The last half of June saw over 1000 hail reports across western Canada with the vast majority of them coming from Saskatchewan.
Tyson Ryhorechuk, President of the Canadian Crop Hail Association, said most reports came in following the string of tornadoes that occurred on June 19. They include areas east and southeast of Regina, east of Estevan, Frobisher, Rosetown to Plenty, Nealburg, Shaunovan, Nokomis to Lanigan, and Ituna.
The hailstorms didn't end there. Ryhorechuk said every day between June 23 and 29, there was some sort of hail event in Saskatchewan, with hail sizes ranging from pea-size to toonie-size. However, he said given that crops were in the early stages of development, the chances of recovery were good in most areas.
He adds there are a few differences between the hail seen this season and last season.
"In comparison to last year, as an example, we had seen a lot of hail in early June, and then it kind of trickled off towards the end of June, whereas this year is obviously the opposite. Early June, we hadn't seen much hail, but the latter portion of the month there, we had seen a lot more hail than what we did this time last year. If you're looking at overall claims experience, it's running just about par from last year for the amount of claims that are out in the countryside."
Ryhorechuk said due to the large amount of claims coming in, there will be a lot of adjusters bustling around to attend claims in a timely fashion.
"Organization and preparation is crucial in effective claims adjudication. As an industry, we're asking that farmers are diligent and timely in filing their claims, as it allows companies to best plan and prepare claims for their adjusters in the field to make sure that they're getting their routes and they're timing everything done in a timely fashion." he said.
Hail insurance companies like Ag Direct Hail Insurance have been busy this season.
Executive Vice President Bruce Lowe said the quantity of hail across the Prairies was "pretty much on par with what we see over the last 10 and 20 year averages."
"I will say that Saskatchewan's got a little bit more than their fair share than we typically see. Over the last couple of weeks, like the latter part of June, we had some heavy losses in the Rosetown area from storms. This past week, we saw a little bit in Plenty and Debden and Stump Lake area and around Assiniboia. So just a little bit higher than we normally see, but we've got things rolling and hopefully, you know, we can just continue to dodge some of these storms and have these guys get this stuff in the bin at the end of the season." added Lowe.
(With files from Keira Miller, CJWW)
