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PJX Resources initial Dewdney Trail results promising, drilling ahead

PJX Resources (CVE:PJX) is a junior Canadian gold explorer that listed on the TSX Venture Exchange in mid September of 2011 after raising  $2.5 million, and issuing a fully diluted 25.8  million shares.

The company has secured interests in four separate properties known as the Dewdney Trail, Zinger, Eddy and Vine Blocks that form a circle around the historical Cranbrook mining district located in the southeast corner of British Columbia.

In 1864, a gold rush commenced at Wildhorse Creek, which is 19 kilometers from the city of Cranbrook, producing around 1.5 million ounces of placer gold, and ranking Wildhorse Creek as the location for the third largest output of alluvial gold in the province.

The company is seeking hard rock sources for the prolific amount of alluvial gold that was recovered from around Wildhorse Creek and has secured over 20,000 hectares that are located 29 kilometers northwest of Cranbrook.  This prospect is known as the Dewdney Trail, and may be considered the company’s flagship exploration play.

Dewdney Trail currently contains newly identified large tonnage gold prospects that are 8 kilometers upstream from Wildhorse Creek, and include five primary mineralized zones that the company has identified at Spirit, Tac, Lewis, Jack Leg and Dew Drop. 

The two largest targets are at the Spirit prospect, which carries a strike length of 5 kilometers, and at the Lewis prospect, with 7 kilometers. Both targets carry a stratigraphic continuity over their respective strike lengths, and contain large and intense alteration systems that feature sericite, quartz, pyrite, iron carbonate and iron oxide that are laced with centimeter-wide fractures throughout the host unit that carry gold values clearly visible to the naked eye.

The gold-bearing quartzite sedimentary units at Spirit and Lewis are contained within two distinct geological horizons that have been identified as targets for sediment-hosted gold deposits, with potential horizons that appear to carry a thickness of 75 to 200 meters over a strike of from 5 to 7 kilometers. PJX Resources has collected grab samples within Spirit and Lewis that have assayed as high as 15 grams per tonne (g/t) Au, and include significant visible gold that was recovered from surface exposures.

The company postulates the presence of a primary target that is a large tonnage, low grade sediment-hosted vein type deposit of the type that is found at Muruntou in Uzbekistan, which hosts 80 million ounces of gold, at Sukhoy Log, Russia, with 20 million ounces of gold, Victorian Goldfields at Ballarat and Bendigo with a combined historical production of over 20 million ounces of gold production - or possibly the smaller Meguma Terrane deposits of Nova Scotia. 

PJX Resources has completed airborne magnetic surveys along the Spirit and Lewis prospects and has identified more than 20 priority targets for additional evaluation.

A two phase exploration program at Dewdney Trail is now well advanced, with the first phase consisting of geophysics, geochemistry, geologic prospecting, trenching and sampling nearing completion at a total cost of $320,500. A second phase of trenching, sampling and drilling for a total of $920,000 is approximately one third complete.

This work has allowed company staff and consultants to complete initial prospecting on at least 12 of the 20 priority targets, with extensive mapping and trenching on 3 targets, and drilling on one target, with additional targets set for trenching and drilling this year.

Field staff completed 4.5 kilometers of trail and 500 meters of trenching on 3 targets, and identified and drilled the M1 target, which carries quartzite with inter-bedded argillite, and appears to carry a true width of 250 meters. The unit is variably altered with sericite iron carbonate and iron oxide mineralization and contains multiple episodes of cross cutting quartz veining.

PJX Resources drilled 4 holes for 750 metres to test the M1 unit and identify structural controls over an area of 100 by 200 meters, within a much larger surface expression that is measured at 800 by 1,000 meters.  The company has also collected 400 rock samples and will report assays from drilling and sampling as soon as they are completed and analyzed. 

Sediment-hosted vein type gold deposits such as Sukhoi are known to contain higher grade sections that average as high as 4 to 9 g/t Au, with the remainder of the resource falling into a range of 2.5 to 2.7 g/t Au, at a 1 g/t Au cut off. PJX Resources is testing targets at the Dewdney Trail with the hope of duplicating a similar type of outcome.  

The three remaining properties also hold potential for hard rock resources, containing precious and base metal values.

The Vine property contains a non compliant and historical resource that was drilled by Kokanee Exploration in 1990. This drilling reached down to a depth of 630 meters and intersected 3 massive sulphide veins for a historical estimate of 1.3 million tonnes at 2.2 g/t Au, 26.3 g/t Ag, 3.12% Pb, 3.12% Zn, and 0.11% Cu. Surface trenching also exposed massive and disseminated sulphide, and has potential for additional gold, zinc, lead and silver mineralization, along strike and depth. 

The Eddy property encompasses the Baldy Shear Zone that has been identified over a distance of 10 kilometers and hosts multiple gold targets along a number of dilation zones that have been defined along the length of the structure.

The Zinger gold property carries gold in surface samples that have been identified along a strike length of 9 kilometers. 

Airborne surveys also completed over numerous untested gold targets at Eddy and Zinger and being evaluated for follow up testing.

The company is headed by John Keating who is the Chief Executive Officer, President and Director, and is a geologist with 30 years experience in both mining and exploration. He conducted early stage exploration for Noranda and was President and CEO of Black Bull Resources and Golden Chalice. Kent Pearson is a Director and geologist, with 20 years experience and is President of Locarno Advisory.

Management has noted that historical exploration on the company's prospects totaled around $3 million, and that the $2.5 million raised in the recent IPO should be sufficient to carry out a significant exploration effort on many of the identified prospects. Initial results at Dewdney Trail certainly indicate the presence of visible gold values over a wide area that will be further evaluated by both drilling and surface exploration.