How will record-breaking warm weather affect Saskatchewan farmland?

While many people are getting out to enjoy the unusually warm weather, farmers are nervously waiting to see what this winter melt means for spring seeding.

Bob Bohun has farmed long enough to know what untimely warm weather could mean for his operation.

With Wednesday marking the fourth consecutive day of above-freezing temperatures across the province, the Hafford-area farmer fears the rapid melting followed by many weeks of freezing will create a layer of ice over his farmland and have melting snow run off into sloughs and ditches rather than the soil beneath it.

“It depends how quick the weather warms up — a fast melt will make the water run — or a slow melt will still soak into the ground where it needs to be for our drier climates,” he said.

Warmer weather in the winter is nothing new for Bohun, but what was once a fleeting experience is now most of the five-day forecast.

“We have experienced (this) in the past, but it was very short. We’d get what they call an Alberta Clipper and it’d be only hours long. Now we’re experiencing them in days long, which is quite a bit different,” Bohun said.

University of Saskatchewan hydrologist and director of the Global Water Futures Programme, John Pomeroy, says conversations about warm weather in January may become more common as winters overall are trending to be warmer, with spring arriving earlier.

“Last year was, looks like to be, the third warmest year ever recorded, and the other two were within the past three years,” he said. “So, this is all part of that trend. And the warming is greatest in winters and particularly winter nights have warmed up the most.”

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Pomeroy says Saskatchewan’s winters have seen substantial warming over time as prolonged periods of -30 C to -40 C weather are less common.

Farmland is experiencing a tale of two worlds with drought in much of the west, south and southern parts of the province as the east and northern areas are wetter than normal because of additional rain in September.

Pomeroy backed Bohun’s experience with a melt at this time of year likely creating a layer of ice that could cap the soil. However, he says runoff replenishing creeks, wells and sloughs has a variety of other benefits like recharging groundwater, which then evaporate and can help drive summer rainfall events.

“It gets used by nature one way or another.” he said.

Whether it was for ice fishing, snowmobiling or looking ahead to spring seeding, weather was top of mind for many people at the Western Canadian Crop Production Show in Saskatoon on Wednesday.

“I think it’ll make her easier in the spring,” Albertville farmer Leo Gignac said. “The moisture might stay where it is. It seals off. It shouldn’t blow any more.”

Another possibility suggested by Pomeroy is the wind affecting any exposed soil in parts of the province. He says this could dry out the soil and have it drier than when it entered the winter rather than replenished .

“We’ve got very strange conditions overall throughout western Canada right now,” Pomeroy said.

With colder temparatures expected by the end of the week, Pomeroy says a slow melt over many weeks is what farmers will be looking for to ease any concerns this weather system may have introduced.

And that’s exactly the type of conditions Bohun has been imagining all winter long.

“We’d like a nice slow melt and have a soak in versus a total runoff,” he said.