The region of the Bell-Holm or Marie showing is underlain dominantly by the Upper Triassic Takla Group rocks of the Quesnellia Terrane. The Takla Group, here, comprises mainly argillaceous and arenaceous sedimentary rocks with interbedded mafic volcanic rocks. The area is largely covered by Pleistocene glacial and fluvioglacial deposits. The showing is underlain by schistose mafic volcanic rocks and an associated diorite intrusion.
Mineralization near the old Bell-Holm adit consists of gold and silver bearing quartz veins in an open stockwork in an area around 300 metres in length and 150 metres width. The veins vary from narrow seams to massive veins that are up to 2.5 metres in width. A winze in the adit is now flooded but historical reports claim high gold values. Sampling suggests that the veins may extend along a west strike for 400 metres. Pockets of iron oxides and remnant pyrite is locally present and galena and sphalerite have been tentatively identified. Composite chip samples vary from a low of 0.05 grams per tonne gold and 2 grams per tonne silver up to a high of 9.6 grams per tonne gold and 276 grams per tonne silver (Property File - Byron Resources Inc. June 1987 Prospectus).
The Report of the Minister of Mines for 1915 mentions several workings located in ''a range of low hills ... about 10 kilometres west of Fort George". The workings, scattered along a length of about 5 kilometres, were on various quartz veins. One sample reportedly taken across a width of 76 centimetres in the bottom of a shaft yielded an assay of 27.4 grams tonne gold. The exact location of the shaft is, however, not stated.
In 1928 the Report of the Minister of Mines mentions the presence of several open cuts on quartz veins hosted by "schisted carbonaceous shale in the general vicinity of pre-emption Lots 1601 - 1602", which now cover the southern half of the Byron Resources’ 1987 Marie claims. The descriptions given appear to match quartz vein occurrences near the northern boundary of the Marie claim group (see Assessment Report 16515) which contain insignificant gold and silver values. These veins are exposed in several partly slumped trenches and one short (5 metres) inclined adit.
An old adit which lies in the centre of the area of current interest was apparently already in existence prior to 1938. The Report of the Minister of Mines for that year clearly locates the Bell - Holm group of claims as being coincident with the Marie group that existed in 1986 and 1987). The report states that an old shaft was dewatered and that "sampling disclosed material gold values at one point." This shaft is probably the winze some 4 metres in from the portal of the old adit. The winze was reported flooded in 1987 and no estimate of its depth extent could be given. The associated adit is about 16 metres in length, driven in an east-southeast direction with a short dogleg near the face.
The property appears to have lain idle from 1938 until it was restaked in 1986 by P.G. Paulson and H. Gazier who conducted a limited soil sampling and trenching program in the area of the old adit in July of 1986. Later in the year the property was optioned by Byron Resources Inc geological mapping and prospecting, geochemical soil and rock surveys and geophysical magnetic and VLF-EM surveys. Byron Resources Inc. undertook a trenching and drilling program in August - September 1987, totalling 190 meters of trenching and 305 meters of BQ diamond core drilling in five holes. The best drill core intersection was a quartz vein in hole 87-1 which returned 4 grams per tonne gold across a 30 centimetre width. The quartz vein stockwork is too open and the veins are too narrow and too low grade to be considered economic in the area tested. The trenching and diamond drilling program was reported to have confirmed the existence of an open stockwork of narrow gold bearing quartz veins in the centre of claim Marie 1. The stockwork, however, was considered too open and the veins too narrow and too low grade to be considered economic in the area tested.
In 2008, North Bluff Exploration Inc. had Terracad GIS Services Ltd. provide a set of shaded relief photographs and interpretation which resulted in the plotting of significant lineaments. The different orientations of the light source and hence shadows help select topographic and other features that will be targeted by prospectors when work on the property is resumed.
