West Madsen Property
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Our neighbour, West Red Lake Gold Mines, restarted production at the Madsen Gold Mine in June. With the headframe just a five-kilometre drive from our eastern claim boundary, we are in an enviable strategic location with promising targets that merit further exploration," Greg Lytle, President of Gold Finder.
Gold Finder (formerly GoldON) owns a 100% interest in the West Madsen property (the "Property") that covers 5,988 hectares in the heart of the Red Lake Gold Camp. The Property comprises two contiguous claim blocks: Block A to the east and Block B to the west, both accessible by secondary roads connecting to Ontario HWY 618, then to the town of Red Lake, 15 km to the northeast. Block A adjoins the Madsen Gold Mine property (Figure 1), owned by West Red Lake Gold Mines (WRLG), which announced the restart of production in June and reported the production of 3,800 ounces of gold in July (see WRLG's news release of August 6, 2025).
Figure 1: Looking northeast from West Madsen Block A to WRLG's Madsen Mine Property (click on image to enlarge).
The bulk of the mineral resources on the Madsen Mine property are hosted in a ~7-km-long gold trend that follows the major crustal break or contact between the Balmer and Confederation assemblages. Gold Finder has observed the same Balmer-Confederation contact in outcrop approximately 1.5 km west of the Block A eastern boundary and identified it within an ~8-km corridor of disrupted regional magnetics that traverses Block A from the Madsen Mine property (Figure 2).
Since acquiring the original claim blocks from Great Bear Resources in 2019 and additional claims from Bounty Gold in 2020 to increase the size of Block A, Gold Finder's exploration work, focused on Block A, has included geophysical interpretations, regional mapping and prospecting, rock sampling, a soil-gas-hydrocarbon survey, and approximately 11,100 metres of diamond drilling over 28 holes (Figure 2).
Figure 2: Plan view of West Madsen - Block A with 2025 exploration areas and analytical results.
Diamond drilling has identified gold anomalies in both Balmer and Confederation Assemblage rocks. 2020 drilling intersected 14.4 g/t Au over 0.5 meters (m) in strongly altered Balmer mafic volcanic rocks (hole WM-20-05, see Gold Finder's news release of July 22, 2020), and 2021 drilling intersected 0.16 g/t Au over 195 m, including 0.51 g/t Au over 10.90 m from felsic intrusive rocks of the Confederation Assemblage (hole WM-21-22, see Gold Finder's news release of June 1, 2021). Follow-up drilling to the latter intersection in 2024, 100 meters along strike to the southwest, intersected 0.28 g/t Au over 15 m from the felsic intrusive rocks and 0.85 g/t Au over 9.44 m from silicified metasediments in the hanging wall to the felsic intrusive rocks (hole WM-24-05, see Gold Finder's news release of November 7, 2024).
In 2025, Emerald Geological Services (EGS) conducted a review of the Company's previous exploration programs on the Property (2019-2024) to identify untested targets and areas that require further fieldwork before undertaking any additional mechanical stripping or drilling. Two areas were selected for the 2025 summer fieldwork (Figure 2), which included the collection of 25 rock (grab) samples and 218 "A" horizon soil samples.
The identification of new gold-in-soil anomalies along regional structural corridors, which host high-grade gold occurrences west of the Property and major gold deposits east of the Property, will aid in the systematic exploration along these structures," said Greg Lytle, President of Gold Finder. "These corridors are already known to contain anomalous gold over significant widths locally along the 8-kilometer corridor covered by the West Madsen Block A claims."
Area 1 Results
Area 1 spans up to 4 kilometers (km) from Tack Lake, where the Balmer-Confederation contact has been identified in drilling, to the western Block A boundary with Athena Gold's ("Athena") Laird Lake property, where Athena recently reported a bonanza-grade grab sample of 373 g/t Au (see Athena's news release of December 4, 2024) and the identification of new gold-in-till anomalies (see Athena's news release of September 4, 2025).
Three north-south lines of "A" horizon soil sampling were completed near the western Block A boundary, each 1.2 km long and spaced 200 meters apart, with 25-meter sample station spacing. These lines were designed to test the Balmer-Confederation contact area and extend south into the Confederation Assemblage across linear magnetic features. The highest result was 228 ppb Au on the south side of the valley west of Tack Lake, which may represent the same gold-bearing structure that is present in the lake. The next highest result was 109 ppb Au further south in the vicinity of a linear magnetic high (see Figure 2 and Table 1).
Additionally, a historical sample near the west shore of Tack Lake was revisited. This sample consisted of syenitic rock with quartz veining in local float. A sample of the boulder returned 438 ppb Au, whereas the original sample reportedly returned 178 ppb Au according to the Ontario Assessment File Database (see Figure 1 and Table 2). The gold-bearing veinlets in this location might be explained as a peripheral offshoot of a geological structure underlying the valley west of Tack Lake.
Area 2 Results
Area 2 spans approximately 1 km near the eastern Block A boundary, where 2020 soil sampling yielded anomalies up to 106 ppb Au from "A" horizon, and where 2024 drillholes WM-24-03 and WM-24-04 intersected ultramafic flows believed to belong to the Balmer Assemblage, which hosts the majority of the current and past producing gold mines of the Red Lake Gold Camp (see Gold Finder's news release of November 7, 2024). The two highest "A" horizon soil anomalies in this area were both 76 ppb Au (see Figure 1 and Table 1), in the vicinity of where hole WM-23-04 was drilled, which returned 0.42 g/t Au and 0.94% Cu over 1 meter in ultramafic rocks (see above-linked news release).
A sample of mafic volcanic outcrop with minor to moderate sugary grey quartz stringers, located 50 meters from the eastern Block A boundary, returned 117 ppb Au (see Figure 1 and Table 2), in the vicinity of anomalous soil samples from the 2020 field program.
The 2025 program was successful in identifying target areas for follow-up exploration work. Results from the 2025 program, along with the 2024 drilling results in Area 2, suggest that the Balmer-Confederation contact may be located further south of where it was previously thought in these areas. This theory will be taken into consideration when planning future exploration programs.
QAQC
Soil and rock samples were collected, documented, and photographed in the field, then placed in sealed bags and delivered to Activation Laboratories (ActLabs) in Thunder Bay, an ISO / IEC 17025-accredited laboratory. Soil sample collection is subject to Emerald Geological Services' internal quality assurance/quality control (QAQC) protocols, which include the insertion of blank material and certified reference material into each batch of samples submitted. Rock samples referenced in this news release were analyzed using ActLabs methods 1A2-50, a 50g fire assay with atomic absorption finish, and 1F2, a total digestion with ICP-OES finish for trace elements. "A" horizon soil samples were analyzed using ActLabs methods 2A, an INAA analysis for gold and trace elements, as well as ActLabs method 2C1, an aqua regia partial digestion with ICP finish for select metals.
Gold Finder owns a 100% interest in the property subject to certain underlying net smelter returns royalties held by Kinross (formerly Great Bear Resources - see news release of September 15, 2021) and Bounty Gold (See news release of January 7, 2021).