“First” mine gets second chance
Historical mines dot the countryside from coast to coast across Canada but few have the honour of being called the “first” in their region. Many claim to be the “largest,” “deepest,” or even “richest” mine in the area, but nothing beats being known as the “first.”
There’s a mystique about that designation; something that only historians and a few “old timers” talk about but every once in a while, outsiders appear on the scene showing interest in “first” mines and all of a sudden, the abandoned and often-forgotten sites starts to show signs of life again.
And that’s exactly what’s happening at the Mooseland Gold Property about 110 kilometres northeast of Halifax as NSGold Corporation of Bedford, Nova Scotia, works to reopen the province’s “first” gold mine.
First discovered in 1858, total historical production from the Mooseland Mine from 1863 to 1934 is 3,865 troy ounces of gold recovered from 9,058 short tons of crushed material. Like many mines of that era, it eventually became uneconomical and potentially too dangerous to operate and it was abandoned.
In 1986, Acadian Mineral Ventures Ltd. of Halifax and US-based Hecla Mining Company, moved back in and drilled 135 diamond drill holes totalling about 31,700 metres, and constructed a shaft and settling pond. Later, between 2002-2004, Azure Resources Corporation of Halifax, worked the site by drilling an additional six holes totalling approximately 1,168 metres, and building a decline and drifts along several veins.
Other mining infrastructure on the Mooseland property includes a three-compartment shaft sunk to a depth of 125 metres with a steel head frame and a ramp to a depth of 50 metres. From earlier exploration, the site has been levelled and five structures have been built; four buildings and one retention pond.
Buildings on site include a magazine, an 18.3-metre high steel head frame, garage, and a core shed and about four hectares have been cleared for a surface plant complex, a contractors’ camp, and a water retention dam.
A 12,000 m3 settling pond is on the site and more than 10,000 m3 of glacial till has been placed and compacted to form a retention dam structure.
Now, NSGold has been on the site and in 2010, it completed 26 diamond drill holes totalling 6,507 metres, 13 in the West Zone (3,613 metres) and 13 in the East Zone (2,894 metres). Last year the company added 16 more holes, eight in the West Zone totalling 2,606 metres and eight in the East Zone adding 2,404 metres for a total of 5,010 metres of NQ-sized core.
The property consists of 105 claims on seven exploration licenses. Individual mineral claims are approximately 16 hectares in area, giving a total area of about 1,680 hectares.
Glenn Holmes, Chief Executive Officer of NSGold, said that mineral resources were identified using block cut-off grade of 2.6 g/t and for the West Zone, non-diluted (planned dilution, to a minimum true width of 1.5 metres was included. Non-planned dilution was not included) Inferred Resources totalled 1.46 million tonnes with an average grade of 5.52 g/t for 259,000 ounces.
“For both zones, the total non-diluted Inferred Mineral Resources was 2.52 million tonnes with an average gold grade of 5.6 g/t for 454,000 ounces,” said Holmes.
The discovery of gold at Mooseland resulted in a rush of propsectors to the Eastern Shore of Nova Scotia and several other significant gold discoveries were made. Collectively the mines of the Nova Scotia goldfields yielded production in excess of 1 million ounces of gold predominantly during the period 1880 to 1930. With the current high gold price the Nova Scotia goldfields are getting another “kick at the can” with several Canadian and Australian junior explorers currently active in the Province. With modern day exploration and development methods now being applied to these historic and long forgotten mines, the Province of Nova Scotia could be about to re-enter a period of significant gold production.
Comments