Kristen Villebrun and Wendy Bush hoped they wouldn't have to pray for Chedoke Creek, but four years after they first raised alarm about the water's condition, they were part of an Indigenous full moon ceremony to do just that. About 50 people showed up near Princess Point on the dark and frigid Monday evening for the monthly ceremony, which was particularly special as it focused on Chedoke Creek. The body of water that runs into Cootes Paradise had about 24 billion litres of sewage and storm water runoff leak into it due to a gate being left open.
“You shade the plant that you're growing with a partially transparent solar cell. It provides a little microclimate underneath it, so it conserves water, and then you get more growth,” Pearce explained. Vertical or movable solar panel options allow for plants like corn or wheat to grow high or for tractors to manoeuvre around crops, Pearce added. Outside of fields, solar panels can also be attached to greenhouses roofs or potentially even floated on bodies of water.
Just under two months ago, Elise Walker was sure her farm near the Milk River would experience another summer of drought conditions. But with a cool, rainy spring now in the rearview, things are looking much different. The native prairie has a nice green tinge, she said, and the rain keeps coming. "It makes a huge difference, considering how dry we've been the past 12 months," she told the Calgary Eyeopener Monday.
For over four decades, Huy Fong Foods has made its world-famous sriracha hot sauce in Irwindale, Calif. — until the worsening climate crisis finally caught up with the company. Severe heat and drought have hit the hot pepper crops sriracha is made from, forcing the company to suspend production until at least the fall this year. It's not just peppers in trouble. California, a major supplier of fruits and vegetables to Canada and the rest of the U.S., is now in the third year of a severe drought. This year has been the driest on record for the state, impacting its main growing region and most of its crops.
Although drought is a natural part of the climate cycle in the Prairies, climate researchers are warning that droughts will become more common and more intense. "When we think about climate change, I think we can be expecting to experience more drought in the future," says James Famiglietti, a hydrologist with the University of Saskatchewan who has been studying global freshwater availability for over a decade. "[Drought] will become the new normal." But farmers have many tools to deal with this threat. From water reservoirs to drought-resistant crops, farmers the world over are practising various adaptation measures to remain viable.
Tom Johnson didn't recognize his own land Saturday morning. "I thought I was in a different country because two days ago everything was brown," he said. The rancher near Oak Point, Man., woke up to green pastures, buds on his yard's trees and a bit of optimism. Parts of southern and central Manitoba saw between 40 and 110 millimetres of rain between Friday and Saturday — the first significant rainfall some areas have seen in months.
Saskatchewan's Ministry of Agriculture announced $119 million in support for cattle producers on Tuesday. The funding is intended to help producers who have faced extra costs, such as accessing water and feed, as a result of the ongoing drought. Funding will also be available to other livestock producers. The support falls under the AgriRecovery program, part of the Canadian Agricultural Partnership agreement. The province is asking the federal government to provide an additional $178 million for the program.
Winnipeg set a new record for the driest July since records began nearly 150 years ago in 1873. Rob Paola, a retired Environment Canada meteorologist who still follows weather and weather history in southern Manitoba, says the Winnipeg airport recorded 8.5 millimetres of rain this past July, when the 30-year average is 75.8 millimetres. That comes after a prolonged 21-month dry spell that has depleted groundwater sources and sucked the moisture out of the soil.
At Michell Farms on the Saanich Peninsula, the pumps are working 24/7. Water is rushing out of wells at about 600 gallons a minute into a series of ponds, and then pushed through pipes to irrigation systems to keep the family’s crops alive and growing. With no measurable rain for nearly two months now, and nothing but heat in the forecast, water is becoming a precious resource. On many of the Gulf Islands, visitors are being asked to bring their own water. Residents are urged to do everything to preserve wells, aquifers and natural bodies of water. Some marinas aren’t filling water tanks for boaters.
Drought is impacting the agriculture sector across Canada but the brunt of the dry weather is being felt in Manitoba and Saskatchewan, where moisture levels have been low since last fall. Moisture levels have improved in B.C. and Alberta, where there’s been more precipitation and snowpack. Ontario has received about half of the precipitation expected at this time of the year.
Manitoba farmer Chuck Fossay has never seen his fields this dry. As he scoops up a handful of black top soil, it runs through his fingers like sand. "It's just bone dry. And there's nothing there to support the seed and the crop to grow," he said. Farming near Starbuck, Man., about 20 minutes west of Winnipeg, Fossay is trying to get his canola into the ground. He's planting a little deeper this year, hoping to find moisture so the seeds can germinate and start growing. He hopes that with some well-timed rain, he can still salvage a near-average crop but with conditions this dry, he said it's likely compromised before it's even planted.
As the climate continues to warm at an alarming rate, experts warn if dramatic steps to mitigate global warming are not taken, the effects in Canada’s Prairie region will be devastating to the country’s agriculture sector. According to Environment and Climate Change Canada, the country is warming, on average, about double the global rate. Scientists with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in the U.S. recently found 2020 was earth’s second-hottest year on record, with the average land and ocean surface temperature across the globe at 0.98 of a degree C above the 20th-century average. However, the agency found the northern hemisphere saw its hottest year on record, at 1.28 degrees C above the average.
A new University of Saskatchewan smartphone app will help farmers and communities identify hotspots of nutrient contamination in freshwaters and possibly predict where algae blooms — slimy, plant-like green organisms that hinder water quality — are likely to grow. “Tracking how and where agricultural nutrients, which help crops grow, may be washed away with rainfalls and snowmelt is a major concern for both researchers and the public, and that’s where our app comes in,” said Environment and Climate Change Canada scientist Diogo Costa.
