"It's like we're the doormat of Manitoba," says Scott Chalmers from the Melita area. "Every storm seems to come through the Souris River and enter the province, at least the big ones anyway."
As an Applied Research Specialist with Manitoba Agriculture, Chalmers keeps his eyes on the skies watching for the next system that's developing in Saskatchewan or North Dakota making its way east.
"We are at 130 mm of rain since a month ago, May 15th or so, and that is equivalent to 44% above normal rainfall," he explains. "So, that's starting to add up. That's just over 5 inches and I don't know if we got five inches in the last 2 years during the growing season combined, let alone in just one month!"
"But what a huge difference rain makes, and we have an incredible crop on the go," he adds.
On a trip to Winnipeg this week, Scott Chalmers noted the standing water on fields along the Trans-Canada Highway. "On our drive from about Austin to Winnipeg I was watching the fields and every single field had water laying in it and very, very soggy conditions. There are just a few fields that went unseeded. I was also up in Arborg last week and they just got most of it in but there are still a few acres that are unseeded up there, and of course the deadlines have passed for the most part in getting other crops in."
This past Tuesday St. Lazare received 49.7 mm in that one day. "If you get the right couple of clouds, like the atmospheric river type clouds they just keep dumping and dumping," explains Chalmers. "What was maybe forecast to be an inch turns into two inches just because you hit the clouds right."
Where is that fine line when there is too much rain?
Chalmers says with all this moisture he would love to see the heat units that we would typically see in June.
"Looking at the crop heat units we're actually about 11% behind on normal heat accumulation at this point in time. So that just means harvest might be pushed a little later," he adds. "But you never know. If the forecast changes here. We're supposed to have another week of heat coming ahead of us here, followed by another downturn into cool conditions. So, I think we're kind of just stuck in a wet cycle."
Please listen to more with Scott Chalmers below!
The Melita Crop Day is scheduled for July 25th. A full day is lined up from 10 am to 3 pm with charter buses to move participants from site to site. A BBQ lunch will be served.
Registration information, please call Scott at 204-522-5415