Projects
Bear Creek Mining has assembled a portfolio of quality mineral properties in Peru, and continues to evaluate projects of geological merit for potential acquisition. The Company secured rights to earn 70% of the Corani Project from Rio Tinto Mining and Exploration Ltd. in January of 2005. Bear Creek has since transformed the grassroots prospect into one of the most important undeveloped silver deposits in the world. Based on drilling only to year-end 2006, the world-class project hosts three adjacent open-pittable deposits that collectively contain 278 million ounces of silver, 3.12 billion pounds of lead and 1.59 billion pounds of zinc (measured and indicated), with another 40 million ounces of silver in the inferred category. The flagship Corani Project in southeastern Peru has advanced to the stage where scoping, metallurgical and pre-feasibility studies are either under way or planned in order to examine a potential bulk-tonnage silver mine with robust base-metal credits. Advanced metallurgical test-work is providing information to guide the design of the optimum processing flow-sheet, maximize recoveries of silver and other metals, and ensure the production of quality concentrates. The results of these tests will be incorporated into the scoping study, which has satisfactorily addressed important aspects of a proposed mine, including power, water, infrastructure and access, among others. The scoping study will be followed by a pre-feasibility study, which will include environmental and socio-economic studies and programs, along with more detailed analyses of the project's economic potential.
Corani is now both an advanced project on a fast track toward mine development and a district-scale exploration project with excellent potential for new silver-rich discoveries. Drilling at Corani totaled 76,625 metres in 455 holes as of mid-April, 2007, and will continue throughout the year to expand and upgrade resources and test newly discovered targets under thin cover elsewhere on the property.
Bear Creek has generated several additional discoveries in Peru since becoming a publicly traded company in 2003. The Santa Ana Property was the Company's first grass-roots discovery made in the same epithermal belt hosting the Corani Project. Bear Creek staked the un-drilled prospect in 2004, based on its potential to host a near-surface, bulk-tonnage silver deposit. The initial sampling program revealed a large silver anomaly and generated encouraging results that suggested the presence of widespread near-surface silver mineralization. Bear Creek completed two phases of wide-spaced drilling in 2006, which confirmed the presence of a significant bulk-tonnage deposit with many favorable features. The oxide-dominant silver mineralization is amenable to low-cost heap-leaching and open-pit mining at a low stripping ratio.
Ongoing drilling is expanding the footprint of the silver mineralization, defining high-grade zones, testing new targets, and providing data for preliminary metallurgical test-work. Santa Ana is rapidly advancing to the stage where a scoping study will soon be initiated to assess its economic potential, yet still has excellent potential for new discoveries. Only about 50% of the 1.4-square-kilometre project has been tested by wide-spaced drilling.
Bear Creek also discovered La Yegua, which lies within the northwestern portion of the Andahuaylas-Yauri Belt hosting many large porphyry and skarn deposits in southern Peru. Initial sampling confirmed anomalous copper and molybdenum in rock samples within a zone measuring at least two kilometres long. Gold values between 0.3 g/t and 5.32 g/t, together with copper values ranging from 0.3% to 5.98%, were returned from an area peripheral to the large copper-molybdenum zone.
La Yegua is prospective for bulk-tonnage, disseminated copper-molybdenum-gold mineralization, as well as higher grade gold-copper deposits within structural zones peripheral to the porphyry-style mineralization. Bear Creek has granted Chapleau Resources an option to earn 51% of La Yegua by spending US$2.77 million on exploration and issuing shares valued at US$350,000 over four years. Chapleau can increase its interest to 75% by issuing another 1.25 million shares. Initial drilling will test priority targets under shallow cover.
Bear Creek Mining has entered into agreements with other industry partners in order to broaden its exposure to exploration projects in Peru. The Company earned a 50% interest in the Ataspaca Project from Southwestern Resources in 2004. The property, which covers a 1.5-square-kilometre copper-molybdenum-gold anomaly coincident with hydrothermal alteration, is prospective for a high-level porphyry copper deposit.
Bear Creek's 2004 drilling program returned anomalous copper-gold-molybdenum mineralization, but the target depth of the potentially economic porphyry copper system exceeded the Company's objectives. In 2005, partners Bear Creek and Southwestern entered into an agreement allowing Anglo American Peru to earn 60% of Ataspaca through work programs that include the drilling of deeper holes, starting in 2007.
Bear Creek has acquired other properties with significant geological potential that are still in the early stages of exploration, including the Don Marcelo Project situated within the prolific Pierina-Alto Chicama-Yanacocha gold belt in northern Peru. Surface sampling has returned anomalous gold values from 89 of 316 samples, with six assays above 1 g/t gold and up to 3 g/t gold. Elevated mercury values suggest that Don Marcelo is exposed at the higher levels of an untested epithermal system with gold potential at very shallow depths. The 2007 program will include additional sampling, geophysics and drilling.
Bear Creek continues to evaluate other projects in Peru and neighboring nations, reflecting a strategy focused primarily on grass-roots exploration for bulk-tonnage, open-pittable gold and silver deposits.
Bear Creek has extensive experience in Peru, and the ability to recognize emerging mineral districts where high-potential properties can be acquired by staking. This experience and expertise has allowed Bear Creek to secure its core assets on modest terms, mainly in areas where infrastructure and community support for mining are favorable.
The Company's Peruvian-based management team also understands the importance of gaining a "social license" to operate, which can only be earned over time through respectful public outreach programs and progressive environmental and social programs and policies.
MAPS AND SECTIONS
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Other Projects