As the newly appointed President and CEO of Silver Spruce I would like to give you, our shareholders, an update on our activities and plans for 2011.
First, I want to thank Lloyd Hillier, who has been the President and CEO of Silver Spruce since its inception during the late stages of the Voisey's Bay rush. Lloyd recently resigned as President and CEO to spend more time on his extensive business holdings including two hotels in Happy Valley - Goose Bay and a recent purchase, and renovation, of another in St. Anthony on the island of Newfoundland. Lloyd, the largest single, non-institutional shareholder, will remain a Director and Chairman of the Board, ensuring continuity for the Company. In lieu of severance Lloyd was awarded stock options at 30 cents per share, approximately three times the current trading price, affirming his belief that the company is well positioned to take advantage of exploration successes.
The Company has an excellent portfolio of properties including rare earths, gold / silver and for the longer term, uranium. Our emphasis this year is on REEs in Labrador and gold/silver on the island of Newfoundland. We have early stage, but very prospective, REE projects along the Pope's Hill Trend (PH) along the Trans Labrador Highway (TLH) to the west of Goose Bay. The area is road accessible along the TLH, thereby decreasing exploration costs considerably. As disclosed late last year, one day of exploration on the original Pope's Hill property defined a 7 km strike length of prospective REE ground with values up to 24%, averaging 5.73% total REEs plus yttrium (TREE) and subsequent compilation has outlined a prospective trend, the PH trend, 100 km long. Our REE values when compared with other projects in Canada (generally values in the 1-2% total rare earth oxides (TREOs) which in themselves are 1.15 to 1.2 times higher than TREE values) are considered to be high. We have a joint venture with Great West Minerals Group for some of the properties along the trend and have optioned another property (MRT) at the eastern end of the trend that has given TREE values up to 8.9%. Our drilling over the winter on the original PH property gave us wide intervals of anomalous TREEs but no intersections of the high grade mineralization found in the prospecting survey however only a 300 m strike length of the 7 plus km trend was tested by the drilling, which in retrospect should have been delayed until the spring.
The 2011 field season has now begun and the PH trend will be the main emphasis for the Company, with an airborne magnetic, radiometric and VLF-EM survey, linecutting, regional and detailed prospecting and geochemistry and ground geophysics planned, aiming to define targets for trenching and/or diamond drilling in the late summer or early fall. Early prospecting successes on both the original PH property and the optioned MRT property, 65 km to the east along the PH trend, indicate the significant potential in the area.
On the island of Newfoundland, the Big Easy is a gold/silver discovery with significant drill intersections over wide intervals in an area never before drilled. Limited regional work indicates that the system is much more extensive than originally known and we now have defined a strike length of at least 4.5 km, remaining open to the north and south. Compilation of the drill data over the Big Easy trend - a 1 km strike length -- is ongoing, aiming for a Phase 2 drill program in the fall.
Results for the Rambler South drill program are pending. This project has the potential to define a small to mid size gold deposit located in the only part of Newfoundland, the Baie Verte peninsula, that has gold milling infrastructure in place.
We have approximately $1.6 M cash on hand, split roughly 50/50 between hard dollars and flow through dollars, which will allow us to fund the planned exploration for 2011.
I have been associated with Silver Spruce as a Director since 2000 and as VP Exploration since 2006 and have intimate knowledge of the company and its projects. I believe that the company has the projects, the cash on hand, and the ability to raise cash in the future as required, to continue exploration into 2012 and beyond. I look forward to working with the Board of Directors to continue to make the company one that all shareholders can be proud of. We are poised for significant exploration successes in 2011 which will hopefully generate interest in the Company and our stock.
I appreciate your continued support and invite anyone who has questions or concerns to call me directly at my office in St. John's at (709) 739-5608.
Respectfully,
Peter M. Dimmell, P.Geo.
President and CEO
Silver Spruce Resources Inc.