The Cow 10 occurrence is located on the ridge separating Chipman Creek to the north and the Chemainus River the south.
The area is underlain by the Mississippian to Pennsylvanian Fourth Lake Formation of the Buttle Lake Group (formerly the upper sediment package of Muller's Myra Formation). These sediments form a northwest trending succession of interbedded argillite, cherty sediment, siltstone and sandstone, with minor conglomerate, crystal tuff and marble. A northwest trending, 30-metre wide gabbroic dyke (informally known as the Mount Hall Gabbro), coeval with the Upper Triassic Karmutsen Formation (Vancouver Group), intrudes the strata northwest of the showing. A stock of quartz diorite and diorite of the Early to Middle Jurassic Island Plutonic Suite (formerly the Island Intrusions) is present to the southwest of the showing.
Locally, an approximately 10-metre thick ferruginous chert (iron formation) horizon has been traced for 700 metres. This bed is generally composed of blue-grey cryptocrystalline quartz (sporadically jasperoidal) with up to 5 per cent each of pyrite and specular hematite and a few per cent magnetite.
In 1986 and 1987, International Cherokee Development completed programs of geochemical sampling, geological mapping, ground geophysical surveys and two diamond drill holes, totalling 213.0 metres. A sample of the chert material assayed 0.3 grams per tonne gold (Assessment Report 16053, pages 23,47,53).
A siliceous, magnetite and pyrite-rich boulder was found a few hundred metres to the northeast of the ferruginous chert. Sulphides and magnetite occur in bands up to 5 centimetres thick. A sample of this material contained up to 4.80 grams per tonne gold. Another siliceous boulder from the same area contained up to 40 per cent sulphide-rich bands, consisting of pyrite, chalcopyrite and sphalerite. A sample of brecciated, hematitic, cherty sediment float found a few hundred metres to the northwest of the iron-rich chert exposure assayed 1.44 grams per tonne gold (Assessment Report 16053).