Ag Weather Forum

Showers Show Some Promise For W. Canada

Doug Webster
By  Doug Webster , DTN Senior Ag Meteorologist

There appear to be changes blowing in the wind which may bring some relief to drought stressed crops across western Canada during the next week. Very warm and mostly dry weather will continue into the weekend before a stalled front stretching from west to east across the central Prairies gains a little energy as a couple of low pressure areas make a journey along the front during the next week.

While we are not predicting a widespread beneficial soaking for the region we do see opportunity for many areas to see at least some modest relief from the dry conditions. During the period from Saturday through the middle of next week we should see daily threats of scattered showers and a few thundershowers across most all of the Prairies.

While every location may not see rain each day we feel that over the several day span most locations should see one or two days with some helpful amounts of showers. Crops are struggling in most areas, falling behind normal plant growth stages for this time of the season due to the dry conditions.

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Areal coverage of short to very short soil moisture levels continues to build and rainfall is needed soon to prevent some rather large crop losses for the season. As we have seen all season, Manitoba has fared the best with respect to rainfall with southern and eastern areas actually a little too wet for some. There has also been a little improvement across parts of southern Alberta during the past week with scattered showers for some but on the whole dry conditions are a major issue for most of Alberta and Saskatchewan.

Our hopes for some increased rainfall are pinned to the idea of the stalled front and low pressure areas moving along it during the next week helping to induce showers and a few thundershowers. It is not out of the question a few thunderstorms could become strong and produce some strong winds and hail for a few spots but the rainfall produced by these storms will be more than welcome.

The upper level pattern evolving will allow for a bit of a battle ground between cooler weather across the northern Prairies and rather warm weather across the southern Prairies and the northern U.S. for a several day period. We have seen little of this pattern during the past couple of months which has lead us down the road into dry conditions.

Longer range model forecasts are also showing some optimism for those looking for rainfall. For the first time in several weeks we are seeing near to above normal rainfall forecast for most of the Prairies for the second half of July into early August. If these forecasts verify we could see rains arrive just in time to help save the crop season for many farmers.

During the first week of July we have seen some cooler weather arrive for most areas bringing some minor help to the crops suffering through the dry conditions. Temperature outlooks for the next few weeks indicate eastern areas may see some cooler weather at times while the west sees a little more warmth but not any extreme heat as it appears now.

Doug Webster can be reached at doug.webster@dtn.com

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