#But the climate was different back in the late Triassic

[generalbytes]

The earliest evidence for fire dates back nearly 440 million years. Our hominin ancestors first used natural wildfires to flush out prey and forage for food. Richard Wrangham's cooking hypothesis suggests that a ready supply of cooked food allowed the Homo lineage to develop its large, complex brains. Of humanity’s greatest inventions, fire remains as important today as in the time of our ancient ancestors — if not as apparent. We have replaced the hearth with electric ovens and central heating, but the burning of fossil fuels accounts for 63.5 percent of U.S. electricity generation. We still heat our homes and cook our food with fire — just in a more roundabout manner. We even use fire in ways our ancestors couldn’t have imagined. The internal combustion engine has replaced animals and our own wobbly legs as the preferred method of travel. We can go farther in a day than the vast majority of our ancestors did in a lifetime and even escape the confines of our planet. Thanks to fire. But fire has done more than create the energy that makes our lives comfortable. By one Harvard professor’s account, fire altered the course of our evolution.

Fire, a brief history

First, some Chem 101. Fire requires three elements for its reaction: oxygen, fuel, and a heat source. Since two of the three elements are provided naturally by plants, the history of fire became intricately tied to them.

Some of our earliest evidence for fire goes back 440 million years to the Silurian period when Earth’s climate stabilized and plants and animals began to move to land. Of note, this period provides the earliest fossil evidence of vascular plants. From this point, fire becomes a recurrent phenomenon with times of high and low activity based on environmental conditions. During the Carboniferous period, atmospheric oxygen hit a record high of 31 percent and plants spread across the supercontinent Pangea, so charcoal records suggest a lot of fire activity during this period. Conversely, the pittance of charcoal from the Triassic period suggests low atmospheric oxygen and fewer plants. Jumping a few million years to the late Miocene, hominins moved to the grasslands and began to further diverge from their ape relatives — likely due to the difference between the African savanna and the dense jungle. Here, they would have also encountered wildfires with far more regularity.

Read Full Article Here : https://bigthink.com/the-present/inventions-fire/

[global-education]

Living in the Paleozoic Era 🌿🦕🌏

Welcome to a journey back in time to the Paleozoic Era, a period of Earth's history that spans from about 541 million to 252 million years ago. It's a time of ancient landscapes, bizarre creatures, and dramatic geological changes. Let's dive into what life was like during this fascinating era!

🌍 Ancient Supercontinents: During the Paleozoic Era, Earth looked quite different from what we know today. The landmasses were joined together in the supercontinent Pangaea, surrounded by a vast Panthalassa Ocean.

🌋 Volcanic Activity: Volcanoes were a common sight, and they released massive amounts of greenhouse gases, creating a warm, tropical climate. Sea levels were much higher, with shallow seas covering large portions of the continents.

🌿 The Dawn of Life: Life was thriving, but it was vastly different from the species we see today. The first land plants appeared, bringing greenery to the barren landscapes. These early plants laid the foundation for terrestrial ecosystems.

🐚 Marine Wonders: The oceans were teeming with life. Ancient creatures like trilobites, nautiloids, and jawless fish ruled the seas. Corals began building reefs, while the first fish with jaws emerged.

🦗 Invasion of Land: One of the most significant events of the Paleozoic was the colonization of land. Arthropods, like millipedes and scorpions, were among the first to venture onto the continents. They were soon followed by amphibians.

🌅 Mass Extinctions: The era was marked by multiple mass extinctions, including the Ordovician-Silurian and Permian-Triassic extinctions. These events shaped the course of life on Earth and paved the way for new species to evolve.

🦕 The Age of Reptiles: By the late Paleozoic, reptiles had emerged, including the iconic sail-backed Dimetrodon. These reptiles were the ancestors of the dinosaurs that would dominate the next era.

🌄 The End of an Era: The Paleozoic Era came to a close with the Permian-Triassic extinction, the most devastating in Earth's history. It wiped out nearly 95% of marine species and marked the end of many Paleozoic life forms.

Today, we marvel at the remnants of the Paleozoic Era, from the fossils of trilobites to the geological formations that tell the story of this ancient world. Studying this era helps us understand the evolution of life on Earth and the forces that have shaped our planet.

[christ2525]

Features Of  Permian Period

Permian Period, in geologic time, the last time of the Paleozoic Time. The Permian Time frame started 298.9 quite a while back and finished 252.2 a long time back, reaching out from the end of the Carboniferous Time frame to the beginning of the Triassic Time frame.

Toward the start of the period, glaciation was inescapable, and latitudinal climatic belts were emphatically evolved. Environment warmed all through the Permian times, and, toward the finish of the period, hot and dry circumstances were broad to the point that they caused an emergency in Permian marine and earthly life. This sensational climatic shift might have been to some degree set off by the gathering of more modest landmasses into the supercontinent of Pangea. A large portion of Earth's property region was integrated into Pangea, which was encircled by a huge world sea called Panthalassa.

geologic time Earthly plants extensively differentiated during the Permian Time frame, and bugs advanced quickly as they followed the plants into new territories. Likewise, a few significant reptile genealogies originally showed up during this period, including those that in the long run led to warm blooded creatures in the Mesozoic Time. The biggest mass termination in the World's set of experiences happened during the last option part of the Permian Time frame. This mass eradication was serious to such an extent that main 10% or less of the species present during the hour of greatest biodiversity in the Permian made due to the furthest limit of the period.

Permian rocks are tracked down on all present-day landmasses; nonetheless, some have been uprooted extensive good ways from their unique scopes of affidavit by structural vehicle happening during the Mesozoic and Cenozoic periods. A few beds dated from the most recent Permian ages are eminent for their fossils; layers (rock layers) in the Russian Stage contain a striking vertebrate faunal collection as well as fossil bugs and plants.

Permian geological features The continental pieces were joined and Features Of  Permian Period.

During the Permian, the remains of the late Carboniferous glaciation were still felt. Therefore, the level of water remained fairly low throughout the period.

The continental pieces were almost completely united in the micro continent of Pangea. Only Southeast Asia was left out, which was a separate portion throughout the Mesozoic.

Pangea was located on the equator during the Permian, but it extended to the ice-covered poles. It was surrounded by the universal sea, Panthalassa, although the Paleo-Tethys ocean was already growing at the southern tip of the continent.

The Permian Time frame gets its name from the Russian district of Perm, where rocks stored during this time are especially advanced.

The Permian climate The Permian Time frame comprises a significant junction both throughout the entire existence of the World's landmasses and in the development of life. The important geographic highlights of the Permian world were a supercontinent, Pangea, and an enormous sea bowl, Panthalassa, with its branch, the Tethys Ocean (a huge space in the tropical eastern side of Pangea).

aleoclimate The gathering of the different huge bodies of land into the supercontinent of Pangea prompted an unnatural weather change and the advancement of dry to parched environments during Permian times. As low-scope seaways shut, warm surface sea flows were redirected into a lot higher scopes (regions nearer to the shafts), and cool-water upwelling created along the west shoreline of Pangea. Broad mountain-building occasions happened where bodies of land impacted, and the recently made high mountain runs unequivocally affected neighborhood and local earthbound environments.

Broad glaciation endured from the Carboniferous Time frame into the underlying phase of the Early Permian Age over tremendous areas of present-day southern India, Australia, Antarctica, and northeastern Siberia. Center Permian environments by and large were hotter and wet. Environments of the Late Permian (Lopingian) Age were ordinarily hot and locally exceptionally dry. Deserts became far reaching in different tropical and subtropical regions during this time.

The orogenies that obvious the get together of Pangea emphatically affected both environment and life. East-west barometrical stream in the calm and higher scopes was disturbed by two high mountain chains — one in the jungles situated east-west and one running north-south — that redirected warm marine air into higher scopes. The mainland impacts likewise shut different before marine seaways and secluded pieces of the tropical shallow-water domains that were home to marine spineless creatures. These domains ultimately became endemic (territorially confined) organic areas.

Volcanism might have emphatically impacted environment toward the finish of the Permian Time frame. Broad Siberian flood basalts (the Siberian snares) in northeastern Siberia and neighboring western China emitted around quite a while back and for around 600,000 years expelled 2 million to 3 million cu km (480,000 to 720,000 cu mi) of basalt. The ejections contributed extraordinary measures of volcanic debris to the climate, presumably obscuring the skies and bringing down the effectiveness of plants in taking up carbon dioxide from the air during photosynthesis. Some geoscientists battle that rising magma likewise consumed coal creases, delivering coal fly debris and adding huge amounts of carbon dioxide to the environment, the two of which later blended in with and exhausted oxygen from the seas.

[a-dinosaur-a-day]

So the Geologic Time Scale is a tool created by geologists and paleontologists to describe deep time on planet Earth, specifically

it is supposed to be utilitarian - useful for understanding the history of life quickly, the history of the earth quickly, and communicating the scale of deep time

there is one problem, of course: the older something is, the less we have of it. the earth is constantly recycling and changing, and we lose stuff to time. that's just the consequence of the same systems that lead to life evolving at all, etc. Change is good, it's how we have life, but that also means we have death.

so the geologic time scale has a certain degree of what we call "time bias". IE, the closer something is to Today, the more we emphasize it

what do I mean by emphasize? well, the scale is divided into different chunks that are supposed to be equivalent to one another:

Eons (biggest) - Phanerozoic, Proterozoic, Archean, Hadean Eras - these go within eons. Phanerozoic has the Paleozoic, Mesozoic, and Cenozoic eons. Periods - these go within eras. So the Mesozoic has the Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous periods Epochs - these are within periods. The Paleogene period has the Paleocene, Eocene, and Oligocene epochs. Ages (smallest) - these are within epochs. There are lot of them, because these are the smallest units. One of the more famous ones is the Maastrichtian age of the Late Cretaceous Epoch (Cretaceous Period)

even in that explanation you can start to see the time bias: in the period right after the end-cretaceous extinction, the Paleogene, epochs have specific names. In the period right before - the Cretaceous - the epochs are just "late" and "early".

and there are even worse examples - the second age of the Cambrian still doesn't have a name, the boundary between the jurassic and the cretaceous is undefined, everything before the cryogenian is ridiculously unclear, etc.

some of that is just. unavoidable. because of the loss of information due to change over time. I doubt we'll ever get the "precambrian" (everything before the Phanerozoic eon) described to the level we have described the Phanerozoic.

Okay, so let's go back to that chart. That chart is of the epochs in the Phanerozoic, aka the eon of Earth's history that we are currently in, the one in which most complex life exists. Even with time bias, you can see that most of the epochs are roughly equivalent in length, with some variation due to the ways we define epochs (ie, we try to use different events in the history of life to define these things, so some epochs are shorter than others due to the frequency of said events)

the holocene and the anthropocene are the two most recent epochs. and both are significantly smaller than any epochs that came before. This is Time Bias in a nutshell.

Cause here's the thing: it was one thing to have the holocene be short. it just started. we were in the middle of it. presumably, it would have kept going for a while. But now they're installing the anthropocene, rendering the holocene that short, forever, and making the anthropocene even more short.

yes, human activity has had and will continue to have a major effect on life on earth. but millions and millions of years from now, these events - from the start of the ice age to today's climate change - will all become one single event. We know this, because the End-Permian extinction - the last extinction that was similar to today's - happened in multiple pulses, too, and we lump it all into one thing. If there are paleontologists 100 million years from now, they'd lump the end-Pleistocene, Holocene, and Anthropocene extinctions all into one thing, because it all is one thing. The combination of dramatic climate change with a bioengineering species that doesn't know how to stop.

even if we could argue that it just helps us humans to mark off the anthropocene as the great uptick in manmade climate change and environmental destruction, it renders the geologic time scale into the one thing it was never supposed to be: impractical.

Because the GTS is supposed to help us communicate the scale of deep time. And now that we have these ridiculously small units, much smaller than anything else, that's almost impossible to do to scale.

take this post I made many years ago. you can see how it was almost impossible for me to make it a reasonable length and include just the holocene. I had to make the holocene a single pixel.

how the hell would I make that scale with the anthropocene? suddenly I have to work at an even smaller scale to include it, which makes everything else before it even longer by comparison.

It's just impractical.

It's also exceptionally narcissistic. Imagine thinking the current biosphere can tell the difference between destruction we caused before industrialization and the destruction we caused after. It's all the same to the earth.

so this graph is showcasing how ridiculously skewed these two epochs are, which indicates how impractical they are, thus demonstrating why the anthropocene is a bad idea and should not be implemented in the geologic time scale.

Tada

~ Meig & @quark-nova

ICS time bias in one picture

[mesozoicsuggestions]

well tbh Ctenosauriscus cold pass as a log in my corner of the world. you see the ocean here, the baltic sea, has aggresive Cyanobacteria bloomings during summer. well then everything looks slimy and green. and tbh everything cold be log. like thanks cyanobacteria for giving us air to breath etc etc. but chill with these shenigans in the baltic sea (this is a human pollution created problem. this is not normal for baltic sea)

Next time I hear my cousin complaining that she doesn’t look enough like a log I shall tell them where True Logginess can be achieved. 

I don’t know if the Baltic Sea might be a little chilly for us; I mean, because we are huge-bodied archosaurs we are a little better at controlling our temperatures than mere lizards, so maybe your sea is a log-mimic’s paradise. 

-Mod Shuvo

[dobermanprocrastinating]

Mesozoic Era (reminder)

The Mesozoic Era, often referred to as the Age of Dinosaurs or the Age of Reptiles, is divided up into three separate time periods: the Triassic (251.902 million years ago-201.3 million years ago), the Jurassic (201.3 million years ago-145 million years ago), and the Cretaceous (145.5 million years ago-66 million years ago.) The Mesozoic Era came to an end when an asteroid hit the Earth and wiped out most life on our planet. Only a few species, mostly small mammals, managed to survive the mass extinction because of their diet.

Triassic Period

Introduction

The Triassic period is the first of three in the Mesozoic Era and also the shortest, beginning around 252 million years ago and ending 201 million years ago. It followed the great Permian mass extinction at the end of the Paleozoic Era. This period of time was when life on land grew more diverse.

Different species

While dinosaurs didn’t exist yet when the Triassic period started, there were plenty of reptiles, some of which would later evolve into our famous friends. After the Permian extinction, two groups of animals survived to dominate the land. These were Therapsids (mammal-like reptiles) and Archosaurs (more reptilian creatures). At the start of the Triassic, it seemed that the Therapsids would rule this new era, however, by the middle of the Triassic, most of the Therapsids had gone extinct, leaving Archosaurs as the clear winners.

One lineage of the Archosaurs evolved into true dinosaurs by the mid-Triassic. Species such as coelophysis (very small and agile creatures) and plateosaurus (giant herbivores and a close relative of the sauropods) carried the future of the dinosaurs on their backs as they paved the way for the more famous species that followed in the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods. 

By the late Triassic, another group of Archosaurs had branched into the first pterosaurs. Sharovipteryx (a gliding breed) and icarosaurus (a flying reptile) were tiny compared to what the pterosaurs would become, only being about the size of our modern day flighted birds, but they were fierce predators to the insects.

Yes, funnily enough, some of our insects already existed at this point in time, and they weren’t all that different from how we see them today. Spiders, millipedes, and centipedes are just a few to name that still exist on Earth today, as well as new groups of beetles. The Triassic was also the time when grasshoppers came about.

And lastly, the first mammals evolved near the end of the Triassic period from the almost extinct Therapsids. These early mammals were very small, rarely more than a few inches in length, at least in the time of the late Triassic and early Jurassic. They were mainly herbivores or insectivores, so therefore were not in direct competition with the Archosaurs or later dinosaurs. Many of them were arboreal (lived in trees) and nocturnal (awake at night) to avoid the much larger predators that dominated their world. Despite having fur and suckling their young, they laid eggs, much like today’s platypus. 

The Earth

At the beginning of the Triassic, the continents we know today were still together, forming the supercontinent known as Pangaea. Generally, the climate in Pangaea was dry with very hot summers and cold winters. Although the climate was more moderate farther from the equator, the world was warmer than it is today and there were no polar ice caps.

Late in the Triassic, the Tethys Sea began to spread, leading to a divide between the northern and southern portions of Pangaea. This began the separation of the supercontinent into two large continents known as Laurasia and Gondwana, which became fully divided in the Jurassic period.

A bitter ending

A mass extinction, most likely caused by climate change, marked the ending of the Triassic period and the beginning of the Jurassic. The event is one of the five major mass extinction events of the Earth, killing around 76% of marine and terrestrial creatures. This extinction gave way for dinosaurs to evolve into the more famous species we hear about.

[wtf-triassic]

Triadobatrachus massinoti

By Scott Reid

Etymology: Triassic frog

First Described By: Piveteau, 1936

Classification: Biota, Archaea, Proteoarchaeota, Asgardarchaeota, Eukaryota, Neokaryota, Scotokaryota Opimoda, Podiata, Amorphea, Obazoa, Opisthokonta, Holozoa, Filozoa, Choanozoa, Animalia, Eumetazoa, Parahoxozoa, Bilateria, Nephrozoa, Deuterostomia, Chordata, Olfactores, Vertebrata, Craniata, Gnathostomata, Eugnathostomata, Osteichthyes, Sarcopterygii, Rhipidistia, Tetrapodomorpha, Eotetrapodiformes, Elpistostegalia, Stegocephalia, Temnospondyli, Euskelia, Dissorophoidea, Xerodromes, Amphibamiformes, Lissamphibia, Batrachia, Salientia, Triadobatrachidae

Referred Species: T. massinoti

Status: Extinct 

Time and Place: Approximately 251–250 million years ago, in the late Induan to early Olenekian of the Early Triassic.

Triadobatrachus is only known from the Sakamena Formation in Northern Madagascar.

Physical Description: Triadobatrachus superficially resembles modern frogs, it was only around 10 cm long, had a broad head and a very reduced tail. Its skeleton had many features associated only with frogs among amphibians, including a very frog-like skull with big eyes and their characteristically elongated hips. Soft tissues preserved around the fossil even show that it had the wide, round body of frogs too. However, the skeleton of Triadobatrachus differed from living frogs in a few major ways. It had much more vertebrae than living frogs, 26 compared to the maximum 4–9 of frogs alive today, giving it a much longer body, and these vertebrae had ribs, unlike living frogs. Its legs were shorter and more squat, especially its back legs, which were hardly any longer than its front ones, making Triadobatrachus incapable of hopping despite its derived hips. Even the stumpy tail was still more prominent than in living frogs, and may have even retained some degree of mobility. To sum it up, Triadobatrachus more or less looked like a stretched out frog with short legs. Think of a horned toad lizard but with more of the toad part and less horned.

Diet: Like other frogs, Triadobatrachus was probably carnivorous, likely feeding on invertebrates like insects and other arthropods, molluscs, worms, and perhaps even any small vertebrates it could fit in its mouth.

Behavior: One of the most standout features of Triadobatrachus is that it couldn’t have hopped like modern frogs. Instead, Triadobatrachus would have walked around on land more like a salamander, although it is unknown just how much time it would have spent on land in the first place anyway. It was clearly amphibious, and it probably swam by kicking its back legs like frogs, unlike the undulation of newts and salamanders. It would have spawned like living amphibians too, laying shell-less eggs in water that hatched into tadpoles and underwent metamorphosis just like modern frogs. Otherwise, its behaviour is a mystery. We don’t even know if it would have croaked or not.

Ecosystem: Not much is directly known about the ecosystem Triadobatrachus inhabited, as the only known fossil had been washed out to sea along the coast. The intact body at least implies the body wasn’t transported far, so Triadobatrachus probably lived in coastal floodplain rivers and swamps. Various other temnospondyl amphibians are known from the area, including Edingeralla, Deltacephalus, Mahavisaurus, Wantzsosaurus and Tertremoides. Despite being amphibians, many of these temnospondyls were likely euryhaline, meaning they could tolerate salt water and inhabited the coastline, something only a few living amphibians are even remotely capable of standing. The peculiar aquatic reptile Hovasaurus lived along the coasts, although it’s unknown if it ever crossed paths with the freshwater frogs, and terrestrial procolophonid parareptiles were also present. Plant remains suggest the environment was tropical and semi-arid with a monsoonal climate that supported conifer forests along with seed ferns, horsetails and clubmosses.

Other: Triadobatrachus is one of the only known stem-frogs, along with the polish Czatkobatrachus, and is certainly the oldest. The early evolution of Lissamphibia (all living amphibians) is poorly understood, particularly whether their ancestry lies in the temnospondyls or some other “amphibians”. Triadobatrachus doesn’t solve this debate, although it does show similarities to the Permian amphibamiforms like Gerobatrachus, supporting the temnospondyl affinity for batrachians (the frogs and salamanders) amongst dissorophoids.

Before they were considered to be temnospondyls, lissamphibians were often thought to be lepospondyls, a probably paraphyletic or even polyphyletic (i.e. unnatural) collection of “amphibians” on the tetrapod tree more derived than temnospondyls (some may even be honest to goodness amniotes!). This picture is complicated by caecilians, which at one point were suggested to be lepospondyls while batrachians were temnospondyls, making Lissamphibia polyphyletic! The story got even stranger after a little Triassic amphibian, Chinlestegophis, was discovered in 2017 and was considered to be a stem-caecilian. Chinlestegophis pulled caecilians back into temnospondyls with the other lissamphibians, but at almost opposite ends of the temnospondyl tree—batrachians in amphibamiforms and caecilians in with the stereospondyls related to the giant metoposaurs! So lissamphibians may all be temnospondyls...but also polyphyletic, unless nearly all of Temnospondyli is classed as lissamphibians and becomes part of the crown group. This would also mean our small modern amphibians both independently miniaturised from the much larger, classic predatory amphibians of the Palaeozoic and Triassic. What a concept.

Regardless of temnospondyl taxonomic troubles, Triadobatrachus is a perfect transitional form from more generalised amphibians to the highly specialised anatomy of frogs. Particularly, it shows that some of their unique anatomical adaptations evolved before they were able to hop, and may have functioned for other activities like swimming. The almost complete preservation of a skeleton as delicate as one of a small amphibian is a remarkable find, let alone one that represents a perfect transitional form for a group of animals whose evolutionary history is shrouded in mystery, and makes Triadobatrachus a fantastic find, no matter how unassuming it may be.

~ By Scott Reid

Sources under the Cut 

Ascarrunz, Eduardo; Rage, Jean-Claude; Legreneur, Pierre; Laurin, Michel (2016). "Triadobatrachus massinoti, the earliest known lissamphibian (Vertebrata: Tetrapoda) re-examined by µCT-Scan, and the evolution of trunk length in batrachians". Contributions to Zoology. 58 (2): 201–234.

Lires, A. I., Soto, I. M., & Gómez, R. O. (2016). Walk before you jump: new insights on early frog locomotion from the oldest known salientian. Paleobiology, 42(4), 612-623.

Maganuco, S., Steyer, J.S., Pasini, G., Boulay, M., Lorrain, S., Bénéteau, A., Auditore, M. (2009). “An exquisite specimen of Edingerella madagascarensis (Temnospondyli) from the Lower Triassic of NW Madagascar; cranial anatomy, phylogeny, and restorations”. Società italiana di scienze naturali.

Pardo, Jason D.; Small, Bryan J.; Huttenlocker, Adam K. (2017-07-03). "Stem caecilian from the Triassic of Colorado sheds light on the origins of Lissamphibia". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 114 (27): E5389–E5395

Piveteau, J. (1936). "Une forme ancestrale des amphibiens anoures dans le Trias inférieur de Madagascar". Comptes Rendus Hebdomadaires des Séances de l'Académie des Sciences. 202: 1607–1608.

Rage,J-C; Roček, Z. (1989). "Redescription of Triadobatrachus massinoti (Piveteau, 1936) an anuran amphibian from the Early Triassic". Palaeontographica Abteilung A. 206: 1–16.

Roček , Z., Rage, J-C. (2000). "13. Proanuran Stages (Triadobatrachus, Czatkobatrachus)". In Heatwole, H.; Carroll, R. L. (eds.). Amphibian Biology. Paleontology: The Evolutionary History of Amphibians. 4. Surrey Beatty & Sons. pp. 1284–1294.

Ročková, H., Roček Z. (2005). “Development of the pelvis and posterior part of the vertebral column in the Anura”. Journal of Anatomy. 206(1): 17–35.

Xing, L., Stanley, E. L., Bai, M., & Blackburn, D. C. (2018). “The earliest direct evidence of frogs in wet tropical forests from Cretaceous Burmese amber”. Scientific reports, 8(1), 8770.

[alphynix]

Almost-Living Fossils Month #05 -- Cryptic Choristoderes

The choristoderes were a group of aquatic reptiles that mostly inhabited freshwater environments. Known mainly from North America, Europe, and Asia, they first appeared in the fossil record in the Late Triassic (~205 mya) -- although their lineage could potentially go back further than that -- and they varied in appearance from large long-snouted croc-like creatures to more lizard-like and miniature plesiosaur-like forms.

Many them were fully aquatic and spent their entire lives in the water, with some developing the ability to give live birth and others returning to land only to lay eggs (with only females having well-developed enough limbs to be able to haul themselves out onto shore). In some places their fossils are incredibly common, with every life stage represented from babies to adults (even one with two heads!), and yet despite having such detailed knowledge of their lives we still don’t know exactly what type of reptile they actually were.

Their evolutionary origins and relationships are very unclear, with the only real certainly being that they’re at least diapsids. They’re often classified as either archosauromorphs (closer related to crocodilians and dinosaurs/birds) or as lepidosauromorphs (closer related to lizards), but they could also be a much earlier separate branch of the reptile family tree.

Some of the large crocodilian-like neochoristoderes survived into the Cenozoic and initially did quite well for themselves -- even outcompeting actual crocodilians in the northern continents for a while -- but then they seem to have fallen victim to the cooling and drying climate of the Eocene-Oligocene extinction about 33 million years ago.

But that wasn’t the end of the choristodere lineage just yet.

A small number of fossils of a little choristodere named Lazarussuchus have been found in a few different places around Europe, with the youngest specimens dating to as recently as the Early Miocene (~20-16 mya). Surprisingly it wasn’t closely related to the neochoristoderes at all, but instead seems to have been part of a much older and more “primitive” branch of the choristodere family tree that must have been surviving since at least the mid-Jurassic with very little presence in the fossil record.

At about 30cm long (1′) it was less aquatic than most other choristoderes, with large claws that would have given it good traction on land and a more generalized lizard-like body plan. One specimen even preserves soft tissue impressions, showing that its toes lacked webbing and that it had a low crest running along its tail.

Its lack of specialization may have been the reason for its longer survival, being able to adapt to a wider variety of environments compared to its more water-reliant cousins.

It’s unclear exactly how much closer to present day these rare last choristoderes survived. If they managed to make it through the mid-Miocene extinction then they might potentially have persisted until the onset of the Pleistocene Ice Age 2.5 million years ago -- but their fossils are scarce enough that we’ll probably never know for certain.

[toastling]

Dragons

The Drakan race, colloquially known as dragons, are an ancient and varied species that predates our own by several hundred thousand years. The first known intelligent life on the planet, they were the dominant life forms up until the emergence of human civilization around 15,000 years ago.

Accounts from this time are few and far-between outside of Drakan sources, but according to these sources, the dragons initially tried to coexist peacefully with homo sapiens. Unfortunately, it was not to be. Learning magic by observing the dragons, humans used their own art against them and began driving them out of their cities and territories, claiming their land for our own.

Though we have existed in conflict longer than we’ve coexisted, today, in a post-war world, tensions between humans and dragons are at an all-time low. They live among us in our cities and have largely come out of hiding in an attempt to undo the damage done by D’aagor and to bridge the gap between us. But there remains a long history of violence and genocide that cannot be ignored.

Because of this history, most dragons are still wary of humans, even while living alongside us - and rightfully so. While they are considered a fringe minority, there still exist radical groups who are staunchly ‘pro-human’, and by extension, anti-dragon, practicing acts of violence and terrorism against our sibling species. Similarly, there remain dragons who believe D’aagor was right that we cannot be trusted, and who think our two species should remain separated or who would like to visit some of the pain we inflicted on them in their past on us.

Though the situation appears stable on the surface, events like the Morning Star Massacre serve as a constant reminder that there is still a lot of hate between us and that a utopian society where dragons and humans live together in harmony is still not yet within our grasp. Though great strides have been made, there is still work to be done.

As a species, dragons did not evolve from dinosaurs, but rather from other proto-reptiles sometime during the late Triassic Period. As they have existed longer than us, they are also more advanced than us. However, while we humans rely heavily on our cleverness and our use of tools and technology to survive, the dragons have managed to get by primarily by using magic.

Though they are not technologically inept, and they have some surprisingly advanced scientific knowledge, dragons are the progenitors of all known magical art forms, and are more inclined to the magical arts than humans by nature. Though some ancient accounts of the Drakan people seem to indicate that this may be a manufactured trait, or at least one they expanded on artificially at some point in their species’ past.

Dragons can survive in a wide array of different climates, and are capable of tolerating extremes in temperature and habitat far beyond what any human could withstand. They can be found living anywhere from the bowels of volcanoes to the frozen tundras of the antarctic, managing a comfortable existence even when food or resources are seemingly scarce by way of their magic.

If their claims are to be believed, the Drakan people did a good deal of genetic engineering to their benefit in the past, and the result of this is that they are a more hardy species than they perhaps otherwise would’ve been. And, for whatever they cannot tolerate, they have their magic to fall back on to protect or support them.

Dragons are also a social species, much like humans, and rarely live alone. Wherever you find one dragon, you will likely find more, and families tend to share the same nest across multiple generations. In fact, it’s actually somewhat rare for a dragon to move out of its family nest and into one that belongs to them alone, outside of mates, who are given the option to share nests or to leave and start their own. These days, many dragons elect to share one nest, but this is gradually beginning to change - especially for dragons who have chosen to live in human cities.

Perhaps the most notable thing about dragons, however, is the wide variety of shapes and sizes that they come in. While some of it can be chalked up to adaption and evolution, DNA analysis indicates that while all dragons share enough genetic material now to reproduce with one another without issue regardless of race, these multiple different races may actually be more closely approximated to subspecies. And for some of them, it would appear that their evolutionary ancestors are completely separate entities.

Dragons, then, are a more varied species, genetically speaking, than humans. Because of this, the differences between them can be more than superficial. But, they seem to be better off for this. They are highly adaptable and continue to evolve to this day, just as we do, though in the case of the dragons, this evolution may be more directed by their own hand than nature’s.

Some dragons today even have a sizable chunk of human DNA in their genome, sizable enough that they are able to not only freely shapeshift into us, but reproduce with us, resulting in halflings - an entirely new species distinct from both humans and dragons, but capable of intermingling with either and transforming into either - be it partially or completely - at will.

This human DNA was artificially inserted into their genome fairly recently - during sometime in the late middle ages - in order to help them better blend in among humans and escape persecution. Dragons with this human DNA in their genome are known as ‘Shifters’, and comprise about 40% of all modern day dragons. They are considered to be a new, separate race within the Drakan species, but one which can have the defining traits of any of the other 9 known races.

The current King of Dragons, Sirus Albion, monarch of the Aldarian Empire (the last known Drakan superpower), is a Shifter, and an outspoken proponent for the rights of Shifters within Drakan communities. Until fairly recently, Shifters were seen as traitors to the species, and while they were not met with violence, the opinion of Shifters has historically been rather poor, and they have been treated by purebloods as second-class citizens. This began to change sometime around the mid 1800′s, however, and today, they are seen as being just as dragon as any other race within their rather expansive species.

The lifespan of a dragon greatly dwarfs that of a human, with the oldest known dragons having lived to be over 2500 years old. This upper age limit appears to be universal across all their races, and taking all 10 into account, lifespans tend to average out at around 1800 years. Because of this, dragon culture is remarkably slow to change from a human perspective, while from a dragon’s perspective, human culture moves at a breakneck pace. This has only served to complicate matters when it comes to coexistence.

As far as magic is concerned, all dragons have ‘mana pools’ far greater than that of all but the most extraordinary human mages, but as a trade off, most dragons are limited to magic that is confined to a singular ‘element’. There are 5 basic elements - Earth, Air, Fire, Water, and Lightning - but some dragons have elements unique to them or their bloodlines, including the likes of Smoke or Magma. What these elements boil down to is ultimately a limitation on the kind of magic a dragon can freely perform.

The most common magic a dragon can use is called ‘breath magic’, and would be consist of the likes of breathing fire or causing earthquakes with their cries. Though magic can be performed that doesn’t belong to any of the elements, as compared to human mages, dragons have a more difficult time performing these. So typically, dragons require more time, focus, and mana to perform something like a teleportation spell or to create a non-elemental energy construct than a human would.

To help get around this, most dragons try to work these spells into their elements somehow - such as a teleportation spell that allows them to warp around through fire or water-covered surfaces - to enhance utility. But they can also create spells that they can program into crystals colloquially referred to as Draconite.

Draconite is any gem or crystal used by the dragons to perform magic. They serve a wide variety of uses and can come in a wide variety of types, shapes, and sizes, just like the dragons themselves. They can be common quartz or rare precious stones. By manipulating their internal structures with their mana, they are able to turn crystals and gems into magical circuits that can memorize and instant cast any spell programmed into it. Each gem or crystal can only know and perform one spell, but will have a much easier time with it than a dragon and will cast it at no cost to a dragon’s mana.

Most dragon cities rely heavily on draconite to exist, with the Kingdom of Aldaron, capital city of the dragons, using it to keep a good chunk of its structures floating in the sky above as opposed to on or in the ground. Draconite also doesn’t need any external magical input to cast their spells, unless they are specifically programmed to work that way. Instead, most gems and crystals are constantly casting some permanent or passive effect that is self-sustained by energy generated by the gems or crystals themselves.

This energy is not infinite, however, and eventually, it will run out. When this happens, a new draconite gem or crystal will have to be introduced to continue the effect, much like changing the battery in a piece of technology.

[andreagillmer]

Golden Triangle a Bright Spot in Gold Exploration

Source: Streetwise Reports   10/09/2018

With gold prices moving sideways, the Golden Triangle of British Columbia—and several companies exploring there—continue to provide a bright spot for gold exploration.

Three different gold rushes and some of Canada’s greatest mines have been found on the Golden Triangle, located just inland from the Alaska Panhandle.

The mines include Premier, Snip and Eskay Creek. Other significant and well known deposits located within the Triangle include Brucejack, Galore Creek, Copper Canyon, Schaft Creek, KSM, Granduc and Red Chris.

Rick Mills of Ahead of the Herd noted, “After decades of productive mining and some big discoveries, the Golden Triangle went dormant. Isolated from major infrastructure, the area was expensive to conduct sampling, surveys and drill programs in, and due to its harsh winter climate, was only accessible for half a year. Not much news came out of the Golden Triangle during the 1990s and 2000s. When gold prices weakened to about $400 an ounce, several mines shut down, unable to make a decent margin against fixed costs.”

Over 130 million ounces of gold, 800 million ounces of silver and 40 billion pounds of copper have been found in the area, but experts believe this is only the tip of the iceberg.

“The BC Geological Survey database has identified over 900 mineral occurrences, 67 of which have documented mineral resources,” said Mills. “Lately there has been a resurgence of interest in the Golden Triangle, with something of a staking rush going on there as juniors position themselves for the next discovery hole. So what changed? The excitement is being driven by five factors.”

These factors, according to Mills, are:

New Deposits: Pretium Resources Inc. (PVG:TSX; PVG:NYSE), Seabridge Gold Inc. (SEA:TSX; SA:NYSE.MKT) and Imperial Metals Corp. (III:TSX) all made multimillion pound strikes.

New Infrastructure: “New road and power infrastructure built by the British Columbia (BC) government includes the paving of the Stewart-Cassiar Highway north from Smithers; port facilities for export of concentrate opened at the town of Stewart; and most importantly, a $700 million high voltage transmission line to bring power to mining properties previously inaccessible to the grid and reliant on diesel-powered portable generators,” according to Mills.

Declining Snow Cover: The retreat of glaciers reveal rocks never before seen.

New Geological Theory: A new twist is that most of the Golden Triangle’s deposits are found within a few kilometers of a contact zone (Triassic-Jurassic unconformity).

Higher Gold Prices: Low gold prices shut down several operating mines in the Golden Triangle during the 1990s and early 2000s, and also squelched exploration. “Since then a tripling of gold prices has injected gold fever back into the area, and combined with a new geological theory and the above factors, breathed new life into the possibility of discoverers hitting the next Valley of the Kings or KSM,” Mills asserted.

Against this backdrop, gold explorers including Golden Ridge Resources Ltd. (GLDN:TSX.V), Aben Resources Ltd. (ABN:TSX.V; ABNAF:OTCQB) and GT Gold Corp. (GTT:TSX.V) continue to report impressive results.

Mike Blady, CEO of Golden Ridge Resources, said its recent discoveries in the heart of the Golden Triangle set the company apart from the crowd.

“We are one of the few companies to make a new discovery this year, so that sets us apart from the rest of the companies in the area,” Blady told Streetwise Reports. “We discovered a new gold-copper porphyry called the Williams Zone that was discovered by our team using geophysics and geochemistry, and we confirmed it with drilling.”

The company acquired the Williams Zone property in 2014 from Barrick Gold Corp. (ABX:TSX; ABX:NYSE) and performed an aerial survey of the area in 2015.

“So it all started back in 2014, there was an airborne survey flown on the project in 2015, which found a single point anomaly on the north side of the project,” Blady noted. “Single point anomalies generally turn out to be nothing,” but subsequent exploration confirmed the company had struck pay dirt.

“In 2016, we did some reconnaissance geochemistry on that part of the property and were pleasantly surprised with a strong copper-gold anomaly. The following we year we came back and used ground-based geophysics to further delineate the Williams zone. The anomaly was covered with overburden and dense forest, so our next move was to strip back the overburden by hand and sample the bedrock, which turned out to be the first rock samples ever taken from the Williams zone,” Blady said.

“The first Williams Zone hole was the culmination of the last three years of slow, methodical exploration work that led to the success we had: HNK-18-001, 327 meters grading 0.31% copper, 0.35 g/t gold, 1.94 g/t silver, which we released on August 14. An initial discovery hole of this magnitude is very exciting for our geologic team and company. Deposits in the Golden Triangle need to be large and high grade to be of economic value; this discovery is a huge step in the right direction.”

In September, Golden Ridge announced its drilling continues to intersect broad intervals of copper-gold mineralization at Williams, with holes HNK-18-005 and HNK-18-002 intersecting similar geology to HNK-18-001: 326 meters grading 0.36 g/t gold, 0.29% copper and 1.92 g/t silver for HNK-18-005 and 276.15 meters grading 0.31% copper, 0.24 g/t gold and 2.33 g/t silver on HNK-18-002.

Chris Paul, vice president of exploration for Golden Ridge, noted, “The continuity of grade and thickness at the Williams Zone is very encouraging, as are the increasing grades toward the east. The abrupt change in grade across the fault to the east suggests a portion of the high grade has been displaced, possibly downwards, and the true thickness and grade of the Williams is yet to be seen.”

Golden Ridge is also conducting Induced Polarization (IP) surveys, and in late August reported successful results.

“The IP survey successfully delineated a strong chargeability anomaly which is coincident with the porphyry mineralization drilled in the Williams Zone in 2018,” stated the company. “Two 3-km-long IP lines were completed during the Phase I survey and the anomaly is open along strike to the north and south and at depth.”

The company noted that the data shows “high chargeability values at the Williams Zone which merge with high to very high chargeability values in the Lower Alteration Zone (LAZ), suggesting connectivity of the two zones.”

As for what is the next step in Golden Ridge’s exploration plans, Chris Paul stated, “The results so far have been excellent and once all the IP data, assays and geology are compiled, we plan to design additional step-out drill holes and continue targeting the extensions of the system along strike and at depth in the next phase of drilling.”

Meanwhile, several other companies are reporting significant strikes in the Golden Triangle.

Aben Resources reported it had discovered the South Boundary Zone of its Forrest Kerr Golden Triangle project, and in late August provided an update on its exploration drill program currently underway at the property.

The company announced it had intersected mineralization 1.5 km south of the North Boundary Zone in the newly discovered South Boundary Zone area.

The majority of drilling has taken place at the North Boundary area, the location of high-grade precious and base metal mineralization discovered in 2017 drill holes, as well as the site of the first reported drill hole of 2018. Hole FK18-10 “has four separate high-grade zones with the best zone returning an interval of 38.7 g/t Au over 10.0m including 62.4 g/t Au over 6.0m starting at 114 meters downhole.”

“This new discovery of mineralization 1.5km south of the North Boundary Zone is a major development for the Company and further highlights the robust discovery potential at the Forrest Kerr Project,” said Jim Pettit, president and CEO of Aben Resources. “The mineralizing system at the property is apparently widespread and well-developed with high-grade mineralization being discovered at shallow depths over a large area. We believe we have only just scratched the surface at the newly discovered North and South Boundary Zones and an expanded drill program is currently underway with assays pending for most of the holes drilled to date.”

Aben has followed up with the announcement that an eight-hole stepout drill program at the North Boundary Zone intersected “shallow, high-grade gold mineralization” and included highlights of 5.08 g/t Au over 12.0m in hole FK18-12; 23.3 g/t Au over 2.0m in hole FK18-13; and 10.62 g/t Au over 3.0m in hole FK18-17.

The company also noted that so far it has received assay results for about 3,000 meters out of a total of 10,000 meters of drilling conducted this season.

GT Gold Corp. (GTT) has also been announcing summer drill results. On Sept. 10, GT Gold reported the discovery of a major new gold-copper-silver porphyry at the Saddle North target on the Tatogga property.

“Commencing at just 79 metres down-hole, hole TTD085, the first Saddle North hole of the 2018 season, intersected a very broad interval of sheeted vein, vein stockwork and disseminated style Au-Cu-Ag mineralization, centered on a monzodiorite intrusion with common strong potassic alteration,” the company stated.

Charles Greig, vice-president of exploration for GT Gold, commented, “These terrific hole 85 results, and visual intercepts in holes 90, 93 and now hole 98, indicate possibly the most important new copper-gold-silver porphyry discovery in the northern part of the Golden Triangle since the discovery of the nearby Red Chris deposit, which is within sight of our property. The scale and grade of the Saddle North intrusion is outstanding, and we believe the best of it is intact, at surface beneath thin glacial sediments, and to depth.”

“We see tremendous upside for expansion, and again, as was the case with Red Chris, further grade increases at depth. The Company now has enviable options before it: near-surface bulk-tonnage and potential deep high-grade underground-style gold at Saddle South, coupled with a massive new copper-gold-silver porphyry system right next door,” Greig added.

According to the company, additional assays are pending, drilling is continuing, the system remains open along strike in both directions and at depth.

Earlier announcements involved the Saddle South target. On Sept. 4, GT Gold announced the continued rapid expansion of the Saddle South discovery, with new high-grade gold intercepts east, west, south and to depth along 1,000 meters of east-west trend and to 350 meters of north-south width.

Those intercepts included 9.55 g/t gold over 40.89 meters from 534.00 to 574.89 meters in hole TTD079.

And on August 8, the company reported the intersection of high-grade gold in stepout drilling both to the east and west of its 2017 Saddle South gold discovery and, additionally, the discovery of a new and deeper high-grade trend to the south.

“We are very pleased with the early success of the drill program at Saddle South this season,” said Steve Burleton, GT’s president and CEO. “All holes have hit mineralization as we step out to the east and west, and our deep drilling encountered high grades and strong widths along a new and well-mineralized trend not far south and east of the area drilled in 2017. . .We look forward to further demonstrating the true potential of the Saddle discovery area—both North and South.”

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Aben Resources Ltd.

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Disclosure: 1) John McPhaul compiled this article for Streetwise Reports LLC and provides services to Streetwise reports as an employee. He or members of his household own securities of the following companies mentioned in the article: None. He or members of his household are paid by the following companies mentioned in this article: None. 2) The following companies mentioned in this article are billboard sponsors of Streetwise Reports: Aben Resources, Pretium Resources and Seabridge Gold. Click here for important disclosures about sponsor fees. As of the date of this article, an affiliate of Streetwise Reports has a consulting relationship with Golden Ridge Resources. Please click here for more information. 3) Comments and opinions expressed are those of the specific experts and not of Streetwise Reports or its officers. The information provided above is for informational purposes only and is not a recommendation to buy or sell any security. 4) The article does not constitute investment advice. Each reader is encouraged to consult with his or her individual financial professional and any action a reader takes as a result of information presented here is his or her own responsibility. By opening this page, each reader accepts and agrees to Streetwise Reports’ terms of use and full legal disclaimer. This article is not a solicitation for investment. Streetwise Reports does not render general or specific investment advice and the information on Streetwise Reports should not be considered a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Streetwise Reports does not endorse or recommend the business, products, services or securities of any company mentioned on Streetwise Reports. 5) From time to time, Streetwise Reports LLC and its directors, officers, employees or members of their families, as well as persons interviewed for articles and interviews on the site, may have a long or short position in securities mentioned. Directors, officers, employees or members of their immediate families are prohibited from making purchases and/or sales of those securities in the open market or otherwise from the time of the interview or the decision to write an article, until one week after the publication of the interview or article. As of the date of this article, officers and/or employees of Streetwise Reports LLC (including members of their household) own securities of Golden Ridge Resources, Pretium Resources and Aben Resources, companies mentioned in this article.

( Companies Mentioned: ABN:TSX.V; ABNAF:OTCQB, GLDN:TSX.V, GTT:TSX.V, )

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[goldcoins0]

Golden Triangle a Bright Spot in Gold Exploration

Source: Streetwise Reports   10/09/2018

With gold prices moving sideways, the Golden Triangle of British Columbia—and several companies exploring there—continue to provide a bright spot for gold exploration.

Three different gold rushes and some of Canada's greatest mines have been found on the Golden Triangle, located just inland from the Alaska Panhandle.

The mines include Premier, Snip and Eskay Creek. Other significant and well known deposits located within the Triangle include Brucejack, Galore Creek, Copper Canyon, Schaft Creek, KSM, Granduc and Red Chris.

Rick Mills of Ahead of the Herd noted, "After decades of productive mining and some big discoveries, the Golden Triangle went dormant. Isolated from major infrastructure, the area was expensive to conduct sampling, surveys and drill programs in, and due to its harsh winter climate, was only accessible for half a year. Not much news came out of the Golden Triangle during the 1990s and 2000s. When gold prices weakened to about $400 an ounce, several mines shut down, unable to make a decent margin against fixed costs."

Over 130 million ounces of gold, 800 million ounces of silver and 40 billion pounds of copper have been found in the area, but experts believe this is only the tip of the iceberg.

"The BC Geological Survey database has identified over 900 mineral occurrences, 67 of which have documented mineral resources," said Mills. "Lately there has been a resurgence of interest in the Golden Triangle, with something of a staking rush going on there as juniors position themselves for the next discovery hole. So what changed? The excitement is being driven by five factors."

These factors, according to Mills, are:

New Deposits: Pretium Resources Inc. (PVG:TSX; PVG:NYSE), Seabridge Gold Inc. (SEA:TSX; SA:NYSE.MKT) and Imperial Metals Corp. (III:TSX) all made multimillion pound strikes.

New Infrastructure: "New road and power infrastructure built by the British Columbia (BC) government includes the paving of the Stewart-Cassiar Highway north from Smithers; port facilities for export of concentrate opened at the town of Stewart; and most importantly, a $700 million high voltage transmission line to bring power to mining properties previously inaccessible to the grid and reliant on diesel-powered portable generators," according to Mills.

Declining Snow Cover: The retreat of glaciers reveal rocks never before seen.

New Geological Theory: A new twist is that most of the Golden Triangle's deposits are found within a few kilometers of a contact zone (Triassic-Jurassic unconformity).

Higher Gold Prices: Low gold prices shut down several operating mines in the Golden Triangle during the 1990s and early 2000s, and also squelched exploration. "Since then a tripling of gold prices has injected gold fever back into the area, and combined with a new geological theory and the above factors, breathed new life into the possibility of discoverers hitting the next Valley of the Kings or KSM," Mills asserted.

Against this backdrop, gold explorers including Golden Ridge Resources Ltd. (GLDN:TSX.V), Aben Resources Ltd. (ABN:TSX.V; ABNAF:OTCQB) and GT Gold Corp. (GTT:TSX.V) continue to report impressive results.

Mike Blady, CEO of Golden Ridge Resources, said its recent discoveries in the heart of the Golden Triangle set the company apart from the crowd.

"We are one of the few companies to make a new discovery this year, so that sets us apart from the rest of the companies in the area," Blady told Streetwise Reports. "We discovered a new gold-copper porphyry called the Williams Zone that was discovered by our team using geophysics and geochemistry, and we confirmed it with drilling."

The company acquired the Williams Zone property in 2014 from Barrick Gold Corp. (ABX:TSX; ABX:NYSE) and performed an aerial survey of the area in 2015.

"So it all started back in 2014, there was an airborne survey flown on the project in 2015, which found a single point anomaly on the north side of the project," Blady noted. "Single point anomalies generally turn out to be nothing," but subsequent exploration confirmed the company had struck pay dirt.

"In 2016, we did some reconnaissance geochemistry on that part of the property and were pleasantly surprised with a strong copper-gold anomaly. The following we year we came back and used ground-based geophysics to further delineate the Williams zone. The anomaly was covered with overburden and dense forest, so our next move was to strip back the overburden by hand and sample the bedrock, which turned out to be the first rock samples ever taken from the Williams zone," Blady said.

"The first Williams Zone hole was the culmination of the last three years of slow, methodical exploration work that led to the success we had: HNK-18-001, 327 meters grading 0.31% copper, 0.35 g/t gold, 1.94 g/t silver, which we released on August 14. An initial discovery hole of this magnitude is very exciting for our geologic team and company. Deposits in the Golden Triangle need to be large and high grade to be of economic value; this discovery is a huge step in the right direction.”

In September, Golden Ridge announced its drilling continues to intersect broad intervals of copper-gold mineralization at Williams, with holes HNK-18-005 and HNK-18-002 intersecting similar geology to HNK-18-001: 326 meters grading 0.36 g/t gold, 0.29% copper and 1.92 g/t silver for HNK-18-005 and 276.15 meters grading 0.31% copper, 0.24 g/t gold and 2.33 g/t silver on HNK-18-002.

Chris Paul, vice president of exploration for Golden Ridge, noted, "The continuity of grade and thickness at the Williams Zone is very encouraging, as are the increasing grades toward the east. The abrupt change in grade across the fault to the east suggests a portion of the high grade has been displaced, possibly downwards, and the true thickness and grade of the Williams is yet to be seen."

Golden Ridge is also conducting Induced Polarization (IP) surveys, and in late August reported successful results.

"The IP survey successfully delineated a strong chargeability anomaly which is coincident with the porphyry mineralization drilled in the Williams Zone in 2018," stated the company. "Two 3-km-long IP lines were completed during the Phase I survey and the anomaly is open along strike to the north and south and at depth."

The company noted that the data shows "high chargeability values at the Williams Zone which merge with high to very high chargeability values in the Lower Alteration Zone (LAZ), suggesting connectivity of the two zones."

As for what is the next step in Golden Ridge's exploration plans, Chris Paul stated, "The results so far have been excellent and once all the IP data, assays and geology are compiled, we plan to design additional step-out drill holes and continue targeting the extensions of the system along strike and at depth in the next phase of drilling."

Meanwhile, several other companies are reporting significant strikes in the Golden Triangle.

Aben Resources reported it had discovered the South Boundary Zone of its Forrest Kerr Golden Triangle project, and in late August provided an update on its exploration drill program currently underway at the property.

The company announced it had intersected mineralization 1.5 km south of the North Boundary Zone in the newly discovered South Boundary Zone area.

The majority of drilling has taken place at the North Boundary area, the location of high-grade precious and base metal mineralization discovered in 2017 drill holes, as well as the site of the first reported drill hole of 2018. Hole FK18-10 "has four separate high-grade zones with the best zone returning an interval of 38.7 g/t Au over 10.0m including 62.4 g/t Au over 6.0m starting at 114 meters downhole."

"This new discovery of mineralization 1.5km south of the North Boundary Zone is a major development for the Company and further highlights the robust discovery potential at the Forrest Kerr Project," said Jim Pettit, president and CEO of Aben Resources. "The mineralizing system at the property is apparently widespread and well-developed with high-grade mineralization being discovered at shallow depths over a large area. We believe we have only just scratched the surface at the newly discovered North and South Boundary Zones and an expanded drill program is currently underway with assays pending for most of the holes drilled to date."

Aben has followed up with the announcement that an eight-hole stepout drill program at the North Boundary Zone intersected "shallow, high-grade gold mineralization" and included highlights of 5.08 g/t Au over 12.0m in hole FK18-12; 23.3 g/t Au over 2.0m in hole FK18-13; and 10.62 g/t Au over 3.0m in hole FK18-17.

The company also noted that so far it has received assay results for about 3,000 meters out of a total of 10,000 meters of drilling conducted this season.

GT Gold Corp. (GTT) has also been announcing summer drill results. On Sept. 10, GT Gold reported the discovery of a major new gold-copper-silver porphyry at the Saddle North target on the Tatogga property.

"Commencing at just 79 metres down-hole, hole TTD085, the first Saddle North hole of the 2018 season, intersected a very broad interval of sheeted vein, vein stockwork and disseminated style Au-Cu-Ag mineralization, centered on a monzodiorite intrusion with common strong potassic alteration," the company stated.

Charles Greig, vice-president of exploration for GT Gold, commented, "These terrific hole 85 results, and visual intercepts in holes 90, 93 and now hole 98, indicate possibly the most important new copper-gold-silver porphyry discovery in the northern part of the Golden Triangle since the discovery of the nearby Red Chris deposit, which is within sight of our property. The scale and grade of the Saddle North intrusion is outstanding, and we believe the best of it is intact, at surface beneath thin glacial sediments, and to depth."

"We see tremendous upside for expansion, and again, as was the case with Red Chris, further grade increases at depth. The Company now has enviable options before it: near-surface bulk-tonnage and potential deep high-grade underground-style gold at Saddle South, coupled with a massive new copper-gold-silver porphyry system right next door," Greig added.

According to the company, additional assays are pending, drilling is continuing, the system remains open along strike in both directions and at depth.

Earlier announcements involved the Saddle South target. On Sept. 4, GT Gold announced the continued rapid expansion of the Saddle South discovery, with new high-grade gold intercepts east, west, south and to depth along 1,000 meters of east-west trend and to 350 meters of north-south width.

Those intercepts included 9.55 g/t gold over 40.89 meters from 534.00 to 574.89 meters in hole TTD079.

And on August 8, the company reported the intersection of high-grade gold in stepout drilling both to the east and west of its 2017 Saddle South gold discovery and, additionally, the discovery of a new and deeper high-grade trend to the south.

"We are very pleased with the early success of the drill program at Saddle South this season," said Steve Burleton, GT's president and CEO. "All holes have hit mineralization as we step out to the east and west, and our deep drilling encountered high grades and strong widths along a new and well-mineralized trend not far south and east of the area drilled in 2017. . .We look forward to further demonstrating the true potential of the Saddle discovery area—both North and South."

Read what other experts are saying about:

Aben Resources Ltd.

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Disclosure: 1) John McPhaul compiled this article for Streetwise Reports LLC and provides services to Streetwise reports as an employee. He or members of his household own securities of the following companies mentioned in the article: None. He or members of his household are paid by the following companies mentioned in this article: None. 2) The following companies mentioned in this article are billboard sponsors of Streetwise Reports: Aben Resources, Pretium Resources and Seabridge Gold. Click here for important disclosures about sponsor fees. As of the date of this article, an affiliate of Streetwise Reports has a consulting relationship with Golden Ridge Resources. Please click here for more information. 3) Comments and opinions expressed are those of the specific experts and not of Streetwise Reports or its officers. The information provided above is for informational purposes only and is not a recommendation to buy or sell any security. 4) The article does not constitute investment advice. Each reader is encouraged to consult with his or her individual financial professional and any action a reader takes as a result of information presented here is his or her own responsibility. By opening this page, each reader accepts and agrees to Streetwise Reports' terms of use and full legal disclaimer. This article is not a solicitation for investment. Streetwise Reports does not render general or specific investment advice and the information on Streetwise Reports should not be considered a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Streetwise Reports does not endorse or recommend the business, products, services or securities of any company mentioned on Streetwise Reports. 5) From time to time, Streetwise Reports LLC and its directors, officers, employees or members of their families, as well as persons interviewed for articles and interviews on the site, may have a long or short position in securities mentioned. Directors, officers, employees or members of their immediate families are prohibited from making purchases and/or sales of those securities in the open market or otherwise from the time of the interview or the decision to write an article, until one week after the publication of the interview or article. As of the date of this article, officers and/or employees of Streetwise Reports LLC (including members of their household) own securities of Golden Ridge Resources, Pretium Resources and Aben Resources, companies mentioned in this article.

( Companies Mentioned: ABN:TSX.V; ABNAF:OTCQB, GLDN:TSX.V, GTT:TSX.V, )

from https://www.streetwisereports.com/article/2018/10/09/golden-triangle-a-bright-spot-in-gold-exploration.html

[phooll123]

Jupiter and Venus Change Earth's Orbit Every 405,000 Years

It is a well-known fact among Earth scientists that our planet periodically undergoes major changes in its climate. Over the course of the past 200 million years, our planet has experienced four major geological periods (the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous and Cenozoic) and one major ice age (the Pliocene-Quaternary glaciation), all of which had a drastic impact on plant and animal life, as well as effecting the course of species evolution. For decades, geologists have also understood that these changes are due in part to gradual shifts in the Earth’s orbit, which are caused by Venus and Jupiter, and repeat regularly every 405,000 years. But it was not until recently that a team of geologists and Earth scientists unearthed the first evidence of these changes– sediments and rock core samples that provide a geological record of how and when these changes took place. The study which describes their findings, titled “Empirical evidence for stability of the 405-kiloyear Jupiter–Venus eccentricity cycle over hundreds of millions of years”, recently appeared in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA. The study was led by Dennis V. Bent, a, a Board of Governors professor from Rutgers University–New Brunswick, and included members from the Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory, the Berkeley Geochronology Center, the Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona, and multiple universities.

Professor Dennis Kent with part of a 1,700-foot-long rock core obtained from Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona. Credit: Nick Romanenko/Rutgers University

As noted, the idea that Earth experiences periodic changes in its climate (which are related to changes in its orbit) has been understood for almost a century. These changes consist of Milankovitch Cycles, which consist of a 100,000-year cycle in the eccentricity of Earth’s orbit, a 41,000-year cycle in the tilt of Earth’s axis relative to its orbital plane,  and a 21,000-year cycle caused by changes in the planet’s axis. Combined with the 405,000-year swing, which is the result of Venus and Jupiter’s gravitational influence, these shifts cause changes in how much solar energy reaches parts of our planet, which in turn influences Earth’s climate. Based on fossil records, these cycles are also known to have had a profound impact on life on Earth, which likely had an effect on the course of species of evolution. As Prof. Bent explained in a Rutgers Today press release:

“The climate cycles are directly related to how Earth orbits the sun and slight variations in sunlight reaching Earth lead to climate and ecological changes. The Earth’s orbit changes from close to perfectly circular to about 5 percent elongated especially every 405,000 years.”

For the sake of their study, Prof. Kent and his colleagues obtained sediment samples from the Newark basin, a prehistoric lake that spanned most of New Jersey, and a core rock sample from the Chinle Formation in Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona. This core rock measured about 518 meters (1700 feet) long, 6.35 cm (2.5 inches) in diameter, and was dated to the Triassic Period – ca. 202 to 253 million years ago.

Within ancient rocks in Arizona’s Petrified Forest National Park, scientists have identified signs of a regular variation in Earth’s orbit that influences climate. Credit: Kevin Krajick/Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory

The team then linked reversals in Earth’s magnetic field – where the north and south pole shift – to sediments with and without zircons (minerals with uranium that allow for radioactive dating) as well as to climate cycles in the geological record. What these showed was that the 405,000-years cycle is the most regular astronomical pattern linked to Earth’s annual orbit around the Sun. The results further indicated that the cycle been stable for hundreds of millions of years and is still active today. As Prof. Kent explained, this constitutes the first verifiable evidence that celestial mechanics have played a historic role in natural shifts in Earth’s climate. As Prof. Kent indicated:

“It’s an astonishing result because this long cycle, which had been predicted from planetary motions through about 50 million years ago, has been confirmed through at least 215 million years ago. Scientists can now link changes in the climate, environment, dinosaurs, mammals and fossils around the world to this 405,000-year cycle in a very precise way.”

Previously, astronomers were able to calculate this cycle reliably back to around 50 million years, but found that the problem became too complex prior to this because too many shifting motions came into play. “There are other, shorter, orbital cycles, but when you look into the past, it’s very difficult to know which one you’re dealing with at any one time, because they change over time,” said Prof. Kent. “The beauty of this one is that it stands alone. It doesn’t change. All the other ones move over it.”

The super-continent Pangaea during the Permian period (300 – 250 million years ago). Credit: NAU Geology/Ron Blakey

In addition, scientists were unable to obtain accurate dates as to when Earth’s magnetic field reversed for 30 million years of the Late Triassic – between ca. 201.3 and 237 million years ago. This was a crucial period for the evolution of terrestrial life because it was when the Supercontinent of Pangaea broke up, and also when the dinosaurs and mammals first appeared. This break-up led to the formation of the Atlantic Ocean as the continents drifted apart and coincided with a mass extinction event by the end of the period that effected the dinosaurs. With this new evidence, geologists, paleontologists and Earth scientists will be able to develop very precise timelines and accurately categorize fossil evidence dated to this period, which show differences and similarities over wide-ranging areas. This research, and the ability to create accurate geological and climatological timelines that go back over 200 million years, is sure to have drastic implications. Not only will climate studies benefit from it, but also our understanding of how life, and even how our Solar System, evolved. What emerges from this could include a better understanding of how life could emerge in other star systems. After all, if our search for extra-solar life life comes down to what we know about life on Earth, knowing more about how it evolved here will better the odds of finding it out there.

 By Matt Williams  -          Matt Williams is the Curator of Universe Today's Guide to Space. He is also a freelance writer, a science fiction author and a Taekwon-Do instructor. He lives with his family on Vancouver Island in beautiful British Columbia.

Earth, Featured, geological record, geological timeline, Jupiter, milankovitch cycles, pangaea, Venus

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[andreagillmer]

Golden Triangle a Bright Spot in Gold Exploration

Source: Streetwise Reports   10/09/2018

With gold prices moving sideways, the Golden Triangle of British Columbia—and several companies exploring there—continue to provide a bright spot for gold exploration.

Three different gold rushes and some of Canada's greatest mines have been found on the Golden Triangle, located just inland from the Alaska Panhandle.

The mines include Premier, Snip and Eskay Creek. Other significant and well known deposits located within the Triangle include Brucejack, Galore Creek, Copper Canyon, Schaft Creek, KSM, Granduc and Red Chris.

Rick Mills of Ahead of the Herd noted, "After decades of productive mining and some big discoveries, the Golden Triangle went dormant. Isolated from major infrastructure, the area was expensive to conduct sampling, surveys and drill programs in, and due to its harsh winter climate, was only accessible for half a year. Not much news came out of the Golden Triangle during the 1990s and 2000s. When gold prices weakened to about $400 an ounce, several mines shut down, unable to make a decent margin against fixed costs."

Over 130 million ounces of gold, 800 million ounces of silver and 40 billion pounds of copper have been found in the area, but experts believe this is only the tip of the iceberg.

"The BC Geological Survey database has identified over 900 mineral occurrences, 67 of which have documented mineral resources," said Mills. "Lately there has been a resurgence of interest in the Golden Triangle, with something of a staking rush going on there as juniors position themselves for the next discovery hole. So what changed? The excitement is being driven by five factors."

These factors, according to Mills, are:

New Deposits: Pretium Resources Inc. (PVG:TSX; PVG:NYSE), Seabridge Gold Inc. (SEA:TSX; SA:NYSE.MKT) and Imperial Metals Corp. (III:TSX) all made multimillion pound strikes.

New Infrastructure: "New road and power infrastructure built by the British Columbia (BC) government includes the paving of the Stewart-Cassiar Highway north from Smithers; port facilities for export of concentrate opened at the town of Stewart; and most importantly, a $700 million high voltage transmission line to bring power to mining properties previously inaccessible to the grid and reliant on diesel-powered portable generators," according to Mills.

Declining Snow Cover: The retreat of glaciers reveal rocks never before seen.

New Geological Theory: A new twist is that most of the Golden Triangle's deposits are found within a few kilometers of a contact zone (Triassic-Jurassic unconformity).

Higher Gold Prices: Low gold prices shut down several operating mines in the Golden Triangle during the 1990s and early 2000s, and also squelched exploration. "Since then a tripling of gold prices has injected gold fever back into the area, and combined with a new geological theory and the above factors, breathed new life into the possibility of discoverers hitting the next Valley of the Kings or KSM," Mills asserted.

Against this backdrop, gold explorers including Golden Ridge Resources Ltd. (GLDN:TSX.V), Aben Resources Ltd. (ABN:TSX.V; ABNAF:OTCQB) and GT Gold Corp. (GTT:TSX.V) continue to report impressive results.

Mike Blady, CEO of Golden Ridge Resources, said its recent discoveries in the heart of the Golden Triangle set the company apart from the crowd.

"We are one of the few companies to make a new discovery this year, so that sets us apart from the rest of the companies in the area," Blady told Streetwise Reports. "We discovered a new gold-copper porphyry called the Williams Zone that was discovered by our team using geophysics and geochemistry, and we confirmed it with drilling."

The company acquired the Williams Zone property in 2014 from Barrick Gold Corp. (ABX:TSX; ABX:NYSE) and performed an aerial survey of the area in 2015.

"So it all started back in 2014, there was an airborne survey flown on the project in 2015, which found a single point anomaly on the north side of the project," Blady noted. "Single point anomalies generally turn out to be nothing," but subsequent exploration confirmed the company had struck pay dirt.

"In 2016, we did some reconnaissance geochemistry on that part of the property and were pleasantly surprised with a strong copper-gold anomaly. The following we year we came back and used ground-based geophysics to further delineate the Williams zone. The anomaly was covered with overburden and dense forest, so our next move was to strip back the overburden by hand and sample the bedrock, which turned out to be the first rock samples ever taken from the Williams zone," Blady said.

"The first Williams Zone hole was the culmination of the last three years of slow, methodical exploration work that led to the success we had: HNK-18-001, 327 meters grading 0.31% copper, 0.35 g/t gold, 1.94 g/t silver, which we released on August 14. An initial discovery hole of this magnitude is very exciting for our geologic team and company. Deposits in the Golden Triangle need to be large and high grade to be of economic value; this discovery is a huge step in the right direction.”

In September, Golden Ridge announced its drilling continues to intersect broad intervals of copper-gold mineralization at Williams, with holes HNK-18-005 and HNK-18-002 intersecting similar geology to HNK-18-001: 326 meters grading 0.36 g/t gold, 0.29% copper and 1.92 g/t silver for HNK-18-005 and 276.15 meters grading 0.31% copper, 0.24 g/t gold and 2.33 g/t silver on HNK-18-002.

Chris Paul, vice president of exploration for Golden Ridge, noted, "The continuity of grade and thickness at the Williams Zone is very encouraging, as are the increasing grades toward the east. The abrupt change in grade across the fault to the east suggests a portion of the high grade has been displaced, possibly downwards, and the true thickness and grade of the Williams is yet to be seen."

Golden Ridge is also conducting Induced Polarization (IP) surveys, and in late August reported successful results.

"The IP survey successfully delineated a strong chargeability anomaly which is coincident with the porphyry mineralization drilled in the Williams Zone in 2018," stated the company. "Two 3-km-long IP lines were completed during the Phase I survey and the anomaly is open along strike to the north and south and at depth."

The company noted that the data shows "high chargeability values at the Williams Zone which merge with high to very high chargeability values in the Lower Alteration Zone (LAZ), suggesting connectivity of the two zones."

As for what is the next step in Golden Ridge's exploration plans, Chris Paul stated, "The results so far have been excellent and once all the IP data, assays and geology are compiled, we plan to design additional step-out drill holes and continue targeting the extensions of the system along strike and at depth in the next phase of drilling."

Meanwhile, several other companies are reporting significant strikes in the Golden Triangle.

Aben Resources reported it had discovered the South Boundary Zone of its Forrest Kerr Golden Triangle project, and in late August provided an update on its exploration drill program currently underway at the property.

The company announced it had intersected mineralization 1.5 km south of the North Boundary Zone in the newly discovered South Boundary Zone area.

The majority of drilling has taken place at the North Boundary area, the location of high-grade precious and base metal mineralization discovered in 2017 drill holes, as well as the site of the first reported drill hole of 2018. Hole FK18-10 "has four separate high-grade zones with the best zone returning an interval of 38.7 g/t Au over 10.0m including 62.4 g/t Au over 6.0m starting at 114 meters downhole."

"This new discovery of mineralization 1.5km south of the North Boundary Zone is a major development for the Company and further highlights the robust discovery potential at the Forrest Kerr Project," said Jim Pettit, president and CEO of Aben Resources. "The mineralizing system at the property is apparently widespread and well-developed with high-grade mineralization being discovered at shallow depths over a large area. We believe we have only just scratched the surface at the newly discovered North and South Boundary Zones and an expanded drill program is currently underway with assays pending for most of the holes drilled to date."

Aben has followed up with the announcement that an eight-hole stepout drill program at the North Boundary Zone intersected "shallow, high-grade gold mineralization" and included highlights of 5.08 g/t Au over 12.0m in hole FK18-12; 23.3 g/t Au over 2.0m in hole FK18-13; and 10.62 g/t Au over 3.0m in hole FK18-17.

The company also noted that so far it has received assay results for about 3,000 meters out of a total of 10,000 meters of drilling conducted this season.

GT Gold Corp. (GTT) has also been announcing summer drill results. On Sept. 10, GT Gold reported the discovery of a major new gold-copper-silver porphyry at the Saddle North target on the Tatogga property.

"Commencing at just 79 metres down-hole, hole TTD085, the first Saddle North hole of the 2018 season, intersected a very broad interval of sheeted vein, vein stockwork and disseminated style Au-Cu-Ag mineralization, centered on a monzodiorite intrusion with common strong potassic alteration," the company stated.

Charles Greig, vice-president of exploration for GT Gold, commented, "These terrific hole 85 results, and visual intercepts in holes 90, 93 and now hole 98, indicate possibly the most important new copper-gold-silver porphyry discovery in the northern part of the Golden Triangle since the discovery of the nearby Red Chris deposit, which is within sight of our property. The scale and grade of the Saddle North intrusion is outstanding, and we believe the best of it is intact, at surface beneath thin glacial sediments, and to depth."

"We see tremendous upside for expansion, and again, as was the case with Red Chris, further grade increases at depth. The Company now has enviable options before it: near-surface bulk-tonnage and potential deep high-grade underground-style gold at Saddle South, coupled with a massive new copper-gold-silver porphyry system right next door," Greig added.

According to the company, additional assays are pending, drilling is continuing, the system remains open along strike in both directions and at depth.

Earlier announcements involved the Saddle South target. On Sept. 4, GT Gold announced the continued rapid expansion of the Saddle South discovery, with new high-grade gold intercepts east, west, south and to depth along 1,000 meters of east-west trend and to 350 meters of north-south width.

Those intercepts included 9.55 g/t gold over 40.89 meters from 534.00 to 574.89 meters in hole TTD079.

And on August 8, the company reported the intersection of high-grade gold in stepout drilling both to the east and west of its 2017 Saddle South gold discovery and, additionally, the discovery of a new and deeper high-grade trend to the south.

"We are very pleased with the early success of the drill program at Saddle South this season," said Steve Burleton, GT's president and CEO. "All holes have hit mineralization as we step out to the east and west, and our deep drilling encountered high grades and strong widths along a new and well-mineralized trend not far south and east of the area drilled in 2017. . .We look forward to further demonstrating the true potential of the Saddle discovery area—both North and South."

Read what other experts are saying about:

Aben Resources Ltd.

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Disclosure: 1) John McPhaul compiled this article for Streetwise Reports LLC and provides services to Streetwise reports as an employee. He or members of his household own securities of the following companies mentioned in the article: None. He or members of his household are paid by the following companies mentioned in this article: None. 2) The following companies mentioned in this article are billboard sponsors of Streetwise Reports: Aben Resources, Pretium Resources and Seabridge Gold. Click here for important disclosures about sponsor fees. As of the date of this article, an affiliate of Streetwise Reports has a consulting relationship with Golden Ridge Resources. Please click here for more information. 3) Comments and opinions expressed are those of the specific experts and not of Streetwise Reports or its officers. The information provided above is for informational purposes only and is not a recommendation to buy or sell any security. 4) The article does not constitute investment advice. Each reader is encouraged to consult with his or her individual financial professional and any action a reader takes as a result of information presented here is his or her own responsibility. By opening this page, each reader accepts and agrees to Streetwise Reports' terms of use and full legal disclaimer. This article is not a solicitation for investment. Streetwise Reports does not render general or specific investment advice and the information on Streetwise Reports should not be considered a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Streetwise Reports does not endorse or recommend the business, products, services or securities of any company mentioned on Streetwise Reports. 5) From time to time, Streetwise Reports LLC and its directors, officers, employees or members of their families, as well as persons interviewed for articles and interviews on the site, may have a long or short position in securities mentioned. Directors, officers, employees or members of their immediate families are prohibited from making purchases and/or sales of those securities in the open market or otherwise from the time of the interview or the decision to write an article, until one week after the publication of the interview or article. As of the date of this article, officers and/or employees of Streetwise Reports LLC (including members of their household) own securities of Golden Ridge Resources, Pretium Resources and Aben Resources, companies mentioned in this article.

( Companies Mentioned: ABN:TSX.V; ABNAF:OTCQB, GLDN:TSX.V, GTT:TSX.V, )

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