I am pleased to have been engaged by Silver Quest Resources. Silver Quest and it’s predecessors have a long history in the mining industry as one of the first junior mining companies to list on the Venture Exchange. Silver Quest is an exploration company filling a niche in British Columbia, Yukon, and Ontario by advancing and developing silver and gold resources. I like this company for three main reasons. The company’s president, Randy Turner, is committed to the success of the company, as proven by his more than 15 years of involvement in various roles. Second and third, I like the two main assets, the Capoose –Silver Trend property and the Davidson Property, both silver and gold properties with vast upside potential located in central BC.
Great Leadership
Mr. Randy Turner, the new President and CEO of Silver Quest, is a skilled and qualified professional geologist with over thirty-eight years of mineral exploration, business and financing experience to draw from. Mr. Turner has spent the majority of his career working for Canadian mineral companies. As president of Winspear Diamonds Inc., Mr. Turner guided the company from the discovery of the Snap Lake diamond deposit in northern Canada through its sale to De Beers Mining for C$305 million.
Prior to his position at Winspear, Mr. Turner was president of Trimin Resources Ltd. where he was involved in the development and sale of the McIlvenna Bay copper/zinc deposit in Saskatchewan. Mr. Turner also spent many years working on property acquisitions and joint ventures for Esso Minerals in Canada and AGIP Mining in the US and Australia. Mr. Turner’s knowledge, contacts and experience in the exploration industry are an invaluable asset to Silver Quest, and one of the reasons, I believe, that this company is truly one to watch as they have great potential knocking at their door.
BC Properties
Silver Quest’s main area of exploration is Central British Columbia, approximately 120 kilometres southwest of Vanderhoof. The company’s three main assets, the Capoose-Silver Trend, the Davidson and the 3T’s properties are all located within this region. Although I won’t go into too much detail at this time on the 3T’s property, it is worth mentioning that the property already has NI 43-101 inferred resources of 2,356,937 ounces of silver and 148,100 ounces of gold. Management has also informed me that 3T’s should be the site of a winter drill program early in 2010 with the goal of expanding the known gold and silver resources.
BC Property location map
Capoose – Silver Trend
The Capoose-Silver Trend property is the Company’s flagship project. Silver Quest has put together a land package totalling over 14,000 ha surrounding a historical mineral resource of 32.66 million ounces of silver and 308,500 ounces of gold. To-date, 112 drill holes have defined three mineralized zones which remain open in all directions and at depth. Also of significant interest is a five kilometre long silver-gold-copper-lead-zinc soil geochemical anomaly with multiple high priority targets that are defined and drill ready, but currently untested. The five kilometre long mineralized trend encompasses the historical resource and trends in a north-easterly direction. At the south end of the Capoose-Silver Trend land holdings there are multiple mineralized showings that need to be further explored; these include the Fawn, Buck and Rut mineral occurrences.
Silver Quest’s recently completed drill program included 1,692 m spread across 13 diamond drill holes. The focus of the program was to test the extensions of the south end of zones one and two, as well as to test the area between the two zones. Silver Quest’s concept is that the current three zones are actually connected creating one large disseminated gold and silver deposit. Last year’s program included drill hole D-08-91 which successfully connected zones one and two at their north ends and yielded 240 m of 45.5 g/t silver and 0.76 g/t gold. Silver Quest has only received assay results from the first hole of this years program, D-09-100, which was drilled at the south end of zone one and appears to expand mineralization to the south. Two areas of significant mineralization were intersected in this hole; an upper zone of 16 m grading 67.9 g/t silver and 0.26 g/t gold, and a lower zone of 30 m grading 23.1 g/t silver and 1.99 g/t gold, with a 9 m higher grade zone within the interval of 61.8 g/t silver and 4.72 g/t gold. These results are extremely encouraging and I look forward to seeing further high-grade results from the remaining twelve drill holes completed this year. I also anticipate an NI 43-101 resource calculation on the Capoose-Silver Trend property by the second quarter of 2010.
Capoose-Silver Trend drill hole location map and estimated zones of mineralization
Davidson Property
Silver Quest holds 100% interest in the Davidson property, located 10 kilometres west of the Capoose-Silver Trend property. The Davidson Property has been optioned to Richfield Ventures, which included Davidson in a larger land package called the” Blackwater Project”. Richfield has completed 15 holes totalling more than 2,450 m this year. The majority of these holes have been collared on Silver Quest’s Davidson property and have confirmed and expanded historical mineralization in three mineral zones. Richfield believes the area may contain a bulk tonnage gold deposit. The best hole to date on the Davidson property was a Silver Quest hole drilled in 2005, DAV-05-02, that assayed 3.4 g/t silver and 1.43 g/t gold over 140.5 m. Richfield has recovered many intersections that have similar values of gold and silver over long intervals including BW 48 which returned 148 m of 5.0 g/t silver and 1.26 g/t gold. Richfield is lead by a group of experienced and knowledgeable individuals. The group is well financed and plans on completing the earn-in option on the Davidson property towards the middle of 2010. It is expected that Silver Quest will retain a 40% interest in this property; a significant amount for the upside potential, but a reasonable amount to be able to fund their portion of further exploration while also being able to advance their flagship project, the Capoose-Silver Trend Project. I look forward to the release of the results from the remaining four drill holes, and hope to see a resource calculation released prior to next summer.
Drill hole location map from Richfield. Davidson property is above the blue line
Additional Properties
In addition to the Company’s BC projects, Silver Quest has a package of early-stage projects located in the booming White Gold Area of the Yukon and the Thunder Bay Region of Ontario, creating an in-depth pipeline of projects for advancement. At the top of the list is the Boulevard project recently optioned from Kiska Metals and Northgate Minerals. A new gold discovery was made last year in the trenches on Boulevard. The discovery trench, TRV0801 returned 7.04 grams per tonne (g/t) gold over 6.0 metres. A second trench, TRBV0802 returned 6.43 g/t gold over 2.0 metres. The Boulevard project has been soil sampled, trenched and drilled over the past three years. Silver Quest completed an auger soil sampling program this year to better define the targets to be drill tested next season.
Bottom line
Silver Quest is a company in all the right geographical locations, building and defining resources with a pipeline of strong exploration properties to deliver upside potential. The quality of Silver Quest’s Projects, and the added value of an experienced management team and board, makes this worthy of consideration for most speculators portfolios.
