipeline of earlier-stage projects that feature past-producing open pits along with several areas containing historic gold resources. Timberline is continuing its exploration efforts at other South Eureka locations with mapping and geochemical and alteration modeling in order to target deeper high-grade mineralization. The Company also recently completed a large magnetic survey to aid in the exploration and drill hole targeting throughout the district.
Timberline's current gold resource estimate at Lookout Mountain, which was prepared by Mine Development Associates ("MDA") of Reno, Nevada, consists of:
- 390,000 ounces Measured & Indicated Gold Resource1
(20,765,000 tons at 0.019 opt gold (18,838,000 tonnes at 0.65 g/t)) - 221,000 ounces Inferred Gold Resource2
(18,385,000 tons at 0.012 opt gold (16,679,000 tonnes at 0.41 g/t))
The resources were calculated utilizing a cut-off grade of 0.006 ounces of gold per ton (opt) (0.21 grams per metric tonne (g/t)) for oxide material and 0.030 opt (1.03 g/t) for sulfide material. Approximately 83 percent of the resource ounces are from oxide material and 17 percent are from sulfide material. The effective date of the resource is April 17, 2012, and the complete technical report is filed on SEDAR.
The full MDA Resource Estimate with various cut-off grades may be viewed at http://timberline-resources.com/main.php?page=208. Steven Osterberg, Ph.D., P.G., Timberline's Vice-President of Exploration, is a Qualified Person as defined by National Instrument 43-101 and has reviewed and approved the technical contents of this release. He has verified the drill results and other data disclosed in this news release, including sampling, analytical and test data. Field work has been conducted under his supervision. The Timberline sampling and analysis program included an industry standard QA/QC program. After logging and cutting or dividing the sample intervals in half, the samples were picked up by Inspectorate America Corporation and taken to their ISO-9001 certified assay lab in Sparks, Nevada for analysis. The samples were analyzed for gold using a standard 30g fire assay with an AA finish. Samples returning a gold value in excess of 3 ppm were re-analyzed using a 30g fire assay with a gravimetric finish.
The Lookout Mountain mineral resources were modeled and estimated by MDA by evaluating the drill data statistically, utilizing geologic interpretations provided by Timberline to interpret gold mineral domains on cross sections spaced at 50- to 100-foot intervals across the extents of the Lookout Mountain mineralization, rectifying the mineral-domain interpretations on level plans spaced at 10-foot intervals, analyzing the modeled mineralization geostatistically to aid in the establishment of estimation parameters, and interpolating grades into a three-dimensional block model. Mike Gustin is a Qualified Person as defined by National Instrument 43-101 and is responsible for the resource estimate.
To view the entire news release follow the link below:
July 31, 2012 (Source: MarketWire)
Disclosure: Timberline Resources is a Vulture Bargain Candidate of Interest (VBCI) and is our fully fledged Vulture Bargain #4. Members of the GGR team are actively accumulating shares of TLR and continue to hold a speculative long position in the company.
