Massive snowfall needed this winter after summer of drought: Manitoba infrastructure minister

Manitoba's extremely dry summer and unseasonably warm fall have led to historic lows for river and lake levels across the province.

And that could mean trouble come spring — unless the province gets an enormous snowfall this winter, Infrastructure Minister Ron Schuler says.

"We haven't seen something like this since the 1930s, so we are very concerned," Schuler told host Shannah-Lee Vidal in a Friday interview on CBC's Radio Noon.

"If we do not get a substantially above-average snowfall this winter, we could be in serious trouble next spring."

Water flow on the Assiniboine River at Headingley is about half of what it normally is this time of year — around 560 cubic feet per second, compared to normal flows around 1,000 cubic feet per second.

"And that number keeps dropping," Schuler said.

While there has been a bit of rain in recent weeks, that precipitation has all been absorbed into the ground.

The soil is in turn being dried out by continued warm temperatures, Schuler said, though that will slow down somewhat once some frost sets in.

But he's worried about what the trend will mean for Manitoba's agriculture producers, who were already hit hard by the summer drought.

That dry weather resulted in poor growth in pastures, which often meant animals had to be moved multiple times to graze, and sometimes a great distance. Many farmers had to sell off their animals in emergency sales, and some went out of business altogether.

"Agriculture is struggling already with the dry [weather] that we had this last summer. If we go in this dry into next spring, it could end up being very, very bad for agriculture. And it'll also be very bad for our lakes," Schuler said.

One longtime resident of the rural municipality of Headingley, just west of Winnipeg, said he's never seen anything like what's happening to Manitoba's water levels right now.

"It's kind of alarming," said Ed Johner, who has lived in the RM for almost 50 years

"People will start having foundation problems because their soil is moving away from their basement walls. It has all kinds of repercussions. I'm very concerned."

And low water levels aren't just an odd sight — they also pose a threat for anyone who needs the water for drinking or hydroelectricity.

The City of Morden already had to restrict water usage this summer due to low water levels on Lake Minnewasta, the source of drinking water for the southern Manitoba community.

And Manitoba Hydro announced in September it doesn't expect to meet its export targets this winter due to the drought. 

In the future, Schuler said Manitoba needs to invest in climate resiliency projects to deal with extreme swings in the weather, which could lead to a one-in-1,000-year flood event being followed the next year by drought.

"That probably will involve looking at starting to hold the water back and not just letting it all flow north and just trying to get it out of our watershed, because we are going to need it," he said.