Tres-Or Resources (TRS-V) began the week with news that it has drilled five holes into the Guigues kimberlite, news that sent the stock down 1.5 cents to nine cents on 114,000 shares Monday. The reaction is discouraging, as this is the first time in a decade that Ms. Duffett, president and chief executive officer, had seriously proposed drilling the big kimberlite in Northeastern Ontario, and the first time in the nearly 20 years that the company has owned the pipe that she has followed through on drill plans.
Tres-Or did its drilling from two sites, probing the pipe with three holes from one setup in the core of the anomaly and two from the other site in the southwestern corner of the target. Vertical holes at each site remained in kimberlite at the termination depth of 300 metres, and the three angled holes all encountered varying amounts of kimberlite in the 1,432-metre program. The drilling may not have hit as much kimberlite as hoped, as the company now says that Guigues spans between four and six hectares. Previously, it pegged the pipe as covering between five and seven hectares.
Given the size of Guigues, several more holes would be needed to properly delineate the pipe, but given Tres-Or's limited treasury, the effort so far will be enough to test the company's theory that Guigues is potentially another Victor. Ms. Duffett says that her crew collected enough material to properly test for microdiamonds, and it will be shipped to a laboratory for processing shortly.
Ms. Duffett says that she "looks forward to reporting the microdiamond sample results as soon as they are available," but if Guigues is indeed another Victor, the microdiamond results may not be particularly enlightening. In fact, there may not be many microdiamonds at all. Victor's microdiamond counts left De Beers unimpressed and the big pipe sat idle for a decade until the company decided to collect a big bulk sample. That test showed a low grade, around one-quarter carat per tonne, but with particularly valuable diamonds that made it economic.
As a result, Ms. Duffett and her crew may put more emphasis on what indicator minerals come from the new drill core. Like most geologists, she gushes enthusiastically about having eclogite and lherzolite, rather than the standard harzburgite as the mantle source of the diamonds, but in general terms, Tres-Or is looking for a different suite of indicator minerals.
The good news, for laymen at least, is that the geological jargon is color coded and the ample numbers of orange and purple garnets seen embedded in the kimberlite supports her theory. "We were drawn to Guigues by eclogite (orange) garnets, but the less distinctive lherzolite garnets (purple) with diamond inclusions compositions may ultimately mark the source of most of the diamonds." Perhaps, but the question will be how many diamonds, and over how big an area.
Even with good news, it is unclear how long Tres-Or will be in the diamond exploration business. Curiously, Ms. Duffett is now telling investors that the company is "actively pursuing potential opportunities to spin out its diamond assets to create additional shareholder value." Apparently, more value can be had by splitting a company with a nine-cent stock in two.
Will Purcell |
