Dear Authors - congratulations! The paper is almost ready for publication. I have a few minor comments from an additional reviewer of the revised m/s that need attention before accepting the paper:

1. On page 2 lines 7-10 the impression is given that MODIS is somehow superior to other visible satellites but it is also affected by the same cloud cover limitations as AVHRR. I suggest you revise lines 7-15 to describe more generally the developments in visible satellite monitoring of snow cover over time.

2. Page 2 lines 12-13: Amospheric pollutants are not a stong limitation on snow cover mapping compared to cloud cover. I suggest you remove this unless you have some references to support this claim.

3. Page 2 line 29-31: Brown and Robinson (2011) should be included after Frei et al 1999 as a more recent example of blending reconstructed and satellite derived snow cover information.

Brown, R. D., and D. A. Robinson, 2011: Northern Hemisphere spring snow cover variability and change over 1922–2010 including an assessment of uncertainty. Cryosph., 5, 219–229, doi:10.5194/tc-5-219-2011

Thank you! Ross Brown

Congratulations! Your paper is accepted for publication. Many thanks for your prompt responses to reviwers and editor.

Best regards, Ross Brown.