Traditionally the latter portion of the fall season for the southeast feels more like winter but that's been far from reality the last month and a half.
The average high for mid-December in the southeast is -7 C, with an average low of -19 C. The mercury this year continues to exceed the freezing point.
Environment and Climate Change Canada is projecting that trend to continue throughout the winter months with a strong El Niño forecast.
The atmospheric phenomenon is a bubble of warm air that sits off the coast of South America and pushes the Jet Stream over North America into the Arctic region.
"The Jet Stream is the delineator between the really cold air to the north and the really warm air to the south," Environment and Climate Change Canada Meteorologist Terri Lang said. "When the Jet Stream is way to the north, we aren't getting any cold air coming down at all."
The path of the Jet Stream can dictate the movement of low-pressure systems that carry precipitation. These systems tend to run along the Jet Stream and with its position in northern Saskatchewan and the territories, it leaves Saskatchewan dry.
"We're already dry, so going into a pattern where it's dry still is quite disconcerting," she said. "Not only is the ground dry, it's not replenishing the soil moisture. We need the snow in the mountains as well because that's the source of river flow."
The last El Niño winter for Saskatchewan was in 2015-16 with a temperature map from December/January/February below to show how extreme that pattern was.
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