Imagine an ancient sea...........
Where gold nuggets were precipitated out of solution during the Great Oxygenation Event. There may very well be an area of high grade conglomerate around the margins of the Hamersley basin defined by a " tuff " layer in the conglomerate. The gold component of this layer would have been deposited at a time when the algae were at maximum density. The location would have been in shallow parts of the ancient sea where adequate sunlight was available. The time would have coincided with the deposition of volcanic ash by Mt. Roe. In a recent interview , Quentin mentioned that he saw three distinct layers of conglomerate at the Cannonball area of Comet Well. The bottom layer is a coarse conglomerate 3 to 6 metres thick which he feels was formed in a marine environment. The middle layer is a smaller diameter conglomerate which he feels formed during a lowering of sea levels and is analogous to the Nome fluvial fan gold deposit. The top layer contains the " tuff " layer and is of marine origin. So if you look at Figure 4 , of the May 31 news release , note that there is no " tuff '' layer at the NW end of the cross section where KX157 and KX158 were collected. Likely because of higher topography resulting in erosion of the tuff. And I see from figure 4 that the lower layer pinches out further to the SE. Likely because as you head SE this was a deeper part of the ancient ocean. And finally I feel that the reason that there were no lower layers of conglomerate at last summer's Purdy's Reward sample sites is because this conglomerate was formed in deeper water. This material was resting on basement rock. There may very well be a high grade area of conglomerate formed in the " Goldilocks " area for the algae. Now Quentin mentioned that he is drilling small diameter holes eastwards from Comet Well to try and trace the tuff layer towards Purdy's Reward. And I can certainly understand his plans to return to Purdy's to take bulk samples close to last summer's original samples. I think that topography of the ancient sea will determine who has the best conglomerate. And of course where Mt. Roe basalt has protected the conglomerate , the entire sequence has been protected from erosion.