BOA builds copper exposure in the Murchison

One of Australia’s top mining journalists, Kristie Batten, writes for Stockhead every week in her regular column, keeping a watchful eye on the movers and shakers of the small cap resources scene.

In the lastest edition of Stockhead, Kristie Batten showcases a new-look BOA Resources (ASX:BOA) with its new project and funding to kick off drilling in the June quarter.

In November, BOA announced the scrip acquisition of 49% of the Neds Creek copper project in Western Australia’s Murchison region from Core Value Australia.

Shareholders overwhelmingly approved the deal, as well as a $3.75 million capital raise completed alongside the transaction.

BOA has a path to 100% of the ground by spending $500,000 and issuing 17.2 million shares, which already has shareholder approval.

BOA managing director Cath Norman said the company, which had more recently been focused on lithium and nickel exploration, had been seeking to reinvent itself and had been talking to Core Value about the Neds Creek project for some time.

“We now have a 49% interest in 13 tenements, and we’ve just applied for another one in our own right that’s an add-on to that area,” she told Stockhead.

“It’s a bit over 1000 square kilometres, so quite a big piece of ground.

“My philosophy has always been, if you’re going to be an exploration company, get a big chunk of ground, so that if you find something, you’ve got running room – we’re definitely in that position.”

Neds Creek sits in the same province as Sandfire Resources’ now depleted DeGrussa and Monty copper mines.

While DeGrussa and Monty were volcanogenic massive sulphide deposits, Neds Creek contains multiple prospects of sediment-hosted, structurally controlled epigenetic copper mineralisation.

Norman noted Sandfire had an option over Neds Creek up until about a year ago but was looking for VMS deposits to extend the life of DeGrussa.

Neds Creek surrounds the Thaduna copper deposit, which has a resource of 5.5 million tonnes at 2.2% copper for 119,000 tonnes of copper and 829,000 ounces of gold, as well as the Green Dragon deposit.

“It does tell you that there are some good-looking copper deposits in the area, and our exploration acreage surrounds that mining lease that has the Thaduna tenement on it, currently operated by Sandfire,” Norman said.

“We’ve already started looking at Thaduna and Green Dragon and talking to the operator about how we get our hands on them, because Sandfire is not really interested in this part of the world anymore.”

Gearing up for drilling

Last month, BOA appointed David Reid as exploration manager as it works towards drilling at Neds Creek.

Reid worked for Ventnor Resources (now VRX Silica), which previously held Neds Creek.

“Dave has been on this project since about 2010 and he was the one who took the Thaduna and Green Dragon deposits to resource in 2012,” she said.

BOA’s highest profile target is Ricci Lee, which sits 2km southwest of Thaduna and extends to over 500m in length.

Historical hits at Ricci Lee have included 10m at 5.12% copper, 5m at 3.48% copper, 5m at 4.02% copper and 5m at 6.41% copper.

As part of a technical review, BOA is undertaking a machine learning targeting exercise, to identify new potential mineralised zones and prioritise existing drill targets.

BOA is hoping to finalise heritage agreements by the end of this month.

While the machine learning program will help the company finalise the scope of the program, BOA already has nine drill-ready targets, including Enigma, which previously returned 63m at 1.1% copper from 90m including nickel, cobalt, silver and zinc mineralisation.

BOA has budgeted around $600,000 for its first drilling program, which is scheduled for the June quarter, and is fully funded.

“If we get some success and we want to follow some leads, we’ve got a bit of change there to expand the drilling program if we need to,” Norman said.

Norman said there would be lots of news flow over the coming months.

“With the copper price where it is, we reckon we only need 200,000 to 250,000 tonnes of net copper to make something economic and obviously we’re eyeing off that Thaduna mining lease, and if we get that, we’re halfway there,” she said.

“But we think Ricci Lee is definitely analogous to Thaduna, so we think it’s got great potential.

“We’ve got great potential here to build an economic copper resource.”

At Stockhead, we tell it like it is. While BOA Resources is a Stockhead advertiser, it did not sponsor this article.