Fox Gulch (Bonanza Creek Road)

Large amounts of water were needed to run hydraulic mining in the Bonanza Creek valley. The Yukon Ditch system brought water seventy miles from the Twelve Mile River.

The Yukon Gold Company imported redwood from California for the wood pipeline and steel from Germany and Pittsburgh for the siphons. Local spruce was used for the flumes

The Yukon Ditch crossed Bonanza Creek at Fox Gulch using the Bonanza Siphon. Pressure boxes (wooden reservoirs) and spillways with gates were constructed at the intake end of a siphon to ensure constant water pressure in the pipe.

Pressure and gravity pushed the water up the pipe on the other side of the valley where another pressure box was constructed to convert the pipeline back into a ditch, the most economical, or a flume. On this side of the Bonanza Valley, water went to hydraulic operations on King Solomon Hill and Monte Christo Hill, below Fox Gulch, and Orofino Hill and American Hill above.

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