Perth-based Red Mountain Mining Ltd. said that it has ramped up gold target surface sampling program, after the discovery of higher grade gold from the South West Breccia gold resource at the Lobo project in Batangas.

In a statement, Red Mountain said that it has initiated a systematic program to channel sample all of the identified epithermal vein-breccia structures at Lobo, as well as explore for new high-grade gold bearing structures.

Neil Warburton, Red Mountain executive chairman and acting chief executive, said that they have hit high grade gold at the Lobo project in Philippines, intersecting up to 28.69 grams per ton (g/t) of gold. The results are from additional surface trench channel sampling from the South West Breccia gold resource at the project.

“It included five meters at 10.43 grams per ton of gold including one meter at 25.14 g/t gold and two meters at 18.12 g/t gold, including 28.69 g/t of gold,” Warburton said.

The trenching results build on its recent success at West Drift epithermal lode structure, where the first hole of a 10-hole diamond drilling program returned an intersection of 8.6 meters at 2.53 g/t of gold from 136.6 meters, including 0.85 meters at 5.59 g/t gold, and one meter at 4.62g/t gold.

Review of historical rock chip samples above 2 g/t along the epithermal vein-breccia structures gives additional targets with highest value of 72.6 g/t gold at signal prospect.

Warburton said that the results would strengthen the company’s view that the Lobo epithermal vein-breccia structures will host additional high-grade gold resources.

Along with the recent confirmatory gold intersection at West Drift epithermal lode (8.6 meters at 2.53 g/t of gold), Warburton said that there are now multiple high-grade gold targets to drill.

“The exploration team on site at Lobo is being bolstered as the company ramps up its explorations activities on the entire 10 kilometers of mapped epithermal vein-breccia structures,” the mining executive said.

“Results to date have identified the potential for extensions to the known resource as well as additional high-grade gold mineralization,” Warburton said.

Red Mountain completed the acquisition of significant gold resources and copper gold tenements in the Philippines in October last year.