North America Cooling Raises Frost Potential
By Drew Lerner
Kansas City, May 10 (World Weather Inc.) – A buildup of cool air over Canada this week will bring on some frost and freeze conditions. The cold in Canada is not unusual for this time of year, but the unusually warm conditions up until now have had many farmers in the fields for several weeks and early emergence and establishment of many crops is under way raising the potential for a little plant injury. In the meantime, last freeze dates in the northern U.S. Plains and uppermost Midwest normally occur in the last half of May which would make a cold threat in this next week to ten days relatively seasonable, as well. The potential for serious crop damage in either country s low, but the situation will be closely monitored.
U.S. crops are just beginning to emerge across the northern Plains and upper Midwest. Traditionally, the earliest planted crops in the region and across all of Canada’s Prairies are the more frost and freeze resistant crops like wheat, barley, peas and even sugar beets to a certain degree. Freezes can injure these crops, but it is rare that they would have to be replanted in a light frost or light freeze event.
Corn, soybeans and canola are a little different. These crops are more susceptible to frost and freeze damage, but in the case of corn permanent crop damage rarely occurs when the growing point is still below ground level and that should be the case today in most all areas. Canola, however, is a little different crop.
Canola will often see a wide range of impacts from early season frost and freezes. Notably hard freezes will nearly always result in replanting. However light freezes will often burn back crop development, but it does not always render the crop as a loss. Temperatures dipping down to the upper 20s have occurred often and not resulted in serious production losses or heavy replanting and that should be the case again this year.
World Weather, Inc. believes most of the early season summer crops, like canola, corn and soybeans will not sustain significant crop damage during the coming week of cold weather, but temporary injury is quite likely. There is no well-organized, strong, surface high pressure center advertised for Canada or the north-central U.S., but if such a condition evolves, the potential for much colder conditions will increase. Today’s forecast suggests a considerable amount of cloudiness will come with the cool weather, but there will be breaks in the cloud cover and that is when frost and freezes are expected. Most of the coldest temperatures will be in North Dakota Minnesota, Wisconsin and the Canadian Prairies where extreme lows of 27 Fahrenheit (-3C) to 32F (0C) are expected. The coldest weather in Alberta will occur over the next several nights. Saskatchewan, Montana and North Dakota will begin cooling down Wednesday into Friday and the northern U.S. Plains, upper Midwest and Manitoba will see their greatest cooling late this week and during the weekend. It is too soon to get specific about the coldest temperatures and the timing for such conditions, but the situation is being carefully assessed.
Several traditionally colder locations near the Rocky Mountains in southwestern Alberta and in a northern Alberta’s crop country could see 
temperatures just slightly colder, but the impact is expected to be about the same.
Last year hard freezes dropping temperatures to 17 degrees Fahrenheit occurred in the Prairies after a very warm start to the spring and many crops in Canada had to be replanted. The same is not expected this year, but there will be some crop injury.
Most of the U.S. hard red winter wheat in the Plains and Midwest soft wheat production areas are unlikely to endure temperatures low enough for a serious impact on production potentials. Temperatures will be below average for a while this weekend into early next week, but the odds do not favor much “serious” crop impact.
The situation will be closely monitored. If temperatures Tuesday morning are any indication as to what is coming there will be some notably cool pockets to raise worry over crop conditions.
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