When hiking forest trails in the summer, it is hard to imagine what it would be like to hike the same trails in winter when they are under a deep cover of snow. Following a trail in summer isn’t too difficult for the watchful hiker as one usually just walks where there are no branches, other forest litter and where there may be footprints. But in winter, if the snow is deep and the landscape, landmarks and leafless trees and shrubs are cloaked in snow, transfiguring the once familiar scene into something new and different, one can lose the trail. With the ground covered with several feet of snow, burying logs, stumps and rocks, it may look like there are trails all over the place. Unless a person has an idea of what direction to take and knowledge of the lay of the land, what was once intended to be a half-day hike may instead turn out out to be an all day affair.
There are many different aspects of hiking in a snowy landscape, one of which is that it can provide more exercise (more of a workout) in a shorter distance than does a summer hike.
Sometime during the summer while hiking over lower elevation forest trails, imagine that during the winter with five or six feet of snow on the same route,you would be that much higher, getting quite a different perspective of the surrounding trees and terrain. Caribou get that level of view, and higher, as the snow accumulates. With “snowshoe” feet, they browse lichens at a higher and different level than they would in summer. The snow will hold them up more than it will a moose.
A deep snow cover enables both people and animals to traverse more easily over much of the ground vegetation, rocks and windfalls. Unless the area had been seen in summer, one would hardly know that they weren’t having to wrestle through “mountain misery” (white mountain rhododendron) or endure a painful whopping by devil’s club.
If one were to venture into the creekside forest along Summit Creek at the Char Creek Forest Service Road, it might be found that the events that take place over fall and winter, leading up to the time when a person may travel more easily through a forested area, are quite diverse, producing more than a straightforward outcome.
From the Char Creek road bridge over Summit Creek we could see several areas where the water wasn’t bridged over by snow. In one of those spots, a log that lay across the creek over open water was laden with five feet of snow. The different snowfalls could be seen in the many layers of this wall of snow. On snowshoes we entered down off the road into what looked like a flatish area along the creek to the left of the road several hundred feet south of the bridge. By the humps and bumps and depressions in the snow it was very evident the groundscape certainly wasn’t smooth, even though, with the deep snow cover, travel was relatively easy.
Several of the deep depressions or pits in the snow cover, as much as four feet deep, had very little snow accumulation. Some were wet, indicating a seep that melted successive snow falls. It was best to snowshoe around the pits as one could slide into the hole on the crust under the five inches of fresh snow. We did the same with the “tree wells”. Where two trees were close together, a narrow bridge of snow separated the two tree wells. Some of these bridges were narrow and slippery, Here ski poles helped prevent sliding one way or the other into a five-foot-deep well under the branches of a tree.
Sliding into a tree well or deep snow hollow isn’t a difficult undertaking. Sometimes getting out is another story, especially if the skis or snowshoes end up above one’s body. Then, the next move is to get the footwear lower than the body. It might mean taking skis or snowshoes off to get out. Tree wells can be blamed on the tree’s branches. Snow lands on the branches and ultimately melts or sublimates, evaporates without melting, leaving bare ground under the tree. Tree wells do offer shelter in emergency.
While somewhat following the creek, we encountered steep slopes in two places. To continue along the creek, here it was easier to use one of the many snow bridges to reach the other side and an easier route. Sometimes steep slopes are unavoidable. In one instance, we looked for an inclined ridge in the snow that would take us to the bench above. Here again, the ski poles were not just helpful but a necessity for holding on the slope. Cleated snowshoes are certainly an advantage if not a necessity.
Well, there are some pointers about snowshoeing in deep woods, over deep snow. And if not pointers, then reminders or perhaps something to muse about.
Ed McMackin is a biologist by profession but a naturalist and hiker by nature. He can be reached at 250-866-5747.
