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NNE Winter Thread


powderfreak

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I cored the snowpack today here at the house for CoCoRaHS Total SWE Monday and got 4.99” for the liquid equivalent contained therein.  As Tamarack noted in his post, dealing with the crumbly/crusty layers can be a bit tricky (I’m using the standard rain gauge cylinder coring method).  I don’t like to leave any of the crumbly ice in the bottom on the grass if I can help it, so I probably end up catching some stuff falling in from the sides of the hole as I try to get it all, which would mean some extra liquid.  My last coring, which was done about three weeks ago on Jan 30th on a more manageable snowpack, revealed 1.72” of total liquid.  Since then there’s been an additional 2.66” of liquid equivalent as precipitation, which would sum to 4.38” if that was all added in.  So, today’s 4.99” is probably a bit in the high side, but something in the 4 to 5” range of liquid in the pack here seems reasonable.  It’s definitely been a solid past three weeks here with respect to wintry precipitation if roughly 3” of liquid equivalent has been added to the snowpack.

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Now that the recent blitzkrieg of snow has slowed down, I’ve had a chance to fill out my data tables and see where the 2016-2017 season stands.  The combination of Winter Storm Orson and Winter Storm Pluto back-to-back was enough to finally pull the season’s snowfall ahead of average for the first time since the start of the new year.  The below average snowfall in December and January had us about a foot down (86.0% of average) going into February.  Now, snowfall is actually about a foot ahead (111.7%) of average.

 

The catch-up was supported extensively by the 50 inches of snowfall in the first half of February.  If we get nothing else this month with respect to snowfall, that’s already a decent February right there.  As it stands right now, we’re still in ±1 S.D. territory for snowfall on the month, so it’s not especially noteworthy yet, but it is worth noting that this is the first month to reach this level of snowfall since our string of below average snowfall seasons began – six seasons ago.  It is of course noteworthy to get all that snow in just half of month, but we’ll have to see how the rest of the month goes with respect to whether or not this February will get into some of the top months.

 

For snowpack here, we’re actually a few inches below average at 13.0”, but that should be expected after a couple days of consolidation.  With 4 to 5 inches of liquid in the pack though, I suspect that total water content is probably within average for the date.

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10 hours ago, dendrite said:

Nice inversion this morning. 32F currently on the rockpile and near 0F in northern Coos.

We were really inverted, too... 20s at 4kft and 3F at MVL.

Here in the valley we did 41/3 for max/min...have had some huge diurnal temperature swings this week.  Very spring-like.

The ironic thing is this "warm pattern" has given us some of our colder mins of the winter, ha ha.

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1 hour ago, ApacheTrout said:

For those of you who core their snowpack to determine water content, do you take measurements at various depths, or just for the entire core?

 

You take the entire core, right to the ground.  If you’re not using a tube that can accommodate the snowpack all at once, you might have to do it in sections, but you would sum them up since the entire depth of snowpack is what you want.  This is the information that helps the various organizations with potential flood estimates etc.

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Just now, J.Spin said:

 

You take the entire core, right to the ground.  If you’re not using a tube that can accommodate the snowpack all at once, you might have to do it in sections, but you would sum them up since the entire depth of snowpack is what you want.  This is the information that helps the various organizations with potential flood estimates etc.

My expectation is that the water content of the snowpack is down in the base, rather than spread uniformly throughout the pack.  The upcoming warm and rainy weather has me wondering how much of the snowpack's water content will be added to streamflow.  For example, if half of the snowpack melts this weekend, but 90% of the snowpack's water content is in the bottom half of the snowpack (which doesn't melt much), is there going to be much of a rise in streamflow?

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22 minutes ago, ApacheTrout said:

My expectation is that the water content of the snowpack is down in the base, rather than spread uniformly throughout the pack.  The upcoming warm and rainy weather has me wondering how much of the snowpack's water content will be added to streamflow.  For example, if half of the snowpack melts this weekend, but 90% of the snowpack's water content is in the bottom half of the snowpack (which doesn't melt much), is there going to be much of a rise in streamflow?

 

Great question, but the details on the individual layers in the snowpack are beyond what would be obtained from a typical observer’s analysis.  They do at least model all those nuances at the NOHRSC site that Ginx pointed out, and I’m sure that all goes into runoff/flood calculations.  You can see all the amazing plots they have with snow density and temperature estimates at various depths of the snowpack etc.  If you’re a CoCoRaHS or co-op observer with a site, you can get all that modeled data for the snowpack right in your yard.  Below are the links for the Mt. Mansfield co-op and my site, but you can get it for any site with an ID:

 

https://www.nohrsc.noaa.gov/interactive/html/graph.html?station=MMNV1&w=600&h=400&o=a&uc=0&by=2017&bm=2&bd=1&bh=6&ey=2017&em=2&ed=25&eh=6&data=0&units=0&region=us

 

https://www.nohrsc.noaa.gov/interactive/html/graph.html?station=VT-WS-19&w=600&h=400&o=a&uc=0&by=2017&bm=2&bd=1&bh=6&ey=2017&em=2&ed=25&eh=6&data=0&units=0&region=us

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41 minutes ago, ApacheTrout said:

My expectation is that the water content of the snowpack is down in the base, rather than spread uniformly throughout the pack.  The upcoming warm and rainy weather has me wondering how much of the snowpack's water content will be added to streamflow.  For example, if half of the snowpack melts this weekend, but 90% of the snowpack's water content is in the bottom half of the snowpack (which doesn't melt much), is there going to be much of a rise in streamflow?

In times past I've measured portions of a core separately.  IIRC, I'd find water content ranging from 20% in the top 10" to 40% at the bottom - this before warming ripened the pack, at which time the whole thing can approach 50%.  That's when making a snowball wrings water out of the stuff.  Of course, major crusts within the pack mess up any proportional sequence.  The double crust from January events, especially the 1/24 sleet attack, probably held 2"+ in that 4" depth.  The sleet/ice/sleet sandwich from Dec 1983 (Ft. Kent) had 1.90" in a 3" layer.

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Well from the looks of things it appears Mansfield reached its peak depth for the season before this warm up. It looks like conditions will gradually rot from now through at least the start of March. I am sure there will be a few more snowfalls up there before winter ends but we shall see if it is enough to exceed the max reached this past week. 

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1 hour ago, eyewall said:

Well from the looks of things it appears Mansfield reached its peak depth for the season before this warm up. It looks like conditions will gradually rot from now through at least the start of March. I am sure there will be a few more snowfalls up there before winter ends but we shall see if it is enough to exceed the max reached this past week. 

Unless it follows the 69 pattern again, always seems to peak week of March 20th or so

gendateplot.png

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1 hour ago, eyewall said:

Well from the looks of things it appears Mansfield reached its peak depth for the season before this warm up. It looks like conditions will gradually rot from now through at least the start of March. I am sure there will be a few more snowfalls up there before winter ends but we shall see if it is enough to exceed the max reached this past week. 

There's always a secondary peak. It'll snow again.

 

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1 hour ago, alex said:

Just booked a trip to Mammoth for mid-March. Watch them get buckets of rain while Bretton Woods gets feet of snow...

Dump Alert! In the past 24 hours another 12" of new snow has fallen, bringing our storm total so far to 38-42" and it's still snowing. With all this snow we have officially broken the 500" season snowfall mark. Temps cooled down making this recent snowfall nice and light

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1 hour ago, powderfreak said:

There's always a secondary peak. It'll snow again.

 

Certainly, at Mt. Mansfield Stake elevations, snow is already in the forecast by Friday, and especially by the weekend:

 

.LONG TERM /SATURDAY THROUGH TUESDAY/...

As of 412 AM EST Wednesday...Saturday afternoon/evening should see the precipitation ramping up just ahead of the passage of a cold front from the associated occulded system pushing to the north and west of our area. Most of the CWA should see a half to three quarters on an inch of precipitation during this timeframe. Winds out ahead of the front could lead to a narrow band of gusty conditions and advisory level winds especially across the Champlain and St Lawrence Valleys as the 00Z GFS continues to indicate 850mb winds reaching 65 and 70 knots in the respective valleys Saturday afternoon. After frontal passage, rain will switch over to snow showers late Saturday night/Sunday morning with moderate cold air advection.

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I think it got a bit warmer than guidance had suggested.   What was the forecasted high, 46F?   Got to 57.8F!  Cirus totally cleared out this PM and that helped.  First bit of bare ground showing on steep south slope.  Deer are taking full advantage!

  https://video.nest.com/clip/175242d9df6d434eb7ca675ea6fe10b2.mp4

 

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59 minutes ago, wxeyeNH said:

I think it got a bit warmer than guidance had suggested.   What was the forecasted high, 46F?   Got to 57.8F!  Cirus totally cleared out this PM and that helped.  First bit of bare ground showing on steep south slope.  Deer are taking full advantage!

  https://video.nest.com/clip/175242d9df6d434eb7ca675ea6fe10b2.mp4

 

This warmth has been under-forecast for sure.  I haven't been paying close attention, but I remember Saturday being 10+ above forecast too.

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6 hours ago, alex said:

Question... I want to try and tap a few maples. Seems like the next few days are warm enough to do it? Or should I wait? First  time doing it!

I do it as a hobby ~150 taps. I am in S NH..Different climate than you but it's running like crazy here. I'd image you would get a run up there over this warm spell. Tapping buckets you have a 4-5 week window after tapping before the taps start to dry out and slow down.

So if you want to try it I'd think anytime if fine. Best runs have highs above 40 after a good freeze. It will slow down after a couple days without a freeze and recharge once you get one. Given the micro climates up north it's very dependent on your location. Weather is one of the main reasons I started getting into it. Started with 20 trees and now I'm up to 150. Its alot of work but alot of fun.  

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19 minutes ago, wx2fish said:

I do it as a hobby ~150 taps. I am in S NH..Different climate than you but it's running like crazy here. I'd image you would get a run up there over this warm spell. Tapping buckets you have a 4-5 week window after tapping before the taps start to dry out and slow down.

So if you want to try it I'd think anytime if fine. Best runs have highs above 40 after a good freeze. It will slow down after a couple days without a freeze and recharge once you get one. Given the micro climates up north it's very dependent on your location. Weather is one of the main reasons I started getting into it. Started with 20 trees and now I'm up to 150. Its alot of work but alot of fun.  

:weenie:

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