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Yesterday my partner and I rode into Buck Ridge, a few miles south of Big Sky. On the way in we saw remnants of an older slide on a north-facing, wind-loaded slope that broke 3 feet deep and a few hundred feet wide. We continued riding and parked our sleds at the end of the trail, clicked into our skis and toured out a ridge that offered steep, north-facing slopes for us to investigate. The lack of snow at the higher elevations is staggering. On my first stab at digging a pit I only found 2 feet of snow on the ground—all of it faceted. On the next slope I found deeper snow, 4 feet, but as I stepped out of my skis I sunk to the ground in facets. When I dug my snowpit it was like shoveling sand. This slope had no wind-loading, so it was missing a key ingredient for an avalanche--a slab of snow. We tiptoed around, conscious that if we got onto anything wind drifted we’d probably trigger the slope. We skied the soft facets instead, which were surprisingly good. Here’s a video clip of what my snowpit revealed: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWtZM8PGrpM "
"Here are percentage SWE for 01/15/07 compared to the average from 1971-2000. Brackett Creek 43%, Shower Falls 85%, Carrot Basin 75%, Beaver Creek 67%, Madison Plateau 74%, Fisher Creek 97%."