11/28: Lewis Peak zone.

As was clearly shown on the satellite images from Derek, there's almost no appreciable snow on the ground in the Lewis Peak zone. This is mostly due to the top elevations in this area only reaching just over 8000'.

First photo: Shows bare ground on south aspects near Ben Lomond even to highest elevations.

Second: Very little snow on North aspects near Lewis Peak at 8000'

12/1: James Peak zone

There's a little more snow here, but only on high northerly aspects. The deepest snow I found was about 6" deep. There's a solid pencil to 1F crust (2-3" thick) at the ground with weak, well developed facets above.

First Photo: total snowpack at 8300' North aspect

Second: View of snowcover in Ben Lomond zone

12/5: Ben Lomond zone

There's more snow in this zone, but still not a lot. I was surprised to find mostly snowpacked trails nearly all the way from the N. Fork road system. There is very little snow below about 8000 feet. From 8000 feet and above, I found mostly 8 to 10 inches of total snow depth. A few places were as deep as 12 inches. The basal crust is very supportable even in running shoes. I was surprised how well I could walk both on and off trail. I was also surprised to find more wind slab on the surface than weak facets. It appears the wind got to much of the terrain above about 8200 feet. The most prevalent snow structure I found was multiple layers of fairly hard crusts. In some areas I could locate weak fist-hard facets between the crusts. Seems like the surface wind crusts were mostly 1F and the basal M/F crust was Pencil hard. In some areas, The crusts were decomposing and getting weaker. As a whole, the snow pack is stronger than I had anticipated.

If you don't mind rocks, grass, branches and stumps, There's definitely enough snow above 8000 feet to the summit to ski a bit (as evidenced by tracks), but the surface looked very slick in places. I was hesitant to explore much off the trail on steep slopes in exposed areas due to the risk of slide for life (and lack of self arrest tools).

First Photo: NE slope at 7000'

Second Photo and Video: Total snowpack and surface facets on NNW slope at 8000', relatively wind sheltered area

Third: View of Cutler Basin

Overall, I currently do not have concerns with the existing snow structure on any slopes below about 8000 to 8500 feet in the Ogden mountains. This is primarily due to the high vegetation-height to snow-height ratio. There are definitely some slopes above 8500 feet that are filled in enough to have a bed surface and existing weak layers that could be capable of producing avalanches during the forecasted storms.

I plan to be cautious traveling early season over areas that held old snow, primarily due to the variable snowpack. But the existing snowpack does not appear to be nearly as weak as what I've seen in the Uintas and also what the Cottonwoods look like.

Sorry for lack of photos of the wind crusts and higher elevations, my phone battery died from the cold.