Owl Lake Property
Access
The 20-unit Owl Lake property is located on the south end of Owl Lake in the Thunder Bay Mining Division. It is accessible by aircraft to Owl Lake, or by car, boat, and walking from Terrace Bay on the north shore of Lake Superior. The Kimberly Clark bush road is followed north from Terrace Bay for about 18 kilometers to the main gate. The Aguasabon River must then be crossed above the rapids, and a trail is followed eastwards for 2 kilometers along the river. Another trail to the north is then followed for roughly one kilometer to the showings.
Local Geology
The property's main mineralized zone consists of a plug-like body of pegmatite intruding syenite gneiss and hornblende schists. The schists appear to have been derived from andesite tufts. The pegmatite consists principally of quartz and feldspar with a predominance of quartz. The quartz veins are glassy and vary in strike, but the main veins have a general east-west trend and dip steeply to the south. They range in width from a few centimeters to one meter, and the maximum length is 30 meters. The zone has a length in excess of 200 meters from north to south. To the north, the veins become shorter and narrower. The mineralization is quite uniform and plentiful, consisting of pyrite and molybdenite. The occurrence of the molybdenite is very general, as it is found in the veins at the contact of the quartz and pegmatite; in the pegmatite as a rock mineral; in the fractures in the pegmatite; and along the cleavage planes of some of the feldspars.
Previous Work
The Owl Lake molybdenite showing consisted of two patented claims (Oct 19, 1922) numbered T. B. 3694 and 3695 registered in the name of George W. Galbraith of Grand Rapids, Minnesota. The showing was explored by trenching and stripping over the length of the intrusive and by a series of diamond-drill holes (pre 1938) put down to ascertain the extension and values at depth. An additional four drill holes of about 40 meters each were drilled in the fall of 1966 under the main showings. Detailed geological mapping was also done at that time. In the fall of 1969, a magnetometer survey and geochemical survey was conducted over the showings and the sand plain area to the south and east. A land survey of the unpatented ground was completed in the fall of 1970 to prepare the ground for lease, however, this was never followed through.
In 1998, Brian Fowler explored the old workings on the property and the host gabbroic rocks west of the moly-bearing pegmatite for its potential to host PGE. Two visits were made to the property, via helicopter support - the first in May and a follow up visit in September. The May trip concentrated on the old workings, which consisted of several pits and a single 2.5 meter deep shaft, now filled with water. Three samples (98-1, 2 and 3) were taken; one from the shaft vein; another from one of the pits; and a third from a shear zone in amphibolitized mafics west of the pegmatite. The best assay received was a value of 2.85 % Mo from the shaft vein. The trip in September consisted of a kilometer long traverse across strike of the gabbroic rocks adjacent the pegmatite. One sample (98-59) was taken from an old pit that was located in the gabbro approximately 200 meters southwest of the shaft area. Results were negligible. A third trip in September that same year, via helicopter, was made into a pond just west of Owl Lake and roughly 2 miles north of the main showing. A rusty outcrop of gabbro was sampled (98-60) at the north end of the pond, but returned negligible results.
Current Work
The property was re-staked in the summer of 2010. Additional claims were staked in the fall to cover the gabbroic/ultramafic unit in this area. Some limited sampling was undertaken during the staking. Five samples were sent out for assay. One of the rocks from near the shaft area returned 1.52% Mo. The government geologist (Dorothy Campbell, Thunder Bay District) stated "the Mag and Cu-Ni-Pt results of the Lake Sediment Survey in that area indicates there is a nice Mag anomaly and a few small Cu anomalies. The Mag high is probably an u/m as they have been mapped southeast of the mag high." The potential for the property with both expanded Mo mineralization and PGE is high.
Historical Research
Historical research indicates that a high-grade platinum discovery was made in 1899 by William Pritchard, Thunder Bay, somewhere near or within the Owl Lake claim block. Pritchard travelled an old wagon trail from Jackfish Lake to an area just south of Owl Lake and held two claims (patented 3695 and 3694) where he had sunk several pits over a strike length of 700 meters. The primary metal found in the pits was molybdenite, hosted in quartz veins within a pegmatite body. The pegmatite abuts a gabbro body. Pritchard took samples from a number of pits within the two claims, and quite likely sampled portions of the gabbro as well. Some of the samples ran very high platinum – around a $100/ton. Market prices for platinum at that time ranged from $10-30 per oz. That would put the sample assays between 3 and 10 oz/ton. He returned to the area in 1919 to try and locate the ‘vein’ containing the platinum since the price of platinum had spiked to $100/oz. It is unknown if he located it or even survived the trip, since he was 84 years old at the time. An article written in 1983 by Clem Downey indicates a fellow from Schreiber had seen the original samples and assays. Pegmatites are a common late stage intrusion at the North American Palladium mine north of Thunder Bay. If the Pritchard find could be re-located, it would represent one of the highest grade occurrences of platinum in the country.
