Formentera Drilling Two More Pearsall Wildcats After Initial Success

 Formentera Partners is drilling more Pearsall wildcats in South Texas in delineating its new play, the E&P confirmed to Hart Energy.

The company’s initial two wells have kept up more than 1,000 boe/d in their first 2.5 months online.

In its first 75 days through March, Formentera’s Darlene 1-STX #N731HP made 51,504 bbl and 142 MMcf, totaling 75,149 boe, 69% oil, or an average of 1,002 boe/d, in southeastern Frio County, according to the most current Texas Railroad Commission (RRC) data.

The other well in the initial two-well pad, Hurrikain Cat I-STX #S731H, made 55,180 bbl and 201 MMcf, totaling 88,647 boe, 62% oil, or an average of 1,249 boe/d in its first 71 days.

Formentera is in a joint venture (JV) with another private E&P, Britanco LLC, and Joe Jaggers, founder of Permian-focused Jagged Peak Energy, which Formentera managing partner Bryan Sheffield’s Parsley Energy bought for $2.3 billion in stock and debt assumption in 2019.

Sheffield sold Parsley in 2021 for $7.6 billion in stock and debt assumption to Pioneer Natural Resources. Since then, Pioneer was sold to Exxon Mobil for $64.5 billion.

The JV's first two wells’ combined 3.24 miles of lateral are parallel to Highway 1582 and terminate near its intersection with Highway 85. The wells are surrounded by short Austin Chalk laterals landed uphole at about 6,500 ft that were drilled pre-2000 and have since been plugged.

The Pearsall in the area is at about 10,000 ft.

One of Formentera’s two newest two-well pads toward delineating its leasehold is about 10 miles east and parallel to the Hurrikain/Darlene pad.

The wells are the northerly directed Hooey-STX Unit #N731H and the southerly directed Sendero-STX Unit #S731H.

Formentera is running casing currently on the Sendero well and plans to drill the Hooey next, Sheffield confirmed.

Patterson-UTI Drilling’s Apex-XK #271 walking rig is making the Sendero/Hooey holes.

The third pad is planned for about three miles northwest of Hurrikain/Darlene, stretching parallel to McKinley Road from the foot of McKinley air field at Interstate 35 south of Pearsall, Texas, and terminating south of Stacey Road.

The wells are the north-lateral Roper-STX #N731H and the south-lateral Roper-STX Unit #S731H.

Updip oil window

The new Pearsall attempts to make the tight-rock Pearsall pay after wildcatters gave up on it in the mid-2010s is using modern, higher-intensity frac recipes.

Also, Formentera’s focus is updip of where Pearsall wildcatting in the early 2010s met primarily with gas.

The Hurrikain and Darlene wells were landed in the Pearsall trend’s Lower Bexar member.

There, the Pearsall sits about 3,000 ft deeper than the Eagle Ford and about 3,500 ft deeper than the Austin Chalk.

The JV with Britanco and Jaggers is on a block of Indio Tanks-Pearsall Field leasehold underlying the Briscoe Ranch-Eagle Ford and Pearsall-Austin Chalk fields.

“I applaud the Britanco team, the driving force that brought in Joe Jaggers, for sticking their necks out in leasing the block,” Sheffield told Hart Energy.

The Hurrikain well came in with a 24-hour IP of 1,499 bbl from a 7,862-ft lateral on a 36/64 choke. Gravity is 44 °API.

The well had already flowed 15,130 bbl during its first 14 days prior to Feb. 3, the day of the test, according to the RRC file.

The Darlene wildcat IP’ed 1,282 bbl/d on Feb. 7 from a 9,220-ft lateral on a 36/64-inch choke. Production in the last few days of January was 5,001 bbl after being completed Jan. 15.

Frac fluid was 2,421 bbl/ft. Proppant was not included in the IP report.

The only other Pearsall oil producer in Frio County is the Whitley Dubose #1H that was made by Marathon Oil in 2014 and is now owned by Britanco.

The 5,736-ft lateral—parallel to the Darlene and Hurrikain laterals a few hundred yards away—was completed with 16 bbl/ft of fluid and 475 lb of proppant/ft in 20 stages, according to the RRC file.

The IP was 152 bbl and 183 Mcf on a 12/64-inch choke. In the well’s 11 years online, it has made 97,754 bbl and 350 MMcf. In January, production was 125 bbl; Britanco reported no production from the well in February or March, according to the RRC file.

Marathon sold the Pearsall test well in 2016 to Earthstone Energy, which sold it again in 2022 to Alvarado 2014 LLC.

Britanco bought it mid-2023.

EOG Pearsall shut-in

EOG Resources drilled a Pearsall test last summer in Frio County about 15 miles southwest of Formentera’s Hurrikain/Darlene pad, where the pay has typically been gassy.

It filed an incomplete gas-well G-1 form with the RRC on March 24 for the well, Burns Ranch #1H, describing it as a shut-in producer.

The EOG report showed Pearsall is downdip at the wellsite, sitting at about 11,000 ft.