Duketon Mining has been granted a new tenement, E77/3160, at its 100%-owned Barlee Project in Western Australia’s (WA) Southern Cross region.
This tenement is considered prospective for gold, base metals and lithium, further expanding Duketon’s portfolio in the area.
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The Barlee Project is located approximately 200km north of Southern Cross in a region with several small gold deposits including the Mt Dimer and Marda Gold projects, and the Penny Mine.
The newly acquired land adjoins the company’s existing holdings, increasing the total granted tenure at the project to 253km² and extending the project by 38km along the Youanmi and Clampton faults.
The Barlee tenement covers the granite-greenstone contact, primarily overlying the Archean Diemals Formation, known for its siltstones, shales and mudstone.
This area is part of a fault-bounded basin with mineralisation observed in the south at gold prospects such as Bronzewing, Yarbu and Andromeda.
The project’s southern tenements, contiguous with the company’s existing holdings, have defined gold targets from broad spacing auger sampling, which are yet to be drilled.
Prior exploration on E77/3160 includes regional auger soil sampling, with 306 samples collected and analysed, revealing a maximum gold concentration of 92.7 parts per billion (ppb) and several anomalies over 30ppb gold.
Ultra-fine fraction (UFF) soil geochemistry has identified two significant gold anomalies on the tenement.
In the north, a 3.8km by 1.8km anomaly lies near the Clampton Fault, while in the south, a 3.2km by 2.2km anomaly is associated with the Diemals Formation.
Additionally, six rock chip samples were collected as part of a lithium-focused reconnaissance programme, although no significant assays resulted from this non-targeted sampling. In August 2023, Rox Resources secured binding commitments for a placement of A$7m ($4.5m) to support development programmes at its Youanmi gold project in WA.
