As our summer season comes to a close, we are already making big moves to ensure a successful winter opening. In the past week, our lower slopes have been getting a HUGE back-to-school haircut.

Crews have been hard at work cutting down brush from mid-Main Street all the way over to lower Temptation.

 

These two photos show what a late-summer shearing looks like, before:

And after:

But it’s not just long grass that’s getting trimmed. If left to grow naturally, the woody brush on the slopes can be extremely stubborn, refusing to submit to the early season snowfall.

We saw that on opening day last year. A combination of mechanical and weather factors prevented us from doing our normal amount of brush cutting last fall.

So while we were in snow ghost heaven on the upper mountain…

Warm base-area temperatures left us in a lower-mountain jam…especially on Jammer.

This unyielding brush prevented us from grooming that run until a few extra storms blew through.

But this year, we’ve cropped things down early to prevent that prickly problem from jamming us up again.

The other touchy spot for snow coverage was on the lower runs leading into the base of Centennial and Bear.

But as these photos show, we’ve manicured those slopes (along with the rest of the lower mountain).

 

Making some big cuts now, to remove any obstacles that might keep us from hitting the slopes early this winter.

– April

P.S. Have a safe and happy Labor Day!