Watermelon snow

[1] This type of snow is common during the summer in alpine and coastal polar regions worldwide, such as the Sierra Nevada of California.

Snow algae dominates glacial biomass immediately after the onset of melting, and its pigmentation can significantly darken the surface of a glacier.

[3][4] Watermelon snow has puzzled mountain climbers, explorers, and naturalists for thousands of years, some speculating that it was caused by mineral deposits or oxidation products that were leached from rocks.

Captain John Ross noticed crimson snow that streaked the white cliffs like streams of blood as they were rounding Cape York on the northwest coast of Greenland.

Professor Brande to the usual tests, and it is found to be precisely of the kind of the meteoric stones that occasionally fall in more southern latitudes.

[7] The phenomenon was also reported from the Scottish Highlands in the nineteenth century and subsequently recorded scientifically from a snowpatch in the Cairngorm Mountains in 1967.

The carotenoid pigment absorbs heat and as a result it deepens the sun cups, and accelerates the melting rate of glaciers and snowbanks.