Lac Aux Bouleaux Graphite Property

The LAB Graphite Property lies adjacent to the south of TIMCAL’s Lac des Iles graphite mine in Quebec, which is a world-class deposit and was producing 25,000 tonnes of graphite annually. There are several graphite showings and past producing mines in its vicinity. Graphite is commonly found in the Grenville Province rocks throughout this region and has been commercially mined from a number of deposits located between Mount Laurier in the north to the Ottawa River in the south.

PROPERTY DESCRIPTION AND LOCATION

The Lac Aux Bouleaux Graphite Property (the “LAB Graphite Property”) consists of 14 mineral claims in a contiguous block totalling 738.12 hectares land, on NTS sheet 31J05, near the town of Mont-Laurier in southern Quebec. A small new claim covering 4.86 hectares area (application number 1738877, dated June 30, 2017) was staked to cover the gap between claims 2420591 and 2506091 (Figure 2). The claim will be part of the Property as soon as granted.

Access

The Property is road-accessible through a provincial highway (Route 117) from Montréal, and then following secondary roads 309 and 311. Various tertiary/forest roads provide access to different claims on the Property. The town of Mont-Laurier is located about 20 kilometres to the north, Montréal 150 kilometres to the southeast, and Ottawa 125 kilometres to the south of the Property. Mont-Laurier is also connected to Montréal via rail. Access has to be negotiated with the surface landowners before starting any exploration work on mineral claims located on private lands. The exploration programs on private lands in Quebec are generally run through negotiations and payment of standard reclamation costs for cutting trees, making access roads and movement of a drill rig. It must be noted that only a small portion of the LAB graphite property is under private lands, the majority of the claims, including the historical deposits, are located within Crown lands.

Climate

The Mont-Laurier area has a continental temperate climate with warm humid summers and cold and snowy winters, particularly in January. There are wide temperature variations in each season. The average winter temperature in the area ranges from -4C° to -17C°, and the average summer temperature varies between 10C° to 27C° (Figure 3). Except for geological mapping and surface sampling, which is only possible when there is no snow cover on the ground, the exploration work can be carried out throughout the year.

HISTORY

The LAB graphite mineralisation was discovered in 1957 by two prospectors, a Mr. Phraz Arbic and Dr. L. J. LaRue. Subsequently, a mining company was formed and was named Italia Copper, which carried out some stripping, diamond drilling, bulk sampling and identified a certain tonnage of large flake graphite within a deposit. Then, metallurgical test work was conducted on bulk samples of the graphite material by three laboratories—with favourable results. Due to financial problems, the property ownership lapsed and was eventually acquired by the M.H.M. Syndicate, which carried out more testing and arranged marketing outlets with firms in the United Kingdom. The firms were much impressed with the grade and quality of the flakes, as they surpassed other sources then on the market. But the property was allowed to lapse again due to financial problems, and in 1981 was staked by C. Gordon Awde and purchased by Orrwell Energy Corporation Ltd. Afterwards, the claims were held by TIMCAL until November 2014, were allowed to lapse and then immediately staked by Geomap Exploration Inc. Finally, in 2019, it was acquired by Manganese X Energy Corp., the current property owner.
The Quebec Ministry of Energy and Mines (MRNF) maintains records of past exploration and development work carried out on mineral claims.