Sask. farmers eye spring runoff as temperatures rise

WATCH: Farmers are itching to get seeding as the snow melts quickens apace. Here's the forecast for the next few weeks.

As snow in fields across the province melts away, farmers are eager to get their seeds into the ground. Stems are poking out from under the blanket that covered them all winter.

And with above-seasonal temperatures this week — it’s melting fast.

“It’s going to disappear really quickly,” said Jeremy Welter, vice president of the Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan (APAS), also a farmer in west-central Saskatchewan.

“The hope is that a lot of that moisture sinks in. I went walking through a couple of areas that the snow was gone already, I probably sank well past my ankle, so there’s definitely a pile of moisture sitting in that first little bit of topsoil.”

The Water Security Agency (WSA) says from Saskatoon down to Moose Jaw and as far east as Wynyard, the potential runoff is above normal for this spring.

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The WSA, confirmed by farmers in the south, says fields down near the U.S. border are mostly or fully cleared.

But a little north of Saskatoon, the WSA predicts below normal runoff, and last month was no help.

“In Prince Albert, [it received just] 15 per cent of its normal precipitation for March,” said Danielle Desjardins, warning preparedness meteorologist with Environment Canada.

“So that put it at seventh driest March on record. And then another few stations to the north, also it ended up quite dry.”

Desjardins says Saskatoon recorded 87 per cent of its normal precipitation in March, and while it was drier up north, it’s still more precipitation than last year.

Farmers like Welter say snowfall is important over the winter, but it’s of little use if the snow doesn’t get into the soil. If the fall and winter are extremely cold with a sharp warmup, he says the ground will still be frozen, and all the water will run off into waterways.

“None of it’s going to penetrate because the ground won’t have time to thaw out,” said Welter. “I think the ground has certainly thawed out a little bit, and you really question how deep that frost level went considering how dry it was in the fall.”

And while there’s another system headed our way that could bring more rain, or even snow up north, Environment Canada predicts a warmer spring and summer.

“Not to say you can’t get some cold days in there,” said Desjardins. “But overall, when we look at the end of that period, we are expecting it to be above seasonal temperature-wise, over the course of, I guess the next four or five months.”

When asked if it’s preferred to have a field up on a hill or in a depression, Welter says it depends on the crop, and the part of the province you’re farming in.

“I would say we are a lot closer to the extreme level of dry land farming,” he said.

“I’ve got some friends in other parts of the province and they send me pictures of some of the fields they try to farm, and it seems like there’s as much water as there is dirt on the field. It’s really hard to say, if you’re going through an abnormally wet year, it’s better to have your land a little higher up. If you’re going through some of the drier years, some of those lower areas are probably the only place you’re going to grow a crop. It really depends on the type of year you’re having and the conditions.”

He adds that crop rotations and herbicide rotations are planned years in advance, so there’s not likely any changes farmers can make depending on the runoff.

“We don’t have the luxury anymore of just waking up and going, you know I think I’ll put wheat in this field today,” Welter told CTV News.