Nordgold - a European gold producer with operations in Russia, Kazakhstan, Burkina Faso and Guinea - is applying its arctic experience to the Pistol Bay gold project in Nunavut.

Since at least 2014, Nordgold has become increasingly more involved with exploration at Pistol Bay through its investments in Northquest Ltd., a Toronto-based junior that is advancing the 861-square-kilometer (332 square miles) property that blankets 90 kilometers (55 miles) of the Pistol Bay trend, a series of surface-gold occurrences and zones that runs west from Hudson Bay.

In April, Nordgold, which already owned more than half of Northquest's outstanding shares, offered to buy all of the remaining shares at C25.3 cents each.

Northquest countered with an offer of C26 cents per share, which has been accepted by Nordgold. As of mid-August, Nordgold owned roughly 97.6 percent of the Pistol Bay owner.

According to a maiden resource published in April, the Vickers zone at Pistol Bay hosts 7.79 million metric tons of inferred resource averaging 2.95 g/t (739,000 ounces) gold.

In addition to the initial resource, the technical report also describes 16 other gold occurrences on the Pistol Bay property at which there has been little drilling.

One such occurrence, Howitzer, is a priority exploration target for 2016. Based on results of sampling in 2015, it is now believed that Howitzer could be a larger and higher grade zone than Vickers.

The 2016 program also includes some drilling targeting extension of the Vickers deposit.

-SHANE LASLEY