http://www.goldgeologist.com/mercenary_musings/musing-090914-The-Importance-of-Mentors.pdf

My Mercenary Geologist business has three facets:
First and foremost, I am a field geologist, mapper, and prospector who subscribes to the David Lowell
School of “Boot Leather and Drilling”. I am a dedicated career professional who welcomes the challenge
and reward of working in remote and primitive conditions. In more than three decades of experience, I
have seen nearly every rock type on the planet and have experience in exploration and evaluation of a
multitude of commodities in diverse geological environments.
Secondly, I am an exploration and mining analyst specializing in evaluation of projects, companies, and
business development within the junior resource sector. The last 17 years of my career have been devoted
exclusively to the venture capital business. During this time I have developed a strong network of
professional contacts that constitute a “who’s who” of the mining and exploration business, while also
becoming an investor, economist, and evaluator of junior exploration and mining companies and their
projects. My field experience as a “for hire” (hence Mercenary) consultant for most of my career enables
me to deliver an opinion on the merits of a project and company in a rapid and efficient manner.

Unfortunately I am a dinosaur in many more ways than that.
“Boot leather and drilling” discovers ore bodies and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Ask
the economic geologist who arguably has created more real wealth than any other man ever to walk the
Earth. Ask David Lowell.
As an example, good geological mapping and the resulting conceptual target found Fruta del Norte,
southeastern Ecuador, the largest new gold deposit discovered in the current commodities cycle.
Other recent examples that I personally know and cover in my newsletter where careful surface and/or
subsurface mapping and sampling discovered new mineral deposits or expanded previously know
deposits include: Lydian International’s Amulsar, Armenia; Premium Exploration’s Orogrande, Idaho;
and Eurasian Minerals’ Grand Bois, Haiti.