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Abstract. Values of undercatch-corrected liquid-equivalent snowfall rate (S) at a ground site and microwave reflectivity (Z) retrieved using an airborne W-band radar were acquired during overflights. The temperature at the ground site was between −6 and −15 ∘C. At flight level, within clouds containing ice and supercooled liquid water, the temperature was approximately 7 ∘C colder. Additionally, airborne measurements of snow particle imagery were acquired. The images demonstrate that most of the snow particles were rimed, at least at flight level. A relatively small set of S–Z pairs (four) is available from the overflights. Important distinctions between these measurements and those of Pokharel and Vali (2011), who reported S–Z pairs and an S–Z relationship for rimed snow particles, are (1) the fewer S–Z pairs, (2) the method used to acquire S, and (3) the altitude, relative to ground, of the W-band Z retrievals. This analysis corroborates the fact that the S–Z relationship reported in Pokharel and Vali (2011) yields an S – in scenarios with snowfall produced by riming – substantially larger than that derived using an S–Z relationship developed for unrimed snow particles. 

Abstract Snowfall is an important driver of physical and biological processes in alpine systems. Previous work has shown that surface deposition of snow can vary for reasons not directly related to precipitation processes and that this variance has consequence for water budgets in snow-dominated terrestrial systems. In this work, measurements were made over several winter seasons in a forest–meadow ecotone in the Rocky Mountains of southeastern Wyoming. Two groups of measurements—both with wind-exposed and sheltered precipitation gauges—were analyzed. Reasonable agreement between snow deposition from a Hotplate gauge (exposed) and snow deposition from a SNOTEL pillow gauge (sheltered) is reported. The other result is that snow deposition is enhanced at an exposed gauge that was deployed on the leeward side of a forest–meadow edge. The enhancement is approximately a factor of 2 and varies with wind direction and speed and with upwind forest coverage. The enhancement is greater than was documented in an earlier investigation of Rocky Mountain snow deposition; however, in that study measurements were conducted above tree line.