The Taiga property consists of 1043 claims located 95 km northeast of Dawson and 6 km east of the Dempster Highway. Ordovician to Silurian Road River Group dolomite and black calcareous shales overlain by Devono-Mississippian Earn group siliceous shales, chert and conglomerate underlie the property, and comprise the Taiga Basin, an off-shelf outlier on the Mackenzie Platform.
The area was explored by UMEX in 1976 and 1977 with a large silt and soil sampling program to evaluate shale-hosted lead-zinc-barite potential. In 1994 Blackstone Resources Inc. acquired the database, and discovered a thin pyrite-vaesite horizon which assayed 2.06% Ni with elevated Mo, Au and PGE. Geological mapping in 1996 resolved thrust faults and distinguished three members in the Lower Earn Group. The lowest member is a rhythmic, carbonate-rich section of argillite, shale, siltstone, limestone, with a distinctive siliceous shale containing limestone balls at the top. The middle member, of lower Middle Devonian age, contains thick bedded barite, baritic and carbonaceous shale and the nickel-sulphide mineralization. The upper member comprises chert, cherty argillite and minor barite. In addition to the discovery (TB) showing, mineralization is located 450 m south at the DM showing, and 4 km east (MM showing).
In 1997, 12 holes tested the lateral and down-dip extent of nickel-sulphide mineralization at the DM and TB showings, as well as the MM grid area. Significant results from drilling at the MM grid include 25.5 m of 0.51% Ni and 0.41% Zn within which a 5.3 m interval graded 1.42% Ni and 0.70% Zn.
