Moist to wet snow surface by aspect and unreactive buried SH on Stoney Ridge.

We toured on Stoney Ridge today. Air temperatures were above freezing and there were increasing amounts of high level cloud cover during the morning hours that lead to overcast skies by midday. The surface snow on all aspect ranged from moist to wet with a fair bit of glopping on skis.

I compressed snow from the surface in my hand in numerous areas and found the expected trend of moist on N aspects in the shade, moist to wet on N aspects in the sun, and wet on E aspects in the sun. Snow surface moisture did not vary greatly between 6,300' and 8,300' for a specific aspect. Changes seemed much more dependent on aspect than on elevation.

I found 8 to 10 mm surface hoar buried about 5 cm (2 inches) below the snow surface on a N aspect in a large open area below treeline at 7,000'. This buried SH was unreactive to shovel tilt/tap tests and appeared well bonded with the layers above and below.