It is also predicted to be warmer than normal in the northern US regions from the Rockies east to the Great Lake region. It is in this area where we make the connection. A warmer winter for Saskatchewan should not send everyone in the province into a state of depression. Warmer than normal would be nice, however drier than normal would not be welcome in much of the province. I have never seen it so dry at this time of year.
Many potholes are dry that have never been so before.
The soil is particularly dry after a year where in Southeast Saskatchewan many farmers reported less than 3 inches of rain during the growing season and not much since. The risk of crop failure in much of southern Sask. One lesson learned during this past year that may help us plan for future dry conditions was how to manage soil moisture with reduced tillage. Many farmers who received lower than normal rainfall were still pulling off crops that were average or in some cases significantly above average. Some of our members were reporting as much as a fifty percent difference between their LDS fields and those of their neighbors that were conventionally seeded.