Soil survey confirms copper, lead, silver and zinc prospectivity at Mount Hope

Initial soil sampling has confirmed historical surface geochemical data at Mount Hope Mining’s Black Hill and Mount Hope East prospects.

Mount Hope Mining’s soil survey has confirmed historical surface geochemical data, prompting the company to start a Stage 2 survey. Pic: Getty Images

• Mount Hope Mining soil survey returns strong copper, lead, silver and zinc at namesake project

• Results confirm historical surface geochemical data at the Black Hill and Mount Hope East prospects

• Stage 2 soil survey to test advanced targets as well as follow-up on Stage 1 survey now underway

Special Report: ASX newcomer Mount Hope Mining has received strong copper, lead, silver and zinc results from a pre-IPO soil survey that confirms historical surface geochemical data at the Black Hill and Mount Hope East prospects.

The soil survey returned results of up to 710ppm lead, 680ppm copper, 250ppb silver along with anomalous zinc and gold, indicating that two distinct mineralisation types – copper-gold and silver-lead-zinc – are present at the two prospects within the company’s Mount Hope project in NSW’s Cobar region.

Cobar is one of the oldest mining centres in the state, delivering 3Mt of copper metal and over 2Moz of gold across more than 140 years of semi-continuous operations, along with significant quantities of lead, zinc and silver.

Adding interest, mineralisation at the two prospects remains open in all directions.

Mount Hope Mining (ASX:MHM) has now started Stage 2 soil surveying to test the advanced Main Road East and Little Mt Solitary targets as well as infill grids at Mount Hope East and Black Hill.

It has also started applications for drill permits.

“We are excited to present these initial positive results from our soil orientation survey completed in December 2024. The purpose of the orientation survey was to verify the historic base metal anomalies defined by previous explorers across the company's tenements,” MHM managing director Fergus Kiley said.

“Our results confirm elevated lead up to 709 ppm, copper to 680 ppm, silver to 250 ppb with anomalous gold and zinc. These findings also confirm that mineralised corridors extend approximately 200m (north-south) at Mount Hope East and 400m (north-south) at Black Hill, both of which remain open in all directions.

“These results are consistent with the historical data, reinforcing the high prospectivity of our project and providing confidence to advance the Stage 2 soil program.”

The Mount Hope project in NSW’s Cobar region. Pic: Mount Hope Mining

Survey results

Mount Hope collected 206 soil samples across the Black Hill and Mount Hope East targets along 200m to 100m spaced lines with 50m sample surfacing to test the robustness of historical assay data prior to listing on the ASX in late December 2024.

The ground-breaking Ultrafine+ soil sampling pioneered by LabWest and CSIRO recorded high levels of base and precious metals, confirming each area’s prospectivity for follow-up exploration.

MHM noted that some of the highest-grade lead-zinc-silver values were identified at Black Hill, while the highest copper-gold-silver grades appeared in coincident samples at Mount Hope East.

Further analysis has defined north-south mineralised trends over ~200m at Mount Hope East and ~400m at Black Hill, with the latter remaining open along strike to the north and south.

Mount Hope East is considered open in all directions, underscoring the considerable potential for delineating additional zones of mineralisation.

Next steps

The company will move to submit drill permits and start the planning of a reconnaissance drill program over the advanced target areas.

It is also conducting ongoing historical data review and integration while completing the Stage 2 soil survey over the advanced Main Road East and Little Mt Solitary targets.

MHM will then carry out follow-up infill and extensional soil sampling at Black Hill and Mount Hope East to extend the areas of known mineralisation.

Other work includes planning geological survey work for each target area and developing prospect-scale geological mapping to tie in geochemical results with planned geophysical survey.

This article was developed in collaboration with Mount Hope Mining, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.

This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.

Originally published as Soil survey confirms copper, lead, silver and zinc prospectivity at Mount Hope