The Yuen occurrence is located 8 kilometres south of the Kwadacha River and about 4.6 kilometres east of the summit of Mount Yuen, approximately 202 kilometres southwest of Fort Nelson. The Cirque deposit (094F 008) is located 9.3 kilometres south.
The area of the Yuen showing is underlain by sediments of the Middle Devonian to Mississippian Earn Group, which are structurally overlain by imbricate thrust sheets of Silurian and older shales, clastics and cherts. Blebby and laminated pyrite and barite are hosted in carbonaceous, siliceous shale of the Upper Devonian Gunsteel Formation (lower Earn Group), informally referred to as the "Active zone".
In 1978, the ground covered by the Yuen claim group was first staked by Rio Tinto Canadian Exploration Ltd. (Riocanex) as the Yule claims following the discovery of the Cirque deposit (094F 008) by Cyprus Anvil and Hudson Bay Oil and Gas in 1977. Exploration work during the period of 1978 to 1982 consisted of geological mapping, soil geochemical surveys, electromagnetic (EM) surveys and five diamond-drill holes. This work discovered weak exhalative barite and pyrite horizons within the Gunsteel Formation at several sites. Minor zinc and lead intercepts were intersected during the drilling programs, but none were economically significant.
Since 1982, the property was controlled by Ecstall Mining Corporation. In 1992, Metal1 Mining Corporation (formerly Minnova Inc.) acquired an option on the Yuen and Noel claims from Ecstall Mining Corporation and in the same year Minnova collected 558 soil samples on the Yuen (YN) property. In 1993, a further 496 soil samples were collected and five diamond-drill holes totalling 643.1 metres tested soil geochemical anomalies and barite horizons in the Noel Creek and China Ridge areas. Drill results were not significant.
The property was dormant for several years prior to Ecstall Mining Corporation's 2006 diamond drilling program. Ecstall conducted a two-hole diamond drilling program on their Yuen Property during September-October, 2006. Only weak baritic laminae were intersected in the Gunsteel Formation in the late autumn drillholes. The laminae are considered to represent exhalative barite from a distant sedimentary exhalative (SEDEX) vent source. Isolated blebs of sphalerite associated with quartz and calcite veins in some of the Y-06-1 drill core have no economic value, but such blebs may account for some of the elevated zinc values found in soil samples collected on the property.
In 2007, Rio Grande Mining Corp. conducted a program of geochemical sampling, gravity geophysical surveys, prospecting and geological mapping on the area as apart of the Kechika property. The following year, Rio Grande completed an airborne magnetic survey on the area.
In 2014, exploration work results by Canada Zinc Metals Corp. in this target area yielded highly anomalous barite from rock sampling in baritic shale, and a long linear northwest trending zinc-lead-barite soil anomaly that aligns closely to mapped coverage of the prospective Gunsteel Formation.
From 2014-16, Canada Zinc Metals Corp. (and Teck Resources Ltd.) have conducted work programs on the optioned Pie-Yuen-Cirque East properties. The company owns 100 per cent of 11 large, contiguous property blocks that comprise the Akie and Kechika regional projects. The company's flagship Akie project is host to the Cardiac Creek deposit (094F 031) and remains the primary corporate focus. The Kechika regional projects, which include the Pie (094F 023), Yuen and Cirque East properties, extends northwest from the Akie property for approximately 140 kilometres along the strike of the highly prospective Gunsteel Formation shale, the main host rock for known SEDEX zinc-lead-silver deposits in the Kechika Trough.
