It’s a bit unusual these days to see a company’s share price more than double on strong trenching results. But this is precisely what happened when Calibre Mining (TSXV: CXB) released additional trenching samples from its wholly owned Montes de Oro gold-silver-copper-zinc project in northeast Nicaragua on Aug. 15, with investors pushing the stock up 163%, or 6.5¢, to close the day at 10.5¢.
The latest results included 52.3 metres grading 7.1 g/t Au from trench no. 9; 23 metres of 5.25 g/t Au from trench no. 17, including 10.15 g/t Au over 9 metres; and 16.2 metres of 4.68 g/t Au from trench no. 19, including 10.14 g/t Au over 6 metres.
“There’s certainly some high grades that we have in these trenches and we see now some continuity especially along that principal structure that holds trench nine and a number of others … around that trend that seems to be giving us consistently high grade results. And, as we’ve seen in trench nine, some very significant widths as well,” Greg Smith, the company’s president and CEO, comments.
Calibre discovered the Montes de Oro target after following up on the recent regional work on its 785-km2 Borosi concessions in the country’s mining triangle, which includes three historical gold producing regions: Bonanza, Rosita and Siuna. Montes de Oro is within the Siuna district, 10 km north of the Calibre’s Cerro Aeropuerto gold-silver project.
Smith says the company started stream sediment sampling late last year in the area before putting in a soil grid in the first quarter of this year. And for the past five months it has been testing the anomalous results found in the soil sampling by trenching. The Vancouver-based firm plans to continue trenching the Montes de Oro target well into the fourth quarter to get a better understanding of the mineralization. So far, it has only partially tested the Montes de Oro anomaly which spans a 400 x 650 metre area and remains open to the northeast.
Calibre adds Montes’ skarn-style mineralization is comparable to Cerro Aeropuerto’s and that of its 100% owned, past producing La Luz mine, sitting 9 km to the south, which produced 2.3 million oz of gold from 17 million tonnes grading 4.14 g/t Au. However, it notes more work needs to be done to confirm the geology before drilling starts.
“Logically once we’re happy that we have a good idea through this trenching of the geology and the grades here on surface the next step will certainly be doing some drilling at Montes,” the 48-year-old CEO comments. While the company could fund its own drill program at the project as it has roughly $2 million in its till, it has been talking with possible joint venture partners over the past months, Smith says.
Partnering up with other miners to advance its projects is an integral part of Calibre’s strategy to survive the cyclical nature of the business. Its joint venture partners include B2Gold (TSX: BTO) — Nicaragua’s largest gold producer and operator of the La Libertad and El Limon mines— and Alder Resources (TSX-V: ALR). B2Gold has earned a 51% interest in Calibre’s Primavera gold-copper project and on 322 km2 of surrounding concessions by spending $8 million. It has an option to earn a further 19% in the project and nearby concessions by investing another $6 million over three years.
Alder has an option to earn a 65% stake in Calibre’s Rosita D concession, which hosts the historic Santa Rita copper-gold mine, by spending $4 million over the next four years.
Calibre ended Aug. 19 down 18% at 9¢.
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