The Kootenay prospect is at 1200 metres elevation on the north side of Lardeau Creek, west of Finkle Creek. It is on the Kootenay (L.7247) claim. The early exploration history of the area is uncertain; however, it was included in a regional geochemical survey conducted by Westmin Resources Limited in the early 1980s, and a soil geochemical anomaly was found 300 metres west of the Black Eagle showing [082KNW014] in 1982. The anomaly was later delineated, trenched and drilled by Camfrey Resources Limited in 1986 and 1987. The Kootenay area was later acquired by Nortran Resources Limited and Multiplex Resources Limited and optioned to Contiki Resources Limited in the early 1990s. The Kootenay prospect is on strike to the southeast of the Nettie L. [082KNW100] mine, and it may straddle the shear zone that controls that mineralization.

The Trout Lake area is underlain by a thick succession of sedimentary and volcanic rocks of the Badshot Formation and Lardeau Group near the northern end of the Kootenay arc, an arcuate, north to northwest trending belt of Paleozoic and Mesozoic strata that is now classified as a distinct, pericratonic, terrane. The arc rocks are bordered by Precambrian quartzite in the east and they young to the west, where they are bounded by Jurassic-age intrusive complexes. They were deformed during the Antler orogeny in Devonian-Mississippian time and were refolded and faulted during the Columbian orogeny, in the Middle Jurassic. A large panel, the "Selkirk allochthon", was later offset to the northeast by dip-slip motion along the Columbia River Fault.

The Badshot formation is composed of a thick Cambrian limestone that is a distinctive marker horizon in the Trout Lake area. It is underlain by Hamill Group quartzite and it is overlain by a younger assemblage of limestone, calcareous, graphitic and siliceous argillite and siltstone, sandstone, quartzite and conglomerate, and also mafic volcanic flows, tuffs and breccias, all of which belong to the Lardeau Group. The rocks are isoclinally folded and intensely deformed, but only weakly metamorphosed. They occur as intercalated beds of marble, quartzite and grey, green and black phyllite and schist. Fyles and Eastwood (EMPR BULL 45) subdivided the group into six formations (Index, Triune, Ajax, Sharon Creek, Jowett and Broadview) of which the lowermost (Index) and uppermost (Broadview) are the most widespread. The Triune (siliceous argillite), Ajax (quartzite) and Sharon Creek (siliceous argillite) are restricted to the Trout Lake area. The Jowett is a mafic volcanic unit.

The Nettie L. and other tenures on Nettie L. Mountain cover a northwest trending "ledge" that contains quartz-carbonate veins that carry pyrite, galena, sphalerite and chalcopyrite, and values in gold and silver. The surface trace is commonly marked by an oxidized "iron cap" that is readily visible in areas of thin cover. The area is underlain siliceous argillites of the Triune and Sharon Creek Formations, by quartzite of the Ajax Formation and by grits and black phyllites of the lower part of the Broadview Formation. The rocks are folded, deformed and locally highly schistose. The main area of mineralization is bounded on the northeast by the Cup Creek fault, on the southwest by the (probably faulted) base of the Broadview Formation, and on the southeast by the Brow Fault. It is 1000 metres long and 200 to 250 metres wide, and covers a portion of the core of the Silver Cup Anticline. This is a regionally important isoclinal fold that is over-turned to the southwest and plunges at 25 degrees to the northwest. It imparts an axial plane cleavage that strikes to the northwest and dips at 60 degrees to the northeast. The rocks are cut by axial plane shears and northeast trending cross faults. One of the latter displaces the anticline between the Nettie L. and Ajax workings. The ore lenses are controlled by faults and drag folds in the core of the fold structure. In the Nettie L. [082KNW100] mine, they are also found in cross faults. The structure is complicated by locally large displacements on post-mineral faults in the plane of the "main lead".

The Kootenay claim area is underlain by isoclinally folded and variably schistose siliceous argillite of the Triune Formation, quartzite of the Ajax Formation and siliceous argillite of the overlying Sharon Creek Formation. The rocks strike to the northwest and dip moderately to steeply to the southwest. Westmin Resources identified a silver-in-soil geochemical anomaly in the area in 1982 and Camfrey Resources Limited delineated it in the late 1980s. The company trenched and diamond drilled the area in 1987. In doing so, it located several previously unmapped bedding plane parallel and cross cutting faults that localize irregular lenses and stringers of quartz mineralized with galena, sphalerite, pyrite and chalcopyrite. The most significant mineralization was encountered in a 5 to 15 metres wide zone of fracturing along a contact between quartzite and argillite. The zone extends for 100 metres along strike and displays two principal jointing directions, both of which are filled with narrow (0.2 to 2.5 centimetres wide) quartz-siderite stringers that contain coarse-grained sulphides. One drill intercept assayed 0.69 grams per tonne gold, 92.4 grams per tonne silver, 0.57 per cent zinc and 0.80 per cent lead over 1.52 metres.