It acquired the remaining 20% in the Guppy-Benalla area for $250,000 in cash, giving it complete ownership of the tenure where previous drilling returned a top assay of 12m grading 12.41g/t gold from a down-hole depth of just 20m.
Consolidation of the area gives Patronus Resources (ASX:PTN) full flexibility over exploration and future potential development pathways at Guppy, which is about 6km from its 475,000oz Cardinia East gold resource within a proven mineralised corridor.
“For a modest cost, we’ve been able to remove the joint venture constraints and now have full control over the Guppy–Benalla area and its potential upside,” PTN managing director John Ingram said.
“The project sits in a proven mineralised corridor close to existing resources, and early results are encouraging.
“The next step is straightforward – systematic drilling to determine whether this can translate into something meaningful.”
The Guppy prospect sits within a corridor of fertile gold-bearing structures associated with the Benalla Anticline – a regional control on mineralisation across the Leonora district.
It hosts a coherent mineralised target identified by exploration carried out during 2025 and early 2026.
Previous drilling returned encouraging gold results such as 12m at 12.41g/t from 20m, 13m at 2.12g/t from 105m and 4m at 6.49g/t from 12m.
More recently, surface sampling and mapping further refined the target with gold anomalism identified along a northeast trending structural corridor.
Rock chips collected across the area returned several samples with grades above 1g/t and peaking at 3.27g/t.
This highlighted the potential for parallel mineralised structures, with the interpreted corridor extending up to ~2.5km along strike within the current tenement boundary.
These provide a clear target for follow-up drilling to test the scale and continuity of mineralisation.
PTN plans to carry out additional aircore and reverse circulation drilling at Guppy.
This is aimed at testing the strike continuity of gold mineralisation and defining the geometry and plunge of mineralised shoots.
It will also evaluate the parallel structures identified by surface geochemistry.
Drilling will begin following heritage survey completion with the Nyalpa Pirnuku Native Title Group.
