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Speed Of Spring Melt Will Determine Soil Moisture Levels

 
While this week's snowfall closed schools and created havoc on the roads, many farmers where pleased to see the white stuff fall.
 
There have been concerns about the low soil moisture levels heading into spring.
 
"We're not bone dry, we're not super dry but there are some areas where we could definitely use a little bit more moisture and what we generally say with that is that we're going to rely on precipitation a bit more next year than we have had too in previous years," said Marla Riekman, soil management specialist with Manitoba Agriculture.
 
She cautions it's not a sure thing that all this snow will end up in the soil.
 
"A lot of the snow that we saw was heavy, wet snow, which means there's more moisture in that snow...than we might see in some lighter, fluffier stuff," Riekman said. "The key things that we'll have to see through the spring is how quickly that snow melt actually happens. If we all of a sudden have a few warm days and this snow melt just happens really fast, we're going to see more of the snow move off of the soil rather than move down in to the soil."
 
 
Source : Steinbachonline

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