The first snow of the year usually shows up while the trees still have most of their leaves, and it usually doesn't stay. The ground is still holding the summer's heat, so it melts from underneath within a day or two and the grass comes back green, which is why the first fall is something to go and look at rather than something to dig out. Wet snow loading a canopy that's still in leaf is what snaps limbs off full-grown trees, and on a quiet morning you can hear it happen. And it is the first day of the year you can read the ground: every rabbit, squirrel, magpie and neighbourhood cat that crossed your yard in the night has left its route written across it in a line of prints, and by noon both the prints and the snow are usually gone.