Bayfield hooks BHP Billiton on Mongolian projects

Vancouver – Bayfield Ventures (BYV-V) has optioned its three mineral licences in southern Mongolian to BHP Billiton (BHP-N).

The major can earn 51% in the largely unexplored projects by spending US$1.25 million by the end of 2007. A further 24% can be acquired by funding work through to the completion of a feasibility study, up to US$25 million.

BHP Billiton’s initial exploration will include its proprietary Falcon airborne gravity gradiometer system.

Bayfield’s southern Mongolian projects, acquired in early 2004, cover 3,000 sq. km in three blocks located east and west of Ivanhoe Mines’ (IVN-T) Oyu Tolgoi deposit. The projects are:

• Khanbogd-2 – a 1,440 sq. km licence, located about 60 km east of Oyu Tolgoi, that has had limited exploration.
• Navtgar Uul – a 1,050 sq. km licence, located about 100 km west of Oyu Tolgoi, with surface copper mineralization discovered by Mongolian Department of Mines mapping conducted in the 1980s.
• Khermen Uul – a 480 sq. km licence about 300 km west-northwest of Oyu Tolgoi. Government studies identified gold porphyry occurrences and some placer gold deposits exploited by locals. There is also outcrop of a weathered (lateritic) mafic-ultramafic assemblage, with occurrences of serpentine-hosted asbestos. Coal has also been observed on the project.

Bayfield Ventures also holds a 24.5% interest in the Baird gold project in the Red Lake area of northwestern Ontario, where Placer Dome (PDG-T) recently earned its 51% interest by spending $800,000 on exploration.

Shares in the junior got a boost from the news, up 24% to 23.5 per share on moderate trading volume of 95,000 shares.