By Brian Konrad

Million dollar rain

Southeast soaker has farmers doing a happy dance

May 22, 2020 | 9:39 AM

CYPRESS COUNTY — Nearly 29 millimetres of rain fell in Medicine Hat in the 48-hour period ending at midnight on Thursday, with similar amounts recorded in automated stations across the district.

While the rain may make for grumpy city folk, farmers and ranchers like Nichole Neubauer in Cypress County were doing their happy dance.

Neubauer says it felt like Christmas morning.

“It really did. Old-time guys always called it a million-dollar rain and that is what this is. We’ve been looking for this for a lot of years because we’ve experienced multiple years of drought here in southeast Alberta” said Neubauer.

Neubauer says the general rain will soak down and help newly planted seed to germinate, while it will also keep the topsoil from blowing in the wind.

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The rain is also beneficial to native grass pastures that were also struggling.

“We were quite concerned what grazing was going to look like for the cows this summer, because that’s their number one food source so this nice, general soaking rain is going to do a world of good for our grass” according to Neubauer, who says their farm had in excess of 50 millimetres as of Thursday morning.

Neubauer says going forward, crops will need heat to help them grow, with timely rain as the plants leaf out and then additional moisture as the heads begin to fill.