Teebone Ridge/Monogram Lake

I knew there would be some dry trail walking on this obs tour, but did not expect 3400 vertical feet of it. Not enough snow in observed low elevation terrain for avalanche danger. Skinnable snow started at 4500 feet, but it was rugged up to 5000 feet.  The snow surface was sloppy and mushy, with 10-15cm of ski pen. The boot pen was the same, at least where the crust was supportable beneath the most recent snow. No dry snow here, at least up to 6000 feet and probably much higher.  No refreeze the night prior. 

Avalanche danger felt low with no likelihood of natural wet avalanches. Could get a little wet snow to move here and there, but it felt more dangerous from a knee injury perspective than that of getting caught in an avalanche. With full sun and warm temps would expect typical, small-ish wet loose avalanches starting in steep rocky terrain, but today wasn't that day. Clear, cool nights and warm days would get a nice diurnal corn cycle going.

15cm of wet melt forms above the 1/28 crust- melt layer. Crust in this area was thinner than areas farther west, only 5cm, knife-hard with 1F melt forms below.  Below 1/28; alternating layers of small, rounded grains, melt forms, and crusts. Stability test (CT's) produced moderate and hard resistant planar shears in wet snow below the 1/28 knife-hard melt-freeze crust. So resistant in fact that the fracture instantly reglued itself together; could not separate the snow above and below the observed fracture.