Temagami claims’ status uncertain following court decision

A 9,800-sq.-km area near Cobalt, Ont., may be reopened for staking if the Ontario government and Teme-Augama Anishnabai band agree to lift a 20-year-old land caution on the mineral-rich ground.

Following a recent Supreme Court of Canada ruling that denies the Indian band rights to the area it claims, the provincial government plans to negotiate a new “treaty” with the Teme-Augama Anishnabai (or Bear Island band). The agreement could include concessions allowing mineral claims on the ground, said Brian Blomme, a spokesman for the Ministry of Natural Resources. In the spring of 1990, when the periphery of the caution area was reopened, Ontario witnessed the hottest staking rush of the year. Over 1,000 claims were registered with the Sudbury and Larder Lake mining recorders in April alone as prospectors vied for a share of the prospective ground. Now, a much larger area may be made available for staking. On Aug. 15, the Supreme Court upheld a previous ruling that the Teme-Augama Anishnabai forfeited rights to the land in the Temagami Lake district when it agreed to the terms of the Robinson-Huron Treaty of 1850. Although the Ontario government’s fulfilment of its treaty obligations was also questioned in court, the recent ruling against the Teme-Augama Anishnabai land claim is final.

The rocks in the region, mostly proterozoic sediments, are known to host a number of precious and base metal occurrences, including Teck’s (TSE) past-producing Temagami copper-gold mine. Jim Ireland, acting resident geologist for the Cobalt district, thinks the ground has excellent exploration potential.

“I would like to see the whole area opened up for exploration,” he told The Northern Miner. “We have both the Shining Tree area, with base metal and gold potential, and the Temagami greenstone belt.”

This year, Falconbridge’s Mirage project, an exploration program designed to find another Sudbury within the depths of the Wanapitei anomaly, has added even more excitement to the region. According to geologists at both Falconbridge and Teck (TSE), a portion of the 60-km-long anomaly remains under caution.

“We’re certainly going to look at the (caution) area,” said Paul Severin, manager of Falconbridge’s Sudbury exploration office.

Falconbridge holds nearly 2,000 claims covering the western peak of the magnetic anomaly, and plans to drill a deep hole into the stratigraphy after a detailed analysis of its geophysical data is complete. A field crew is currently on site, mapping the property’s geology.

Teck holds a much smaller block of ground to the east, where there appears to be a separate magnetic peak. The boundary of its claim block abuts the caution area in an irregular pattern, suggesting the land caution may have interrupted the company’s staking drive.

But the government warned that prospectors should not be too quick to sharpen their axes and stock up on claim tags, since it may take months before any kind of agreement is reached on the future of the Temagami bush land. “At this point, it’s a bit premature for any decisions,” said Blomme. “Call me in a couple of weeks.”

Even if the ground is reopened for exploration, it’s possible that it will be returned to the original claimholders, whose mineral rights were suspended when the caution was imposed in 1974. In that case, finding and re-registering the claimholders will be a lengthy process.