Nature Walk: Snowing

Snow comes down in total silence unless it is wind-driven. Then we only hear the sound of the wind. Snowflakes are thin, wafer-like and appear as ice crystals close-up. They are usually six-sided or hexangonal due to the crystal structure of ordinary ice, but can also be triangular in shape and may not be perfectly symmetrical. The most common story we have all heard is that no two snowflakes are identical, however, the laws of probability almost certainly bring that statement into question. Here we see heavy snow driven by a south wind that has reduced visibility to less than one-half mile.