If you think it's been unseasonably dry for the last while, you're right.

Senior meteorologist David Phillips with Environment Canada says he knows this area is usually dry, but looking over the stats, he sees we've gotten only about a millimetre of precipitation in the last three weeks.

"We saw a little bit of snow in October and a fairly good dump in early November and some of it stayed and all of a sudden a big high pressure area, one of these American systems that just pump air from the south into southern Alberta came and certainly melted the snow and warmed up the temperatures," Phillips says. "I've looked at last three weeks, my gosh, I know you're dry country but talk about a millimetre of precipitation, it doesn't matter if it's rain or snow it condensed down to one millimetre."

He says we've also had higher than normal temperatures.

"I've seen 13, 14, 15 degrees and in December the temperatures have cooled off a little bit but they're still up to 5, 7 degrees," he says. "Occasionally you'll get an afternoon that's below freezing but that's only been one day this month."

This is usually the time of year when the soil moisture gets recharged but it's not happening and Phillips says while farmers don't lose their crops in December it's a bit of a concern considering how dry it was through the past growing season.

He says there's still a long ways to go to restore that moisture but it's likely we won't see that happening for the next couple of weeks.

 

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