Prairies feeling continued drought through winter months

The prairies are staying dry over the winter as the federal government's newest drought maps are showing the lack of moisture is sticking around.

The map, released monthly, details moisture levels across the country and classifies them between D0, abnormally dry, and D4, exceptional drought.

Trevor Hadwen, an agri-climate specialist with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, says the assessment isn't changing much month-to-month.

"For Saskatchewan itself, we didn't see a whole lot of changes, to be honest, when we're looking at the assessment, conditions haven't degraded enough to make it jump to another class and the only real improvement we saw was kind of in that central part of the province around Saskatoon."

A concern in Western Saskatchewan is still holding strong, as they're on the edge of a severe drought system hitting Alberta.

"We're seeing more degradation in Alberta, to be honest. In southern Alberta, we still have a very large pocket of exceptional drought," said Hadwen, "We typically don't see those during the winter period and those have held on right through the fall period and from earlier in this summer.

"We've got a large pocket along the East Central part of Alberta, Brooks and North, that is is kind of in that D4 or exceptional drought pocket and then a fairly large pocket that contains most of that southern and central region that is either in a D2 or D3, so extreme or severe drought conditions throughout much of southern Alberta."

The only exception has been a bit more moisture coming in south of Medicine Hat to provide some relief.