Irrigation farming may no longer be sustainable in Alberta, say water advocates, who point to lower water levels across the province due to receding glaciers and less snow in the mountains.

About 70 per cent of the surface water used in Alberta every year is used for irrigating crops. Less water and more demand for it could spell the end for some farms in Southern Alberta.

About 70 per cent of the surface water used in Alberta every year is used for irrigating crops, such as these near Lethbridge.
(CBC News/Erin Collins)

John McKee, who uses irrigation on his farm south of Lethbridge, said it is essential to farming in Southern Alberta.

"Irrigation provides stability and allows you a return," he said. "Even during our dry years we were able to get a crop back on the irrigated fields to allow for cash flow."

Without that money, even more farm families would be out of business, he said.

"In the town that I grew up in, I was one of many farmers, and now I think there are three farm families that go to Sterling school now."

Alberta drier than the '30s

Studies by Dave Sauchyn, a climate change expert with the Prairie Adaptation Research Centre in Regina, suggests that Alberta's farm families should brace for more dry years.

The province is already drier than it was during the dust bowl years of the '30s, he said.

The Alberta government recently imposed a moratorium on new water licences for the rivers used to irrigate Southern Alberta, including the Bow River, from which 90 per cent of the water taken is used for irrigation.

David Schindler, a world renowned water activist based in Edmonton, said the government moratorium doesn't go far enough.

"We need to take some of that water back. Irrigators aren't going to like to hear that," he said.

Schindler said more demand for less water means the days of irrigated farming in the province are numbered.