The Lorimer Creek magnetite occurrence is exposed in a logging roadcut situated at an elevation of approximately 300 metres immediately north of Lorimer Creek, west of Gordon River and approximately 10.5 kilometres north of Port Renfrew.
The area is underlain by a northwest-trending limestone roof pendant, which in turn is underlain by quartz diorite of the Mesozoic and/or Paleozoic Westcoast Complex.
The showing can be classified as a calcic iron skarn or contact metasomatic iron deposit. Massive magnetite mineralization is generally developed near marble, mafic volcanic and diorite contacts and associated with pyroxene±garnet skarn. Locally, a 2-metre by 10-metre massive, fine to medium-grained body of magnetite lies beneath marble and locally developed pyroxene skarn. The overlying marble has an undulating and abrupt contact with the magnetite. Approximately 250 metres to the north, a fine-grained, dark mafic rock (diabase) hosts two parallel magnetite-pyrite-pyrrhotite veins, 15 to 40 centimetres wide.
The first magnetite showings were staked in 1898 along Bugaboo Creek to the northwest. Exploration and development work continued until 1907. In 1957, Noranda Exploration Company Limited resumed exploration work in the area. Various exploration programs before activity once again ceased in 1974.
In 2002, Emerald Fields Resources optioned a group of claims from Gary Pearson and proceeded to stake additional claims in the area, thus creating the Pearson property. From 2003 to 2011, Emerald Fields Resources and Pacific Iron Ore Corporation completed various exploration projects in the area as part of the Pearson project. These included prospecting, diamond drilling, ground and airborne geophysical surveys, geological mapping and geochemical sampling. An airborne magnetometer survey was flown over the property in 2006. Also that year, Jeff Larocque and Dante Canil of the University of Victoria conducted geological mapping on the Pearson claim group as part of a project to delineate the occurrence and origin of ultramafic rocks related to anomalous nickel, chromium, copper and platinum group elements.
In 2009, Pacific Iron Ore undertook a geological mapping project over a large portion of the property to better define mineralization potential and controls. That year, several apparently fault-controlled magnetite-sulphide veins and a several metre-wide magnetite showing within a marble knob were discovered in the Axe Creek area.
In 2005, on behalf of Tres Guis Minerals Limited, Rod Kirkham collected nine rock samples from the Gordon River–Renfrew Creek area north of Port Renfrew. One of the samples collected within the vicinity of the Lorimer Creek showing returned anomalous results for silver and copper.
In 2010, nine diamond drillholes were drilled in the Axe Creek area, including four at the Lorimer Creek magnetite showing. Drillhole 10-01AX encountered some magnetite mineralization, but no other holes encountered any mineralization of economic importance. Drillholes 10-06AX and 10-05AX, drilled to test the magnetite-sulphide veining to the north, encountered minor disseminated sulphides and a small section of semimassive sulphides.
A grab sample of massive magnetite collected by Emerald Fields in 2004 assayed 45.6 per cent iron, 0.6 per cent copper and 0.192 gram per tonne gold, whereas samples of the magnetite-sulphide veins to the north assayed 44.3 per cent iron, 1.01 per cent copper and 0.177 gram per tonne gold (Assessment Report 28059, page 16).
Sample KQ-05-05, collected by Rod Kirkham in 2005, returned assays of 0.089 gram per tonne gold, 3 grams per tonne silver, 0.96 per cent copper and greater than 50 per cent iron (Property File, Kirkham, March 1, 2005, page 15).
A grab sample of sulphide vein material collected from the Axe Creek magnetite-sulphide veins in 2009 returned assays of 1.375 per cent copper (Assessment Report 32175, page 10).