Referenced from Watanabe 1996 & 1997 and MITI 1992 & 1997.

There is no history of mining reported for the Minamikayabe application area. Several quartz-barite-sulfide mineral vein occurrences occur within 1-2 km of the tenement. Prior interest in the mineral potential of the Kameda Peninsula followed the discovery of gold precipitates in the active hot springs of the Osorezan geothermal field on Shimokita Peninsula in northern Honshu by the MMAJ in 1988. Osorezan is located about 65 km south of Minamikayabe.

The MMAJ undertook geological- and metallogenic-studies in the Kameda Peninsula during the 1990’s. This work included detailed geological mapping, petrological studies, radiometric age dating and limited scout diamond drilling, and was the first study to define the distribution and character of two major AAA lithocap occurrences at Minamikayabe and on SAMJ’s nearby Kobui tenement area. The two lithocaps at Minamikayabe are known as Mitsumoriyama in the western part of the project and Nukeishi in the northeast.

During this program, two diamond holes were drilled in the Minamikayabe area. One hole tested the western lithocap (Mitsumoriyama) and intersected a 300-m thick zoned advanced argillic body comprising alunite, vuggy-silica and associated high-temperature minerals. Quartz veins distributed across the advanced argillic zone between 0.1 to 6cm wide gave gold values between 1 and 2 ppm, highlighting, the potential for a disseminated, bulk-tonnage gold resource in the lithocap. The collar of this hole is located within a few hundred meters, but outside, of the project boundary.

The second drill hole tested the Hokko-Minami epithermal veins within the tenement, about 1.5 km east of the western lithocap, and returned an intercept of 17.7 g/t Au in a 30-cm wide quartz-adularia vein at about 100 m below surface, (Watanabe, 1996). A deep geothermal exploration hole (1,833.8 m) drilled by New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) about 6 km north of the Minamikayabe lithocaps intersected mineralized volcanic rocks at the base of the hole that assayed 0.17 g/t Au, 3.12 g/t Ag, 0.33% Cu and 198 ppm Mo (no interval stated in literature), which is consistent with possible porphyry-style mineralization.