Full Sun and Warming on Slide Mountain

Below freezing temperatures with light to moderate W winds kept it cool above 9000' in this area today.  Once below the peak, the strong March sunshine was felt warming the snow surface with light winds.  2 to 4'' of recent snow exists on top of a firm and supportable melt freeze crust.  This surface snow was warming up and sliding easily on top of the melt freeze crust in steeper terrain from ski turns.  In some areas that received previous wind loading, small wind slab avalanches with propagation were failing from ski cuts.  These small wind slab avalanches were behaving more like loose wet avalanches once initiation occurred.  All avalanche activity observed today was size D1, relatively harmless to backcountry users.  Temperatures increased into the afternoon.