A 15-HOLE maiden drilling campaign at Erdene Resource Development Corp’s Bayan Khundii Gold Project in southwest Mongolia has established lateral and vertical extensions of the high-grade Striker Zone. Additional exploration is in the planning stage and is expected to include a second phase of diamond drilling and metallurgical testing during the first half of 2016.

Mineralization in Striker Zone extended at depth with 26 metres @ 5.9 grams/tonne gold, including 15 metres @ 9.9 grams/tonne. A step-out hole 60 metres southeast of the deep hole intersected 35 metres @ 5.7 grams/tonne from surface, including 12 metres @ 16.0 grams/tonne.

The maiden drill program commenced on November 8 and consisted of 15 angled (45 to 60 degree) diamond drill holes totalling 695 metres. Drill hole depth ranged from 31 to 70 metres with maximum true vertical depth of approximately 50 metres.

The program targeted the southwest portion of the Bayan Khundii prospect, a 550 metre by 300 metre area, where previous surface sampling and trenching completed by Erdene in the third quarter returned highly anomalous gold values.

Apart from the results from the two holes mentioned above, high-grade veins were confirmed in a third, which returned a one metre intersection @ 167 grams/tonne. Visible gold was observed in 10 of the 15 holes drilled within a number of quartz veins as irregular-shaped grains, up to 2mm.

Gold mineralization has now confirmed through drilling over a 475 metre area and is open along strike and at depth. The mineralization is associated with quartz veins and/or hematite within, or along, the boundary of quartz-hematite veins and veinlets. The main mineralized veins are interpreted to dip at 40 to 50 degrees to the southwest.

In the June quarter of 2015, Erdene conducted an initial exploration program on the southern portion of the Khundii licence which led to the discovery of the Bayan Khundii (Rich Valley) gold prospect, 20km south of the company’s flagship Altan Nar Gold-Polymetallic Project.

Two separate mineralized zones were subsequently identified over a 1.4km-long area that remains open in all directions. The Khundii exploration licence is in its 6th year of a 12-year term, and has no associated royalties.

Erdene is a Canada-based resource company focused on the acquisition, exploration, and development of base and precious metals in underexplored and highly prospective Mongolia. It holds four exploration licences and a mining licence in southwest Mongolia.