Anax Metals Limited ('Anax' or 'the Company') announced the geochemical results of the 2021 exploration of its wholly owned tenements. The 100% Anax owned Loudens Patch Project (E47/4281) is located equidistant between Karratha and Port Hedland in the Pilbara Region of Western Australia. It lies adjacent to the southern boundary of the Whim Creek Project which Anax operates under joint venture with Develop Global Limited and is proximate to De Grey Mining's Mallina Project to the east, where gold resources have recently been defined at Hemi. Anax secured the Loudens Patch exploration tenement in 2020 when the ground was dropped by De Grey. Anax considers the geological setting to be highly prospective for gold, with the Loudens Fault to the west and the Mallina Shear to the south, both regional gold-mineralised structures, enclosing a sub-basin of the Archean Mallina Basin metasediments. Folding within the sub-basin follows the regional northeast trend and provides the ideal structural setting for epithermal gold mineralisation. In addition, the ground is prospective for Pilbara-style felsic intrusive hosted gold, being situated 60km due west of De Grey's Hemi 6.8moz Au gold discovery in the Mallina Basin, along the Mallina Shear. Anax has applied the UltraFine+TM soil sampling technique across the main structural trend that transects the Loudens Patch tenement from southwest to northeast, generating two gold-in-soil anomalies, up to 0.18ppm Au. Additionally, rock chip sampling along a quartz limonite outcrop in the north of the tenement, following up gold anomalies in historical soils, generated both gold (0.27ppm Au) and lithium (90ppm Li) anomalies. Gold and lithium often occur in proximity, both being deposited in granite-greenstone terranes. Gold is usually associated with structurally controlled quartz-sulphide veins while lithium occurs in pegmatites. UltraFine+TM soil sampling will be extended across the tenement in 2022, and rock chip sampling will verify the new soil anomalies along the structural trend. Heritage clearance has been scheduled to enable drilling. Mount Short (E74/651) is located 25km north of Ravensthorpe in the Phillips River Mineral Field, Great Southern District of Western Australia. Anax secured the ground in late 2019, which had been historically drilled for nickel in ultramafics by Western Mining Corporation in 1999. More recently, Traka Resources had conducted extensive exploration until 2019, intersecting copper-zinc-lead associated with
structures in Archean metasediments. Anax determined that the ground remains prospective for gold in Archean greenstones, as well as the historically identified base metals. In addition, lithium is of interest as the project lies along strike of Mount Cattlin Lithium Mine, which is owned and operated by Galaxy Resources. Anax's field exploration in late 2021, following the grain harvest, was limited by the primarily agricultural land use and lack of outcrop. Nevertheless, the results generated elevated rare earths in soils (Dy up to 17ppm and Ce up to 63ppm) associated with Archean ultramafics, which warrant further investigation. Anax proposes auger drilling to penetrate agricultural disturbance and enable systematic bedrock sampling. Rare Earth Elements (REEs) had not been included in the historical assay suite presenting a new and exciting opportunity for Anax Metals. UltraFine+TM soil sampling is a new commercial soil analysis technique provided by LabWest. It has been developed in collaboration with CSIRO for gold, lithium and base metals exploration, especially where geology is obscured beneath surface cover. Clays in soil have a large surface area relative to volume meaning clays become ionically charged and attract minute particles of metals mobilised in groundwater. The clay fraction of soil samples is separated in the lab and analysed for an extensive suite of elements including gold, lithium, nickel, cobalt and platinum, as well as `indicator' elements such as bismuth and arsenic.
This method bypasses the "nugget" effect common in conventional soil and stream sediment analysis. The nugget effect results from gold gradually accumulating into minute nuggets in soils, generating patchy analysis results, whereas the UltraFine+TM method generates a clear halo of anomalism near source. Anax is taking part in the CSIRO UltraFine+TM research programme which applies machine learning techniques to the UltraFine+TM results generated by gold explorers across the region, contributing to a region-wide study, however the outcomes of that work will remain confidential until the conclusion of the research.