Follow-up drilling on the recent high-grade discovery at Erdene Resource Development Corp’s Bayan Khundii Gold Project in southwest Mongolia has returned strong results.

Drilling this quarter has intersected additional high-grade gold mineralization including 5.3 grams/tonne (g/t) gold over 63 metres in the Striker Zone, one of multiple high-priority targets within the Bayan Khundii prospect area.

The 63 metre intersection beginning at 50 metres downhole includes a 3 metre section of 49.4 g/t and a 5 metre section of 26.8 g/t. The hole also included four 1 metre samples with grades ranging from 1.2 to 2.6 ounces per tonne.

This hole was about 35 metres down dip from a previous hole which returned 26 metres of 5.9 g/t and high-grade gold has now been traced over greater than 90 metres down dip.

A hole 47 metres east of the above hole included 13 metres @ 2.1 g/t and 14 metres @ 2.0 g/t. Another hole 40 metres southeast of the first hole and 40 metres southwest of the second returned 27 metres @ 1.9 g/t, including 8 metres @ 5.7 g/t.

A new zone was intersected in the Gold Hill area, returning 12 metres @ 2.3 g/t. The drilling program also included the deepest hole drilled to date at Bayan Khundii and intersected high grade gold at a vertical depth of about 125 metres with 1 metre @ 26.3 g/t. Visible gold has been observed in the majority of drill holes, and three trenches, completed to date.

The current Bayan Khundii exploration program includes 3500 metres of diamond drilling, approximately 900 soil samples over a 7.6km by 3km area, 35.4 line km of gradient IP geophysical surveys, 33 line km of dipole-dipole geophysical surveys, 550 metres of trenching and sampling within a 2km by 2km area, and mineralogical studies.

The majority of this work is complete with the exception of drilling with approximately 1700 metres remaining.

The program was designed to test the strike and vertical extent of the high-grade gold mineralization discovered in quarter four of 2015.

In addition, various technical studies in support of future scoping/feasibility-level studies and a mining licence application, including hydro-geological, archaeological, paleontological, and environmental base line studies, have commenced on both Bayan Khundii and Erdene’s Altan Nar gold-polymetallic project 20km to the northwest.

Erdene Resource Development Corp is a Canada-based resource company focused on the acquisition, exploration, and development of base and precious metals in under-explored and highly prospective Mongolia. The company holds four exploration licences and a mining licence in southwest Mongolia.