With little hay to sell, the bulk saved to feed his cattle over the winter, southern Alberta rancher John Bland remembers well the dry conditions last year that threatened his livelihood.

“We’ve never had such a failure in hay ever – in 30 years – as we did last year,” the 64-year-old farmer said. “We had hundreds and hundreds of acres last year that we never cut. There was nothing there to cut.”

Fields failed to grow and fellow ranchers sold off their herds, unable or unwilling to pay to import food.

Now, Alberta is in the grip of a once-in-a-generation drought with the driest back-to-back years on record since the 1880s, poised grimly to drag into a third year with little snow over the winter and, according to Environment Canada, a long, hot spring and summer ahead.

“It’s almost as if nature has forgotten to rain and snow in Alberta,” says David Phillips, senior climatologist with Environment Canada.

Precipitation shortages, compounded by the increased demand of a booming economy and growing population, have left Alberta with an unprecedented water crisis.

The effects of another year of dry conditions could be wide-ranging – this year is expected to bring more pests and more wildfires than last year.

But in a province with 60 per cent of the country’s irrigation, the shortages are hardest felt in the fields and pastures.

“I think times are as tough as we’ve seen them,” said Mr Bland, who normally grows about 1,400 hectares of hay and maintains 330 to 350 head of cattle at his ranch in Cheadle, east of Calgary. He harvested 8,500 bales in 2008, but watched that tally slip to just 1,300 in 2009 – a loss of about $720,000.

A freak spring snowstorm recently blanketed much of Alberta, but with soil moisture now at critically low levels, and 70 per cent of the province declared a drought disaster last year, it won’t make a dent.