Malakoff Diggins State Historic Park is the largest hydraulic mining site in California, located near the town of North Bloomfield in the Gold Rush Country.  Around the 1850s when loose gold in the streams started becoming more scarce, miners started using monitors (water cannons) to blast water onto the hillside to extract more gold - the erosion bluffs (almost resembling badlands) in the background is the result of the cannons.  Millions of gallons of water were used on the hillsides as well as other diggings areas throughout the region & the silt & debris that drained from this region flowed into rivers & started filling up the San Francisco Bay area w/ a rate of one foot of silt per year.  The result led to a lawsuit known as Woodruff v. North Bloomfield Mining & Gravel Company in 1883 & on January 7, 1884 hydraulic mining was declared illegal, making it one of the first environmental protection measures in the country.  This view shows Diggins Pond at relatively high water mark, a nice muddy brown color.