Tennant hits more high-grade copper at NT Barkly project’s Bluebird prospect

Tennant Minerals’ (ASX:TMS) latest results from drilling at the Bluebird prospect, on-site the NT copper-gold Barkly project, have acted as yet another rally for the smallcap, with the company’s share price up 13% in mid-afternoon trades. 

The company is today reporting the results of two diamond drillholes recently completed at Bluebird, with yet more pockets of high-grade copper hit. 

While the intersection in question was less than 1m thickness; the company has also found copper mineralisation at extremely high grades of 54% copper. 

While that may be an anomaly, the company also has another two diamond drillhole assay results pending due for announcement to the market in the near future.

Making sense of grades 

To make sense of today’s results, it’s worth noting investor information provider Undervalued Equity notes high grade gold is considered that over five grams of gold per tonne (g/t). 

Many Australian projects boasting grades of 4g/t are also considered high-grade.

Copper, meanwhile, is considered high grade in concentrations over 1.5%.

Tennant is reporting: 

• 40.0m @ 02.6% copper and 1.34g/t gold from 131m depth, including: 

• 24.5m @ 03.9% copper from 146m depth 

• 04.7m @ 15.2% copper from 164m depth 

• 0.08m @ 54.5% copper from 164m depth 

• 17.8m @ 03.7% copper from 277m depth 

• 09.5m @ 06.0% copper from 278m depth 

The discovery zone at Bluebird remains open to the west below 200m depth; the target also boasts 12 so-far untested magnetic targets for future exploration. 

A geotechnical note: the type of rock hosting copper sulphides logged today are chalcocite rocks, which contain the highest proportion of copper of any sulphide mineral. 

12 targets for drill testing: management

“We have commenced an IP geophysical survey over Bluebird to fingerprint the copper sulphide mineralisation, which will help us prioritise up to 12 targets within the Bluebird-Perseverance Target Zone or drill-testing,” Tennant Minerals chairman Matthew Driscoll said. 

“This will give us even more confidence that Bluebird is just one of several high-grade copper and gold deposits awaiting discovery.” 

“The recognition that the majority of high-grade copper mineralisation is in sulphides has given impetus to our electromagnetic downhole program, to detect extensions of this discovery.” 

A lot going on at Tennant 

August was a busy month for Tennant, with today’s strong results adding on top of an existing backlog of impressive mineral hits at Barkly. 

In mid-August, the company noted it had hit a pocket of bonanza grade gold mineralisation at Barkly. Worth noting is that those results also revealed a mineral system at significant depths, posing questions over how the company’s geotech team intends to get to the metals in question. 

A survey conducted late last month also uncovered a number of other targets on-site, which will likely form part of the 12-target campaign towards which Tennant is moving.

A look at Tennant Minerals' six month charts