North of 60 Mining News - The mining newspaper for Alaska and Canada's North

Thesis Gold Inc. Oct. 24 reports that the first 2023 holes at Bonanza have cut strong mineralization, including one hole that lives up to the name given to this zone on the company's Ranch project in the Toodoggone mining district of Northern British Columbia.

Thesis, which closed a merger with Benchmark Metals Inc. in August, is in the midst of a 50,000-meter drill program that involves roughly 30,000 meters on the Ranch property and 20,000 meters at Lawyers, a property immediately south of Ranch.

A preliminary economic assessment completed for Benchmark in 2022 outlines plans for mining ore from open pits at three Lawyers deposits – AGB, Cliff Creek, and Dukes Ridge – feeding a centrally located mill that would produce 1.7 million oz of gold and 26.7 million oz of silver over an initial 12 years of mining.

This operation was based on 67.38 million metric tons of measured and indicated resources averaging 1.26 grams per metric ton (2.74 million ounces) gold and 24.39 g/t (52.9 million oz) silver; plus 4.87 million metric tons of inferred resource averaging 2.39 g/t (378,000 oz) gold and 39.41 g/t (6.2 million oz) silver at Lawyers.

Based on optimization studies carried out since the PEA, Thesis is focused on expanding underground mineable resources at Lawyers and open-pit mineable resources to add to future mine plans.

The idea of mining ore from both projects is not new. In the 1990s, Cheni Gold Mines Inc. processed ore from Ranch through a mill on the Lawyers property. This historical mining included a 65-meter-long starter pit at Bonanza. Production from Bonanza pit, however, accounted for less than 20% of the 40,000 metric tons historically mined from Ranch.

Since gaining ownership of Ranch in 2020, Thesis has drilled more than 150 reverse circulation holes that have traced the gold mineralized footprint at the Bonanza and adjacent Ridge target for 1,100 meters.

Thesis' 2023 drilling at Bonanza-Ridge is focused on establishing a resource for this zone.

"The key to this year's program at Bonanza-Ridge is to further define the high-grade, near-surface mineralization as we work towards a maiden resource estimate," said Thesis Gold President and CEO Ewan Webster.

Highlights from the first batch of results from this drilling include:

• 4.05 meters averaging 119.49 g/t gold from a depth of 31 meters in hole 23BNZDD001, including two meters of 231 g/t gold.

Thesis Gold Inc.

Aerial view of the exploration camp on Thesis Gold's Ranch property in the Toodoggone mining district of Northern BC.

• 12.57 meters averaging 3.87 g/t gold from a depth of nine meters in hole 23BNZDD004, including 2.79 meters of 8.61 g/t gold.

• 6.11 meters averaging 5.39 g/t gold from a depth of 93.9 meters in hole 23BNZDD013, including 1.77 meters of 11.63 g/t gold.

"Bonanza is certainly living up to its name with hole one," Webster said.

"Assays are pending from up-dip drilling at the Ridge zone, where we expect additional strong results within this interconnected fault network of northeast and northwest structures, defining over 1 kilometer of drill-tested mineralized strike extent," the Thesis Gold CEO added. "Drilling is still ongoing at several zones across the project, and we look forward to sharing those results as they become available."

Thesis anticipates the completion of a maiden resource estimate for Ranch in the second quarter of next year.

Author Bio

Shane Lasley, Publisher

Over his more than 16 years of covering mining and mineral exploration, Shane has become renowned for his ability to report on the sector in a way that is technically sound enough to inform industry insiders while being easy to understand by a wider audience.

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