Hercules Silver (BIG.V) is a solid addition. The company’s focus is the Hercules Silver Project, located in Western Idaho. It’s a disseminated silver-lead-zinc system that has seen as much as 28,000m drilling in previous years, summarizes Peter Krauth, editor of Silver Stock Investor.
This project currently enjoys a substantive 3.5 km of strike length, and yet the mineralization still remains open in all directions. Back in the early 1980’s, when silver was still coming off its then all-time high of $50 in January 1980, this project was seeing aggressive drilling and even a feasibility study. But alas, the silver price fell under $5, throwing a huge wrench into its gears.
We do know that there remains a lot of potential in the form of geochemical and geophysical targets, several of which the new operator has been aggressively advancing of late. Keep in mind too, these targets are in areas that have never seen a drill bit.
Before I get into the project, let’s look at who’s in charge, because no matter how good the rocks are, someone has to find, assess and prove them up. Chris Paul is CEO and director. Having founded Ridgeline exploration, an advanced exploration company which was eventually sold to the industry recognized Goldspot Discoveries in 2021, Paul set out to build a silver company after 15 successful years of high-grade gold and copper-gold discoveries.
Now, let’s spend more time looking at the asset. The Hercules Silver Project lies in Western Idaho, a jurisdiction ranked by the Fraser Institute as one of the world’s best for mining (7th), with most of the mineralization on state land.
There is a 2% Net Smelter Royalty, of which 1% can be bought back for CAD $1M. The project consists of 4,246 acres, or 17.2 sq. km, in Washington County, only 2.5 hours NW of Boise’s International Airport on a highway. There’s already a high voltage transmission line that crosses the property. The nearest town, Cambridge, is about 30 min. away.
Hercules’s project should enjoy a faster path to permitting that what’s typical, because they enjoy grandfathered mining rights and are on state land. Though it’s not required, they generate an annual drill plan, then review it with the state to maintain good relations.
There are several big players already in Idaho, including Hecla, Liberty Gold, Bunker Hill Mining, and Integra Resources. The 28,000m of historical drilling covered 300 holes over 3.5km of strike. That helped define two zones of continuous mineralization to a shallow depth, and these are still open in all directions. In previous work, the geology was never mapped in detail. There’s a 5.5km soil anomaly which only saw short vertical holes.
Overall, the story just keeps getting better. And the geophysics suggest a lot of silver and base metals could be just below where previous drilling stopped. Drilling will help verify historical results, as well as test on strike, below, and even step out to potentially grow considerably.
Recommended Action: Buy BIG.V (traded on the TSX Venture Exchange).