Away from the above link, I'll add a personal bit to this thread as I own a pass at Zao and ride a few days a week in places very few venture.

Zao is either a piste or a tree mecca. In Zao's territory, there is really only one (exposed) face that would ever warrant precautions... above Paradise. (which is illegal. Guides are not even welcome. It's completely shut down.)

Any and all guiding in cats or otherwise should strictly be referred to as "Zao's Backcountry", ie- Kumanodake. Zao (as a resort) is gigantic, but it is not a place that does any avy-control work; Nor is it a place where you can hire guides for the BC. There are no open faces to ski that will kill you that are only being skied by people with guides. There is no guiding at Zao. (Not in the terms that we use that language, anyway.)

Zao's BC, however, does have loads of traps. These are not places being accessed by any guiding operation AFAIK. The Cat operation is climbing from Zao's eastern slope in the forest, encounters a mild peak/face. I'm sure it offers sick tree-skiing. (Actually, it does offer sick tree skiing... it's just that that snowpack is pretty irrelevant in that area being as it's a forest and all.) That cat operation is not accessing the peaks or any exposure.

Now... with snowpack-

It's dangerous. Of course, right?

Last week we had an inverted storm roll in accompanied by high winds. It came in at around -14C and decreased to around -2C in 24 hours while it dumped 20-50cm through 60-75km/hr eastern winds = Top Heavy!!

Needless to say, tree-skiing yesterday was slab-heaven. I was triggering slabs at every entrance I had. EVERY pillow of snow ripped at my trigger. It was kinda fun... but there is no way I would be considering skinning out anywhere. The cats on the backside (not a part of Zao) were probably in similar conditions. Get hit by a slab you triggered and then thrown into a tree = ouch. Hence, a guiding operation showing you around those pillows.

If you ever want a detailed picture of TODAY'S snowpack, PM me. I'm local and I'm Level III from the American Avalanche Institute.