Dart aims for the bulls eye in Victorian gold fields

Gold plays are charging ahead with their exploration plans given the bullish outlook and the fact the precious metal broke past the $US1,800 ($2,600) barrier briefly earlier this week.

Dart Mining (ASX:DTM) has identified new styles of mineralisation at its Sandy Creek and Tallandoon gold fields in northeast Victoria after completing detailed mapping and sampling.

The company says its exploration focus has now shifted to higher volume, disseminated gold sulphide mineralisation in altered granites adjacent to high-grade narrow-vein gold mineralisation.

Dart noted that multiple occurrences of this type of mineralisation had been identified at Sandy Creek.

Additionally, high-grade gold occurring with antimony-lead-zinc-gold-silver silica-sulphide mineralisation has been identified at Tallandoon.

Both fields are known for historical production of extremely high-grade gold of up to 3.5 kilograms per tonne from narrow lodes, though no drill testing has been carried out to date.

Hey ho, a gold drilling we go

Meanwhile, Tesoro Resources (ASX:TSO) has kicked off infill and extensional drilling at the Ternera prospect of its El Zorro project in Chile with two rigs on site and drilling.

An initial program of 20 holes totalling 5,000m is planned for the prospect, where previously drilling returned top hits of 23m at 7.2 grams per tonne (g/t) gold, 15m at 5.99g/t gold and 20.3m at 4.5g/t gold.

Surface sampling programs are also underway at Ternera and Toro Gordo, while data collection activities have started for scoping study inputs including metallurgical, geotechnical, hydrological and environmental studies.

Bryah Resources (ASX:BYH) has started drilling to test the Windalah prospect and a high priority electromagnetic (EM) conductor target north of the Peak Hill gold mine in Western Australia.

At least seven holes will be drilled at Windalah to follow-up on previous drilling that returned what Bryah says are exceptional high-grade gold intersections.

Notable results from the previous drilling were 12m at 4.32g/t gold from surface, including 2m at 17.19g/t gold from 3m; and 5m at 6.62g/t gold from 79m, including 1m at 15.15g/t gold from 82m.

Additionally, the company will drill and case two holes at the EM conductor about 7km north of Peak Hill and 65km east of Sandfire Resources’ (ASX:SFR) DeGrussa mine.

It plans to carry out downhole EM surveys of these drill holes to assist in follow-up exploration.