The Foss and Garvey occurrence is situated in the Duncan River Valley, on the east side of the Duncan River, 125 kilometres north of Kaslo. The occurrence area is located near the confluence of Duncan River and Stevens Creek.
About 1917, the claims were staked by Foss and Garvey. In 1926, the property was restaked by Foss and Tapanila as the Fern and Evelyn claims. During 1969, Bryant Mines Limited completed 549 metres of trenching and open cuts. During 1970, Noranda Exploration Co. Ltd. completed geological mapping, a magnetometer survey, a geochemical soil survey (504 samples) and drilled three diamond drill holes (425 metres). In 1979, the property (Fox claims) was optioned from Sherlynn Mines Ltd. by Amax of Canada Limited. They undertook geological mapping of the property, conducted soil and rock sampling, an induced polarization survey and drilled one diamond drill hole (435 metres). This core contained a 60 metre section containing an average of 0.07 per cent molybdenite (Assessment Report 7848, page 5). During 1984, Big I Developments Ltd. conducted a rock trenching program and in 1986 completed one diamond drill hole (103.3 metres). In 1993, they conducted an electromagnetometer survey and collected five grab samples for analysis.
The occurrence lies on the western margin of the Purcell anticlinorium, a north plunging structure developed in low-grade metamorphic, Upper Proterozoic to Lower Cambrian strata.
The occurrence area is underlain by phyllite, biotite schist, quartzite, hornfels and garnet-epidote skarns assigned to the Lower Cambrian Marsh Adams Formation (Hamill Group). These have been intruded by foliated diorite and leucocratic Cretaceous diorite.
Drilling done by Amax of Canada Ltd. (1979) encountered weak molybdenite mineralization along with trace amounts of scheelite and sphalerite in quartz veins. The veins were encountered on average, at three veins per metre and in some intervals at seven veins per metre. These veins ranged from two millimetres to one metre in width. Molybdenite occurs as scattered rosettes and stringers in approximately ten percent of the quartz veins and in trace amounts disseminated in skarn and quartz monzonite dikes. Pyrite and pyrrhotite both average less than two per cent in the core. Scattered grains of scheelite occur along dry fractures in the hornfels and in quartz pyrite veins, but generally only in trace amounts. Assay results from drill core yielded gold values of two and three grams per tonne (Assessment Report 16096, page 6).
Mineralization in quartz veins and skarns consists of pyrite, molybdenite, scheelite, sphalerite, pyrrhotite, galena, tetrahedrite, chalcopyrite, bismuthinite and stibnite. Alteration zones next to the quartz veins are characterized by quartz, chlorite, sericite, epidote, secondary biotite and calcite.
The most significant structural feature related to mineralization is uniform jointing. The joints are flat lying and close to vertical (strikes of 70 to 80 degrees, dipping steeply south and strikes of 335 degrees, vertical dip). The veins occupy joints in the schists and also parallel bedding. They produce blocks in a quartz monzonite stock and contain molybdenite bearing quartz veins in and peripheral to the stock. They cover an area of 800 by 300 metres.
