Droughts also create major environmental hazards such as reduced water quality, wetland loss, soil erosion and degradation, and ecological habitat destruction. Global Climate Projections, Chapter 10 in: Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, pp. Landfalling droughts, which form over the ocean and then migrate onto land, can cause larger, drier conditions than droughts that occur solely over the land. 1993. During the 20th century, mean annual air temperature has increased by around 1 °C over southern Canada with the greatest warming in the west and the largest rates during winter and spring. Getty Images.

However, increased frequencies of forest fires during drought years can have serious economic impacts. Landfalling droughts, which form over the ocean and then migrate onto land, can cause larger, drier conditions than droughts that occur solely over the land. Environment Canada produces three-month deterministic temperature and precipitation forecasts for the ensuing 1–3, 2–4, 4–6, 7–9, and 10–12 days periods. Most southern regions of Canada, however, experienced drought conditions during the late 1990s to early 2000s.

South Australia is the driest state, and droughts are quite frequent in South Australia. The area experiences constant drought that leaves half a million people with very little food and water. Adaptation involves adjusting to climate change, variability, and extremes to avoid or alleviate negative impacts and benefit from opportunities. Teleconnections between north Pacific SST anomalies and growing season extended dry spells on the Canadian Prairies, International Journal of Climatology, 13, 865–878.

Furthermore, there is little consensus regarding future changes to teleconnections and since these patterns have a significant impact on temperature and precipitation over Canada, insight into the relative occurrence of future drought remains a huge knowledge gap. Warm, dry springs are followed by hot, dry summers; warm summers follow other warm summers; and so on. Rarely has drought been as serious or extensive as the recent 1999-2004 episode. Linkages between Canadian climate and teleconnections such as the Pacific Decadal Oscillation and the North Atlantic Oscillation are also evident, but mainly during the winter season. Paleo studies over the southwestern Canadian Prairies using tree ring chronologies dating back to 1597 indicate that the 20th century lacked the prolonged droughts of the 18th and 19th Centuries when droughts were evident for decades at a time. Maybank, J., Bonsal, B.R., Jones, K., Lawford, R.G., O’Brien, E.G., Ripley, E.A.

Some regions are routinely wet and others are routinely dry. The two seasons a drought will occur are in summer and fall.

and Niitsoo, A. The years 2001 and 2002 may have also brought the first coast-to-coast droughts on record, and were rare as they struck areas less accustomed to dealing with droughts including parts of Atlantic Canada and the northern agricultural prairies (see Figure 1). Bonsal, B.R., Aider, R., Gachon, P., Lapp, S. 2013.
Brown, R.D. 2006.

Drought prediction involves anticipating climatic anomalies that produce unusually dry conditions for an extended period. The word "drought" has various meanings, depending on a person's perspective. Summer drought patterns in Canada and the relationships to global sea surface temperatures, Journal of Climate, 17, 2866–2880. Here's why: Rain and snow don’t fall evenly across Earth. Great Lakes’ water levels have shown substantial variability during the 20th century with no evidence of a long-term trend. Long-lasting impacts include soil degradation by wind erosion and deterioration of grasslands that could take decades and longer to recover. Droughts happen when there is not enough rain for a long period of time. Trends in Canadian streamflow, Water Resources Research, 37, 987–998. During the past two centuries, at least 40 droughts have occurred in western Canada with multi-year episodes being observed in the 1890s, 1910s, 1930s, 1960s, 1980s, and the early 2000s.

2001. Bonsal, B.R., Chakravarti, A.K. Climate models are projecting considerable increases to temperature and in general, small increases to precipitation over southern Canada. These range from those that only consider precipitation, to complex indices that incorporate a water balance approach using precipitation, antecedent soil moisture, potential evapotranspiration, and runoff. Canadian precipitation patterns associated with the Southern Oscillation, Journal of Climate, 10, 3016–3027. No single year on record between Medicine Hat, Kindersley, and Saskatoon was drier than in 2001. Precipitation can be divided into three categories, based on whether it falls as liquid water, liquid water that freezes on contact with the surfac… These forcing factors directly influence local to regional atmospheric flow which in turn, can affect large-scale circulation over other areas of the globe (known as teleconnections). Analysis of consecutive droughts on the Canadian Prairies, Climate Research, 30, 175–187. The site monitors the risk and status of drought over major agricultural regions of the country and also promotes practices to reduce drought vulnerability.

Though often confused with the dry spell, droughts often last longer and are more dangerous. There are various adaptation processes or strategies including sharing and/or bearing the loss, modifying drought effects, research, education, behavioral changes, and avoidance. The North American Drought Monitor [6] has been established as a cooperative effort among drought experts in Canada, Mexico, and the U.S. to monitor drought on a weekly basis. Reasons for the persistence of circulation patterns that lead to drought are not entirely understood but are likely related to surface boundary conditions such as snow and ice cover, vegetation, soil moisture, and sea-surface temperatures (SSTs) that force the climate system through variations in their optical and thermal properties. Over the last 30 to 50 years, average stream flow has decreased in many parts of Canada with significant reductions in the south.
This can happen at any given time, even in winter time, however, for most droughts, they do occur …

The worst and most prolonged Canadian Prairie-wide droughts during the instrumental period occurred in the early part of the 20th century (1920s and 1930s).

Canadians have a great deal of experience in adapting to droughts, however, their strategies vary by sector and location. For Canada, real-time information on pasture conditions, on-farm surface water supplies, and several drought indices are provided in Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada's Drought Watch [5] web site.

This translates into future increases of summer continental interior drying and associated risk of droughts.

Northern Hemisphere snow cover variability and change, 1915–97, Journal of Climate, 13, 2339–2355. Zhang, X., Vincent, L.A., Hogg, W.D. Droughts in the Atlantic Provinces occur even less frequently. Better management responses may be made with improved drought monitoring and advanced prediction.

Note that considerable uncertainty exists with respect to future precipitation, particularly on a regional basis.

For example, the number of natural Prairie ponds in May 2002 was the lowest on record while in 2001, Great Lakes-St. Lawrence water levels plunged to their lowest point in more than 30 years, thereby significantly increasing marine transportation costs. Greater Vancouver has been prone to summer droughts in recent years. A drought is a period of time when an area or region experiences below-normal precipitation.The lack of adequate precipitation, either rain or snow, can cause reduced soil moisture or groundwater, diminished stream flow, crop damage, and a general water shortage.Droughts are the second-most costly weather events after hurricanes.