Ice caves in high altitude karstic areas

High altitude karstic environments often preserve permanent ice deposits within caves, representing the lesser-known portion of the cryosphere. Despite being not so widespread and easily reachable as mountain glaciers and ice caps, ice-caves preserve several information about past environmental changes and paleoclimatic evolution. Since their main characteristics is to have ground-ice older than 2 years, many authors are prone to consider ice-caves as sporadic permafrost phenomena. Here, from the "Vasto ice-cave" looking at th enetrance in the Canin-Kanin massif (2587 m a.s.l.) in the Julian Alps in the exceptional December 2015 with extremely dry conditions. Almost no snow on the ground in one of the most snowy areas of the Alps having mean annual precipitation higher than 3300 mm w.e