Work History
Staked as Rivier cl 1-72 (YB14311) in Jul/88 by Welcome North Mines Ltd. The company added Rivier cl 73-128 (YB15237) the following month and carried out geological mapping and geochemical sampling later in the year.
Cominco Ltd staked Nik cl 1-12 (YB50995) 1 km to the southwest in Jul/94, to cover EM and magnetic anomalies identified during a regional airborne survey flown earlier in the year. The company carried out geological mapping, prospecting and soil sampling later in the year.
Restaked as Coach cl 1-20 (YB69038) in Oct/95 by Expatriate Resources Ltd which carried out geological mapping, soil sampling and prospecting the following year.
In Jul/96 J. Ruza staked JB cl 1-20 (YB85256) 1 km to the south. Ruza never filed any assessment work and the claims lapsed the following year.
In Jul/97 Cominco optioned various surrounding claim blocks, including the Nik claims, to Pacific Bay Minerals Ltd. The company carried out reconnaissance exploration programs on some of the claims and used excess assessment credit to renew the Nik claims for 1 year. In Jun/98 the Nik claims were allowed to lapse.
Restaked as OC cl 1-62 (YB94385) in Nov/2002 by Expatriate Resources Ltd. Expatriate optioned these claims and others to Entourage Mining Ltd in Mar/2003 subject to certain option payments and related work commitments. Entorage carried out a contour soil sampling program in Sep/2003. Entourage dropped the option in Nov/2005.
Capsule Geology
The Finlayson Lake region is dominantly underlain by a layered sequence of Devonian to Early Mississippian metavolcanic and metasedimentary rocks of the Yukon-Tanana Terrane (YTT) that have been intruded by Mississippian granitic intrusions and later Jurassic, Cretaceous and Eocene intrusions (Murphy et al., 2001). The YTT is a volcanic-plutonic pericratonic arc assemblage that was strongly deformed and metamorphosed by Late Triassic time. Volcanic-hosted massive sulphide deposits exist at different stratigraphic positions within the YTT including the Fyre Lake deposit (Minfile Occurrence #105G 034) in the Devonian to lower Mississippian(?) Fire Lake mafic metavolcanic unit, the Kudz Ze Kayah deposit (Minfile Occurrence #105G 117) in the Mississippian Kudz Ze Kayah felsic metavolcanic unit, the Wolverine deposit (Minfile Occurrence #105G 072) within the Lower Mississippian Wolverine Succession and the Ice deposit (Minfile Occurrence #105G 118) in Early Permian Campbell Range basalt.
The quartz-biotite, quartz-muscovite and muscovite-chlorite-biotite-quartz-feldspar schists and interbedded carbonaceous argillite, siltstone and calcareous siltstone rocks that outcrop on the Coach claims correlate with the Fire Lake mafic metavolcanic unit and Upper Devonian schists of unit Dq (Murphy et al., 2001). Serpentinized ultramafic rocks of the Late Devonian North Lakes Meta-diorite unit intrude the eastern part of the claim block and a mid-Cretaceous monzonite stock intrudes west of the claim block.
The occurrence consists of arsenic anomalies in soil overlying quartz-carbonate alteration zones which occur along the margins of serpentinized ultramafic rock located within the hanging wall of a thrust fault. Welcome North reported scattered weak gold values were found within the arsenic anomalies.
Soil sampling by Cominco returned a single, strong coincident arsenic-silver anomaly with elevated lead response, several weak copper-silver anomalies and a single point lead anomaly. It appears none of the anomalies were followed-up.
Expatriate's soil sampling program outlined two anomalies of interest. The first consists of a 200 m wide by 500 m long area in the northwestern corner of the claim block which returned weakly to moderately anomalous, copper, zinc and molybdenum values. The anomaly which strikes perpendicular to topography, is bounded by two normal faults and is underlain by chloritic phyllite and a siltstone/quartzite unit. The second anomaly consists of moderately to strongly anomalous copper values obtained downhill from a quartz-carbonate altered ultramafic. This anomaly may be the same one reported by Welcome North.
The OC claims are underlain by Upper Devonian and Older metapsammites (unit Dq) and Fire Lake metavolcanics (unit DF). A long cylindrical shaped ultramafic body of Late Devonian age intrudes on the east side of the claim block and a large Cretaceous granitic body intrudes on the west side of the claim block. Entourage Mining focused their exploration efforts on finding emerald mineralization similar to that hosted by Regal Ridge (Minfile Occurrence #105G 147) located 38 km to the southeast. Emeralds at Regal Ridge are hosted by Fire Lake metavolcanics in contact with ultramafic intrusions. The Regal Ridge deposit hosts elevated levels of beryllium and chromium in soils. Soil sampling by Entourage returned background levels for the elements in question. The company did not carry out any further work on the OC claims and the claims were allowed to lapse in Nov/2005.
References
BOND, J.D., MURPHY, D.C., COLPRON, M., GORDEY, S.P., PLOUFFE, A., ROOTS, C.F., LIPOVSKY, P.S., STRONGHILL, G., AND ABBOTT, J.G., 2002. Digital compilation of bedrock geology and till geochemistry, northern Finlayson Lake map area, Southeastern Yukon (105G), Exploration and Geological Services Division, Yukon Region, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, Open File Report, 2002-7(D) and Geological Survey of Canada Open File 4243.
COMINCO LTD, Jan/96. Assessment Report #093327 by P.A. MacRobbie.
ENTOURAGE MINING LTD AND EXPATRIATE RESOURCES LTD, Dec/2003. Assessment Report #094427 by C.G. Verley.
ENTOURAGE MINING LTD, Annual Financial Statements 2004, 2005 and 2006. (available on SEDAR).
EXPATRIATE RESOURCES LTD, May/97. Assessment Report #093642 by A. Burgert.
HUNT, J.A., 2001. Volcanic-associated massive (VMS) mineralization in the Yukon-Tanana Terrane and coeval strata of the North American miogeocline, in the Yukon and adjacent areas. Exploration and Geological Services Division, Yukon Region, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, Bulletin 12, 107 p.
MORTENSEN, J.K., AND JILSON, G.A., 1985. Evolution of the Yukon-Tanana terrane: evidence from southeastern Yukon Territory. Geology, vol. 13, p. 806-810.
MURPHY, D.C., 1998. Stratigraphic framework for syngenetic occurrences, Yukon-Tanana Terrane south of Finlayson Lake: A Progress Report. In: Yukon Exploration and Geology 1997, Exploration and Geological Services Division, Yukon Region, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, p. 51-58.
MURPHY, D.C., AND PIERCEY, S.J., 1999a. Finlayson project: Geological evolution of Yukon-Tanana Terrane and its relationship to Campbell Range belt, northern Wolverine Lake map area, southeastern Yukon. In: Yukon Exploration and Geology 1998, C.F. Roots and D.S. Emond (eds.), Exploration and Geological Services Division, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, p.47-62.
MURPHY, D.C. AND PIERCEY, S.J., 1999b. Geological map of parts of Finlayson Lake (105G/7, 8 and parts of 1, 2, and 9) and Frances Lake (parts of 105H/5 and 12) map areas, southeastern Yukon (1:100 000-scale). Exploration and Geological Services Division, Yukon Region, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, Open File 1999-4.
MURPHY, D.C. AND PIERCEY, S.J., 2000. Syn-mineralization faults and their re-activation, Finlayson Lake massive sulphide district, Yukon-Tanana Terrane, southeastern Yukon. In: Yukon Exploration and Geology 1999, D.S. Emond and L.H. Weston (eds.), Exploration and Geological Services Division, Yukon Region, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, p. 55-66.
MURPHY, D.C., COLPRON, M., GORDEY, S.P., ROOTS, C.F., ABBOTT, G., AND LIPOVSKY, P.S., 2001. Preliminary bedrock geological map of northern Finlayson Lake area (NTS 105 G) Yukon Territory (1:100 000 scale). Exploration and Geological Services Division, Yukon Region, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, Open File 2001-33.
MURPHY, D.C., COLPRON, M., ROOTS, C.F., GORDEY, S.P. AND ABBOTT, J.G., 2002. Finlayson Lake Targeted Geoscience Initiative (southeastern Yukon) , Part 1: Bedrock geology. In: Yukon Exploration and Geology 2001, D.S. Emond, L.H. Weston and L.L. Lewis (eds.), Exploration and Geological Services Division, Yukon Region, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, p. 189-207.
PIERCEY, S.J., HUNT, J.A. and MURPHY, D.C., 1999. Lithogeochemistry of meta-volcanic rocks from Yukon-Tanana Terrane, Finlayson Lake region, Yukon: Preliminary results. In: Yukon Exploration and Geology 1998, C.F. Roots and D.S. Emond (eds.), Exploration and Geological Services Division, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, p.125-138.
YUKON EXPLORATION 1988, p. 91-92
