Thanks for your comments :
I didn’t get to canoe through Wolf Lake for the first time until the spring of 2006, just after the last drilling rig was in there.
I wanted to see what this was all about. During the previous winter Flag Resources had brought in a driller to do some exploration on the West side of the lake on a campsite that canoeists had used in the past. The story, by Brian Back of Ottertooth is here:
http://www.ottertooth.com/Temagami/News ... fs-052.htmThe picture was taken by Micmac.
The picture tells a lot. What exploration company would hire a rig that looks to be about vintage 1940 to do some serious drilling?
Flag Resources is the holder of the leases on Wolf Lake. The company is/ was run by Murdo McCloud . Murdo has been playing about with Wolf Lake since the early 1980’s. Others with significant resources at their disposal started to explore there long before that, Inco and Falconbridge, but they found little of interest. McCloud subsequently purchased the claims, spent some small amount of money on them and got them turned into leases. Has anything been found? No. But he is hopeful that he will find the motherlode. McCloud is a mining stock promoter. I don’t know how many other claims /leases he holds around the country but he hires salespeople to promote the stock to raise some money...nothing illegal here. By doing that he has made commitments to his investors to at least drill a few holes to see if anything is down there so that he remains legal. So he brings in an ancient drilling rig and bores a few holes. Then he can say to his investors see ” I have made some effort to determine what is there, but I have found nothing of value”. He pays off the salesmen, and the driller and he pockets the surplus. Then he files his drilling report with the MNDM (Ministry of Northern Development and Mines) and everyone is happy.
MNDM tells us that because someone is drilling/exploring on Wolf Lake, there must be potential there. But nothing gets checked out to provide some clarity as to Flag’s findings.
So where are we now…
When you look at the lease history it becomes apparent that McCloud has been in arrears in his lease payments, but MNDM has continued to allow him to renew the leases. Instead of lapsing as they should have over time, they are in good standing. MNDM have been bending over backwards to keep Flag Resources in compliance with the lease requirements by renewing them every time he does a little bit more work.
And what about Flag Resources. Not exactly a stellar organization either. The Alberta Securities Commission removed Murdo McCloud from being able to hold a Director position in another Alberta Company because he failed to file results in 2004 and subsequent years. It took them until April 2011 to reach this decision and work through the appeal process that Flag Resources initiated.
MNDM want to remove the Forest Reserve status from Wolf Lake. Because having a semi protected status like this deters investment in an area due to the uncertainty of the protection in place. But this uncertainty hasn’t stopped McCloud.
So what did I find when I went to Wolf Lake……
In early May of 2006, I went to drilling site and saw lots of steel shells and cores lying about. But every drill hole had been subsequently filled with debris, except one, which had a small tree trunk stuck in the hole. I removed the tree and dropped a small stone down into the hole. Depth , about 10 feet or less. Maybe this was an anomaly hole and all the others went down several hundred feet. It was impossible to tell as they had been filled with debris. Is this standard practice in the industry?
Why would anyone go to the bother of drilling holes only 10 feet deep on a mining lease they were supposedly exploring.
On the basis of this type of work, MNDM is pushing MNR to remove the Forest Reserve Status on Wolf Lake.
MNDM needs to do some homework here and properly check out the validity of Flag Resource’s exploration efforts in this area before harassing MNR into making changes to the Land Use Status.