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Drilling is one of the defining stages of mineral exploration.
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But what actually happens when a drill rig shows up on site?
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How does the process unfold?
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And what does it take to run a drill?
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Today, Cody Unger from Timberline Drilling is here to help us unpack all of that.
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Welcome back to Grounded, Mining the Facts.
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Today's episode focuses on drilling, the moment when exploration shifts from maps and models to real data pulled straight from the earth.
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This is a topic I think a lot of people misunderstand.
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So I'm really excited to hear from someone who does it every single day.
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Same here.
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And with that, let's welcome our guest, Cody Unger from Timberline Drilling.
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Hello, and thank you for inviting me on this uh pretty highly decorated uh podcast for one.
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Uh, my name is Cody Unger.
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I am the business development manager for Timberline Drilling and have been with Timberline Drilling for the past 13 years.
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Um, a little bit about me.
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My first mining job was in May of 1996 for a company called Echo Bay Minerals.
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Uh project set just south of Battle Mountain, Nevada.
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And ever since 1996, I had kept a role in the mining sector.
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So um actually this year, it's been 30 years since I've been in the industry.
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That's amazing.
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30 years, I feel like is a long time, but I'm really excited to get to learn from you today and hear from you.
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Um, I'm very new to the minerals industry, and I think my first question for you is one that a lot of people have actually.
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So, what does exploration drilling actually involve?
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It involves a huge amount of communication and coordination by our operations team.
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Um at a high level, exploration drilling is how we take our take what geologists are seeing on maps, uh, models, and surface data, and actually testing it beneath the earth.
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Uh it's the drilling contract, our job is to safely and efficiently um drill a hole where the client wants it, or they think that recovery quality core can use to understand the geology.
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Our crews live throughout the United States, so we climb into every project.
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Um, we make sure they have a place to stay.
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Uh it's usually in a hotel in the nearest town that the project is near.
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Um secondly, the project manager is and has already been in talk with the client on a mobilization date.
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Then from there, it's scheduling the transport trucks, bring in the bringing equipment.
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Uh, we use a lot of rental companies for things like water trucks or cliffs and light plants.
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We have to make sure that they have what we need for the project and get them on schedule for delivery.
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Uh, next would be our vendors who play a huge role within our company and most every company.
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From scheduling mud to survey tools, core boxes and blocks, and sometimes fuel.
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So before we turn a single rod to start a project, our team has been grinding behind the scenes, uh, making sure everything is scheduled on site for an on-time start date.
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Yeah, so it definitely takes a lot of hands-on deck, right?
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For you to get all these projects done.
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It takes a lot of you know, groundwork, telephone calls, uh, meet people in person.
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There's so many moving parts, and that that's before we even start.
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Um you know, and we have a great group uh vendors uh that usually know we've been working with them long enough that they know what we're gonna need.
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Um, so usually it's just a phone call to you know one of our vendors or suppliers and say, hey, this is what we need.
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And as big as our company is is getting and is growing, most of these vendors have everything like in a warehouse or on site ready to go for us because they know they're gonna get the call.
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So it's great to have them and we wouldn't be where we are today with without our vendor suppliers, that's for sure.
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Can you maybe paint us a picture about what a typical day looks like for somebody working on an exploration drill rig?
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Usually picked up by the driller uh by 4:30 in the morning.
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Uh we try and start at 6 a.m.
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So that means being at the rig before six, having their toolbox talk, um their safety meetings, doing a cross shift with the crew that's coming, um, that has already completed their 12-hour shift and planning with the geologist uh for like day-to-day operations.
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Geologists usually show up in the morning.
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Uh we give them a crossover of you know what the hole is doing, uh, what to expect, um what our plans are for that day.
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Uh we could we could be strictly quarry, or we could be you know servicing the rig for a couple hours
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and then getting going, or gotta trip the rods out for a for a bit trip or replace a couple rods.
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So, but for the most part, it's a 12-hour run of doing our best, put core in the box in a safe and orderly fashion, no matter what the weather is outside.
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Kind of to get a little bit more into the weeds here, I know we have this really awesome platform.
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So, what's one thing that you wish more people knew about exploration drilling?
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One thing I wish more people understood is how much skill and experience it takes to drill a successful hole.
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From the outside, it can look like you're just operating a machine and drilling a hole, but every hole can be very different.
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Ground conditions change, holes can deviate, water can become an issue, and the equipment gets pushed pretty hard.
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An experienced driller is constantly reading what the drill and the ground and killing them and making adjustments while still maintaining core recovery and keeping the hole on target.
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There's also a lot of logistics behind the scenes with crews, equipment, maintenance, remote locations, weather, and having to move from hole to hole.
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A good drilling crew makes it very easy, but there's a lot of work, teamwork, and problem solving behind it.
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It's the work that it takes to make it happen.
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Our crews work extremely hard day in and day out.
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Our supervisors are working 14 to 15 hours a day, making sure that they have what they need, then doing two hours or more pivot work to send off to the client so that we can get paid.
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You can see only three people on our service jobs, but in reality, there's six people working daily per job to make it happen.
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So when you see the guys with Shanghai's closing at the start of the day and seeing the same guy at the end of the ship with grease and mud from head to toe, they earned it and they deserve a pat on the back and some rest.
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Oh, a hundred percent.
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I have seen drillers come in at the end of a shift and they just look absolutely exhausted, and you know that they spent the whole shift either slinging core rods or core trying to fill up the core boxes, or God forbid something went wrong with the drill, and the poor guys are scrambling to try and get it back up and running.
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And truly, they're just the unsung heroes of of the exploration business.
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They they really are.
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I mean, these guys, you know, work very hard, uh not only for the client, but for themselves and for us.
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Um you could go to any project and you know, our apprentice is doing you know three to four things at the same time, rather it's cleaning core or it's you know logging core in the box, or you see him run over and you know, grab a grease gun because he knows he's at the end of the run and the head needs to be greased.
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And then from there, you know, he may run into the dart jack, take a bite of a sandwich, have a sip of coffee, and then they're they're right back at him.
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So they're busy and they do work hard.
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And and uh without them, we wouldn't be where we are today.
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That's 100%.
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I I like to tell everybody I work for Timberland Drilling, but I I I work for the guys in the groups, they they make us look really good.
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Maybe I have maybe one question that you could help our listeners to understand.
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What kind of education do you need to to work on an exploration rig?
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You don't need uh an education, you know.
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We we have employees that you know just got their GED or a high school diploma, or some of them don't have either one.
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Um we have guys that actually you know have a bachelor's degree or an associate's degree, so it it's it's not really a field where you have to have you know a certificate, you know, or a degree or any background.
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Um we do our own hiring and we do our own training.
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And once an employee comes into you know timber line drilling, uh he goes through a uh a week-long training class that pretty much runs through of what his job duties are gonna be, what we expect him to do, what the client's gonna expect him to do, our policies and procedures.
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We give him their inshaw training, rather surface or underground, sometimes both.
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So all the training that our guys need, we will give to give it to them.
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So it's not something that everybody could do, but for the most part, anybody can do it.
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How would you describe the role that drilling plays in a mineral development project?
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Whether that be, for example, an exploration project or even on a mine site.
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Without exploration drilling, you you don't have a mine or a resource.
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Um, we're always the first ones in and the last ones out.
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Great geologists can look at a mountain and think there may be some sort of precious metal, you know, developed within the layers, but it takes a company like ours to drill beneath those layers that they can't see.
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And and that's why cord
really plays a huge role in each and every you know mine development.
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Yeah, well, thank you so much for being here.
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I don't know if Ella, you had any more questions.
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I don't think so.
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I I've worked with exploratory drilling before, and they're top-notch guys, and they truly do.
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They work really, really hard, and they they are, like I've said, the unsung heroes of the exploration business.
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They they really are the unsung heroes, you know.
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If you put it in an eight-hour ship, that's just short shipped, you know.
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Uh, our guys working 20 days on, 10 days off, 12 to 14 hours a day.
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And we've got some guys with with timber line that have been here, you know, 18, 19, 20 years.
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So it's what it's what they love to do.
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They don't want an office job, they don't want a desk job, they want to be out in the field, you know, drilling and teaching, and you know, seeing the environment.
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And you know, a lot of our guys have been the driller that has drilled a hole to define resource that started a new uh started a new mine.
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So they take a lot of pride in that.
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Uh when you start talking about you know mines all over the US, you know, we're we're drilling in nine different states right now, and and all it takes is that one hole uh to get exactly what that geologist um was looking for.
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And then in you know, five, ten years you have you have an operating mine site.
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So and our like I said, our guys take a lot of pride in that, and you know, it's basically bragging rights.
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I love it.
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Yeah, well, and thank you so much for being here again.
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I think it's so easy for people to look at drilling and just think, oh, you drill a hole in the ground and that's that.
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But you know, what you've talked about here today has really cleared it up for me that there's there's so many different moving parts, there's so many people that go into the drilling industry, there's so much time and effort and so many different things to plan for it.
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It really is such an amazing process, and it it definitely fits in really well to what we've talked about in our podcast about mineral development, drilling, all that kind of stuff.
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And and yeah, thank you so much for being here.
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Yeah, you're you're very welcome.
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And you know, more on topic of what you know what people don't see is the community
involvement.
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And what Timberline Drilling likes to do is you know, you see our trucks in town, you see our our guys going, you know, into the grocery store, the gas station, the restaurants, hotels, you know, wherever they're going, and everybody wants to know what they're doing there, right?
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Because they're they're the outcasts, right?
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They don't know who Timberline Drilling is, and they don't know what we're doing there.
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So they always get a lot of questions of you know, what are you guys doing here?
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And they can say hello or to a long exploratory uh project wherever they're at.
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But that that creates uh conversations within the community, within the townspeople.
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So uh what Timberline Drilling does like to do is get involved with it.
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Rather it be, you know, the boys and girls club, or we'll go to the schools or to the parks and rec centers and say, we're Timberline Drilling, we're gonna be in town for the next six months and we want to give back, you know, to your community.
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Uh, what can we do to help?
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And there's several things that we've been involved with over the last several years that we've helped grow, you know, these these communities that we've been in, whether it's parks and recs or we go to the school district and you know, revives school supplies for the uh kindergartners, first graders, and elementary schools, um, into helping, you know, like big projects of donating money to um a new convention center or rec center.
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So yeah, but there's a lot that people don't see that you know that we do.
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And I think we're doing great things.
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I think we're on a buried put in front of the other path forward uh type of thing for these communities and for the clients as well.
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Yeah, I think that we hear a lot about how mineral exploration companies or even mining companies participate within the communities, but there's that whole other layer of their subcontractors pay into the communities as well and try to be a part of of this industry and a part of kind of this really weird fabric that is civilization, right?
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Where we're all just trying to help each other out and be a part of of each other's lives in this in this sense.
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And I think that it's a very interesting point that we we don't always see all of those background things that go into making everything run.
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To the normal person, to the normal eye, yeah, of anyone.
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I mean, if I was an involvement within this industry, I I would know what it takes to, you know, drill success with core hole.
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You know, I I would have no idea.
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So um you can't blame them for asking all the questions, but it's it's definitely a great conversation piece to have because it keeps the conversation open, it keeps the conversation going.
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And you know, rather we're drilling, you know, for lithium or uranium, you know, any sort of precious metals.
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Uh we use it all and great conversations and and open-ended uh questions, really.
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But uh their answers and their curiosity are you know growing.
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So, you know, why do we need uranium?
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Well, there's several different reasons why we need uranium or lithium, you know, because that's the market demand, right?
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We have it, it's what's in the earth.
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We get it out, we just gotta drill it to make sure it's the quality of you know this metal or uranium or lithium that that we're looking for.
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Yeah, and even with my background in exploration, I feel like I always learn something new from conversations like this.
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And Cody, I know you and I are gonna talk way more down the line from all of the conventions that I see you guys at, or or even just while you guys are out in the community here in the Black Hills, even.
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So thank you so much for being here and for answering all of our questions.
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I know we threw you some curveballs, but we're really excited that we'll get to share this with our community.
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Very happy that you guys have you know shows Timberline Billing and that I could be here to you know answer these questions and like I said, and keep the conversation going.
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And but yeah, I will definitely see you at a few more shows.
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Um starting very soon, as a matter of fact.
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It's definitely travel season and it's show season.
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So you'll see my face around, I guarantee you.
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Well, thank you again, Cody, and thank you to everyone who joined us for this episode.
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If you enjoyed this conversation, follow the show so you never miss an update and send us your questions.
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We'll use them to shape future episodes.
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Join us next time as we dig into common misconceptions about mineral exploration.