The Cotton Belt property is located in the Monashee Mountains of south-eastern British Columbia, approximately 60 km north west of Revelstoke. It is accessible by a network of logging roads that begin at Seymour Arm, 30 km to the southwest.

The mineralization comprises an oxide-sulphide layer, traced through a strike length of 5 kilometres in the western (upper) limb (Cotton Belt zone) of the Grace Mountain syncline and 2 kilometres in the lower limb (McLeod zone). It varies in thickness from a few tens of centimetres to approximately 2 metres. Mineralization generally consists of coarse-grained sphalerite, magnetite, galena and minor pyrrhotite in a dark green, pyroxene- amphibole-quartz-garnet bearing rocks or, as layers within a lighter coloured, more siliceous calcareous gneiss, or as disseminated grains in a siliceous granular marble. The mineralized zones are parallel with bedding in the metasediments and dip about 35 degrees southwest. Several adits, shafts and raises have exposed mineralization intermittently over a strike distance of 1650 metres. The main mineral zone, as exposed on surface, is up to 3.7 metres wide and over 100 metres long. About 2.5 kilometres northwest along strike of the main zone, within the same stratigraphic unit, are several occurrences of massive sulphides. These are known as the Copper King and the McLeod zones Unclassified reserves of the Cotton Belt zone are just under 1 million tonnes grading 6 per cent lead, 2 per cent zinc and 1.7 ounces per tonne silver.

The mineralized zones occur on both limbs of a syncline within the 'Cottonbelt Sequence', a heterogeneous package of dominantly calcareous rocks. At the base of the Cottonbelt sequence is a buff-weathering carbonatite layer overlain by calcareous schists and a calcareous to relatively pure white quartzite. A distinctive grey-weathering, white limestone overlies the quartzite, which is overlain by interlayered micaceous and calcareous schists and an impure grey-weathering crumbly limestone.

Exploration and development of mineral properties in the area date back to the early 1900s with the discovery by Cotton Belt Mines, Ltd. of the stratiform Cottonbelt deposit in 1905. Both surface and underground work continued intermittently on the property and on immediately adjacent properties such as the McLeod, Copper King and Complex from about 1929 through to the present.