Evolving Gold succeeds where others failed with Rattlesnake Hills

By Kevin Michael Grace

When you think of Wyoming’s natural resources, you think of coal (first in US production), natural gas (second) and crude oil (fifth). What you don’t think of is gold. But that seems likely to change, due to Evolving Gold Corp’s continued discoveries at its Rattlesnake Hills property.

Evolving announced its latest results from Rattlesnake October 27: 1.84 grams per tonne of gold over 161.5 metres, including 3.14 g/t over 76.2 meters and 1.03 g/t over 224 metres, including 2.21 g/t over 29 metres. This is the sixth time in just over a year that Evolving has reported similar assays.

Evolving’s CEO Bob Barker says of the results, “I think they’re pretty good.” He continues, “They certainly confirm the North Stock mineralization at a deeper level. I have been pushing very hard for exploration and drilling of a deeper porphyry target. We still don’t have our hand firmly on that yet, but we’re pretty encouraged by what we’re seeing so far.”

Goldcorp is also encouraged by what it’s seen. It bought 15% of Evolving in July for $15.6 million. “They’ve made an investment based on what they believe is the quality of our projects and the quality of our people,” Barker says. “And they’ve provided us with some technical feedback and assistance as we’ve requested it.”

How far is Rattlesnake from production? “That’s a hard question to answer,” Barker replies. “We are getting to the stage of looking at doing a more serious economic evaluation this coming year. We’re going to look in more detail at the metallurgical issues, but we think we’re at a point where we can start to take serious steps in that direction.”

In any event, Barker reports, the infrastructure is “excellent. We’re about an hour and a quarter from Casper, and most of that’s on paved roads. We’re close to the electrical grid, and we have a gas pipeline that runs very close to the property.”

Rattlesnake was owned previously by Golden Predator and before that by Newmont. (Golden Predator retains a 0.5% net smelter royalty which Evolving may buy down to 0.25% for $375,000.) How is it that these companies didn’t see its worth? “It’s always suffered from what I would call an under appreciation,” says Barker. And how is that Golden Predator let it slip away? “At the time they had their hands full with other properties. You make these decisions and balance one property against your others.”

Evolving has other properties, in Nevada, and here too they have been lucky. “We think the land we’ve acquired in the south and the Carlin Trend should never have been made available to us, in my opinion. It’s a remarkable acquisition for a company our size. The potential for a major discovery is really very strong. We’re very encouraged with what we’re seeing there.”

As to Evolving’s near future, Barker concludes, “We look at all sorts of scenarios all the time: whether we’re a company moving toward production or whether somebody’s going to come in and take us over, or will have taken over individual projects by then… Whatever happens, we intend to maximize value to our shareholders.”

The principals of OnPage Media Corp are contractors to, and hold options in, Evolving Gold Corp.