116 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 
“If you will chart the distribution of precipitation and the mean 
monthly temperature at some of the places southwest of this city 
for the past two years, you will find them a very interesting study 
in the light of the yields that were secured in that portion of the prov- 
ince. We think the rains that did not fall in the summer of 1914, 
but that did come in the autumnn of that year, were the chief cause 
of the enormous difference in the yield of crops .in western Saskat- 
chewan in the past two years.”’ 
s 
One table from Prof. Bracken’s report is worth reproducing— 
it is the precipitation at Swift Current where crops were a failure in 
1914 and most abundant in 1915. 
MONTHLY PRECIPITATION AT SWIFT CURRENT 


Ten-year 
Inches Inches average 
Sept... 1913 0-48 Sept. 1914 DOI 1-023 
Oct: # 0-35 Oct: . 2-49 0-794 
Nove. 0-03 Nove = “ 0-92 0-485 
Dec. $ 0-04 Dec 0-97 0-539 
Jan. 1914 0-61 Jan. 1015 0-48 0-540 
Feb. $ 0-38 Feb ees 0-16 0-520 
March “ 0-79 March “ 0-10 0-660 
AD 0-40 . April. “ 0-00 0-660 
Total 3-08 7-29 5122 
May 1914 0-17 May 1915 4-29 1-814 
june sg. 2-31 June 2:42 3-417 
July 0-76 July ¢ Dey | 2-075 
August “ 0-51 August “ 0-76 1-762 
Total 32/5 10-14 9-068 

“From the above it will be seen that for the eight months preceding 
the crop season of 1914 the precipitation was 2-14 inches below the 
average of the ten years; that during the four months of the crop 
growing period the precipitation was 5-32 inches below the average; 
that the 1914 crop was followed by a precipitation 2-07 inches above 
the average; that the spring of 1915 was comparatively dry and the 
crop growing period of that year had a precipitation of 1-07 inches 
above the average. In other words the rains of both 1914 and 1915 
were all favorable for the crop of 1915. 
