Phoenix Lander in Springtime (Natural Colors; credits: Dr Paolo C. Fienga - Lunexit Team)

With early Spring at the Phoenix Landing Site comes the progressive sublimation of the Carbon Dioxide frost that has blanketed the Lander and surrounding terrain throughout the Winter.
During the long Polar-Winter Night, atmospheric CO2 freezes onto the Surface building up a layer of frost roughly 30 cm (about one foot) thick.
In the Spring this frost returns to the Atmosphere as gas (sublimates) over the course of several months. This image, part of a seasonal frost monitoring sequence, shows some areas of bare ground are beginning to be exposed. However, extensive frost patches remain in the topographic lows, such as the Troughs of the local polygonally patterned surface.

Even when the frost has completely sublimated, it must be underlined that the Dust deposited during the Winter could actually obscure (and "erase", in a view from atop) any and all the "Man-Made Features" that are still barely visible here (Backshell and Parachute, Heat-Shield and Lander).

The Parachute that is attached to the Backshell, in fact, is not apparent in this image, and we'll see if it reappears in later images.
Also gone are the dark halos around Lander, Backshell and Heat-Shield - again, this is due to seasonal frost and/or dust.

This and future images will help calibrate expectations for finding the Mars Polar Lander hardware which encountered Mars in 1999.