by People in agriculture and recreation in Saskatchewan have been calling for snow for the past few months. Now that the snow has finally arrived in much of the province, some are breathing a sigh of relief, but for others it may be a little too late.
Mission Ridge Winter Park – located about 75 kilometers east of Regina – welcomes the snow with gusto. Anders Svenson, business manager at the park, said the cold temperatures mean ski hill operators can finally look forward to happy customers on the slopes.
“This is what we have been waiting for so far this season – really cold temperatures so that we can make a lot of snow really quickly. So we are looking forward to it,” said Svenson.
He said Mission Ridge makes 100 percent of its own snow during the season. Hot temperatures can affect what they can produce. Ideal conditions for snowmaking usually require temperatures below -10 C. Svenson told CBC back in December that it takes about 400 hours of those conditions to completely cover the field.
On Monday, he said the park was able to operate partially through the Christmas season, despite the dry weather. But the predicted cold temperatures give him hope that the hill will be fully open for the rest of the winter season.
“Less natural snow doesn’t make people think about skiing. When everything around you is brown you don’t think about skiing. So we saw a little [of] reduced numbers,” Svenson said.
Between 10 and 15 million gallons of water have been loaded into snow guns like this to make snow at Mission Ridge this season, according to the park’s business manager. (Ethan Williams/CBC)
While skiers prepare to enjoy the new powder, farmers like Ian McCreary remain concerned about the lingering effects of the summer drought.
“This amount of snow will not make or break next year’s crop. Most of southwestern Saskatchewan and southeastern Alberta are in perhaps one of the worst droughts of my life,” said McCreary, a grain farmer and cattle in the Bladworth area, 100 kilometers southeast of Saskatoon.
He said his land has about eight feet of mostly dry soil, which is in line with what the International Panel on Climate Change had predicted. He said droughts would become more severe and more frequent.
Farmers welcome any moisture
Cherilyn Jolly-Nagel, past president of the Canadian Wheat Growers Association and a farmer in Mossbank, about 70 kilometers southwest of Moose Jaw, said this is the eighth consecutive year her farm has experienced drought. She said more snow could help crop prospects.
“For the last seven years we’ve had low annual rainfall, so there’s not enough water to grow our normal higher yielding crops, and we rely heavily during the winter on either good rain in the fall, good winter rain, rain good. in the spring or some fluffy white snow,” Jolly-Nagel said.
But Jolly-Nagel said she’s ready if things stay dry.
“These drought conditions have been experienced by every generation of farmers before me and there is not much we can do about it,” she said.
“I know that I know that farmers and our families have gone through this before, they’ve experienced it and they got it. I would say that there are much better insurance programs available to us now. Because that, I’m grateful for that.”
Ian McCreary, a grain and cattle farmer in the Bladworth area, says Saskatchewan is experiencing one of the worst droughts in his life. He says the latest snowfall won’t do much to help the next round of crops. (Chances Lagaden/CBC)
McCreary said that while he believes the moisture from the snowfall won’t make a difference to next season’s crop, any moisture is always welcome.
“We didn’t lose a crop in January. So you don’t give up your crop in January. Three inches of rain in the summer at the right time will definitely help out and leave us with something,” McCreary said.
“I think everybody is looking at their operation at this time of year to say which crops are a little bit better under drought conditions than others. In our case, what are those crops that do a little more better under the great pressure of the grasshopper?”
McCreary said the best thing for farmers to do is get seed in the ground as soon as possible to take advantage of any spring snowmelt.
Meanwhile, McCreary emphasized that these droughts are caused by greenhouse gas emissions. He said everyone must do their part to keep emissions down.
The drought trend continues
Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) says conditions in southern and central Saskatchewan have been generally dry in recent years, and significantly drier between the 2022/23 fall/winter season and the 2023/24 fall/winter season.
“Some of this is from a trend that had already started to form in 2020,” said Natalie Hazel, warning preparedness meteorologist for the ECCC.
“It’s still a concern that it’s always this dry.”
Much of central and southern Saskatchewan finally got the snowfall it had been waiting for over the weekend of January 6th. (CBC/Radio-Canada)
Hazel said there will be some precipitation in the coming days in central parts and swaths of southern Saskatchewan, but not “massive amounts of snow.”
December was hot in the province, but now the soil is frozen because the temperature has dropped. That means, Coll said, that the soil is likely to stay dry.
“So even if we had liquid precipitation, it’s not going to go anywhere. It’s going to sit on top of the soil or run off and therefore not make it into the soil. And the what we need is liquid into the soil.”
Hazel said farmers will be watching what happens when the thaw starts in the spring, and how much precipitation overwhelms the Prairies.
