James Bay Minerals now has one of the largest lithium landholdings at the La Grande greenstone belt

Exploration at the La Grande project has been making good progress with work at the Aero property discovering a second field of spodumene-rich fractionated pegmatite dykes.

This field hosts nine pegmatite dykes over an area of 1.5km by 500m and follows on the discovery of a pegmatite field with 21 fractionated pegmatite dykes – including the initial Avro pegmatite – that extends over a corridor stretching across 3km with a width of up to 350m.

Pegmatite lithium deposits are typically associated with high ‘fractionation’ – i.e. the ancient geological process in which the crystals are separated from magma.

While this is an encouraging result for James Bay Minerals (ASX:JBY), the Aero property is just one of four project areas at La Grande, leaving the company with plenty of room to continue exploring in.

Recent helicopter surveys of the Aqua property have already identified multiple large outcropping pegmatite dykes, some of which appear to be part of the broad pegmatite field discovered by FIN Resources (ASX:FIN) at its Cancet West project. 

The success of the maiden field program, desktop studies and exploration activities has led the company to increase its land position across its La Grande project up to 30,168ha.

Notably, it now covers over 55km of lithium trend along major deformation corridors within the La Grande greenstone belt.

Most of the increase was seen at the Aqua property, which more than doubled in size from 2916ha up to 8,803ha.

This is significant due to FIN’s recent discovery on Aqua’s northwest border.

Joule saw an equal increase – 5,887ha – to 16,385ha following the identification of further prospective areas from desktop reviews and helicopter mapping.

The remaining 614ha increase was at the Aero property, which now covers 4,980ha.

“Strategically expanding our land position along the La Grande greenstone belt was always a high priority, given the success of our maiden field campaign, identification of new prospective areas and neighbouring company results,” executive director Andrew Dornan said.

“JBY’s land position is one of the largest along the premium La Grande greenstone belt with approximately 55km of lithium trend from east to west. This is significant given the rate of discoveries along the La Grande greenstone belt.”