January 19th, 2020-
Nestled in the central Colorado Rockies, in a remote valley high on the shoulders of the continental divide, the Upper Chalk Creek basin bridges timberline in the southern Sawatch range. The basin begins on the edge of the Hancock townsite, deserted for over a century. Situated at 11,000 feet, the valley is embraced by spruce stands that border an alpine meadow. The boggy meadow gently ascends southward for two miles to the basin’s terminus where two lakes feed from the rocky, glacial cwm. The surrounding 13,000-foot peaks feed the basin below with regular cloudbursts. Within this basin, below its timberline, live my wife and I year-round.
From our vantage, we see the weather extremes these mountains can produce. Living every day in the alpine demonstrates that the weather itself is not necessarily extreme, but that the rapid changes between each weather event are. In mid-January, those changes can be seen the clearest within the snowpack. A frozen water molecule within a field of snow is affected by both atmospheric and earthly forces. The former exerts ever-changing conditions in the snowy landscape, the latter is much more of a constant.
Hourly changes in weather effects the general snowpack through the new snow’s moisture, consolidation of previous snow layers, crystal formations within the snowpack layers, wind movement on top of the snowpack, and temperature which determines snowflake formation. All of these factors can change within a storm and interact with thousands of other variables that ultimately affect the structure of the snowpack.
Colorado is located in the easternmost part of the mountainous west; it is referred to as “continental” snowpack. Simply put, it means that by the time most storm systems hit our mountains much of their moisture has been deposited along the coasts. (think Sierra cement or the Pacific Northwest) Therefore, mid-continent, we end up with dry, powdery snow that gets whipped around by the jet stream – further decreasing its moisture. With continental snowpack, we often see lighter, drier snow early in the season, along with colder temperatures producing “faceted” snow. This provides a base of ball bearings for the heavy, wet snow that falls later in the season.
At the moment, we are solidly within our early season conditions. So far, we have seen dry cold storms with temperatures dropping into the single digits and lower after the storm had passed. Even when temperatures rebound in the following days, sunny days rarely get above freezing. Off of trails that have been compacted through recreation, undisturbed snow transforms into large facets, or "sugar snow." Its nickname refers to the texture and quality of the snow. Its biggest quality is that there is no cohesion – it does not want to stick together to create a solid base. This is problematic looking ahead towards heavier spring snows to come, as this "sugar snow" is not a very stable weight bearing layer.
Snow science is talked often talked about as a mysterious, “voodoo” science. We assume it has received this conclusion due to the immense number of variables an individual has to consider – all of which can change in a moment. If you are not living in the area, paying attention to the weather, and listening to what the snow is telling you, it might as well be a mystery.
Throughout the winter, we plan to have regular updates on the conditions of our basin. We cannot extend our discussions past the boundaries of the Upper Chalk Creek Basin, as we do not get to see the daily and hourly changes other valleys see. Even one gulch over can see drastically different conditions. State, federal, and private agencies disperse reports that cover vast areas, condensed down into a few broad sentences. We cannot report on such huge areas, but we hope to provide a resource for our specific basin, high in the mountains of Colorado. You can find our updates here on our website (corruptioncolorado.com) or follow our Instagram through the hashtag #UpperChalkUpdates.
Cheers to the Voodoo,
Z&E
