Estevan Curling Club manager dealing with farm flooding

In ordinary circumstances, the only flooding Pauline Ziehl-Grimsrud has to worry about is that of curling ice.

But this year mother nature has other ideas, with some flooding that has disrupted her family farm out near Torquay.

"With the warm weather at the beginning of the week, we've certainly seen the water moving south of Torquay," said Ziehl-Grimsrud, the longtime manager of the Estevan Curling Club. "And we had localized flooding over a number of the roads. Some of them were the backroads, which weren't a big deal, but (the water) was certainly going over a lot of the high grids."

Long Creek runs near her farm.

"It is quite full, and the bridge on the 350 Highway south of Torquay is handling the water and ice that is coming but it is very full," she said. "And then south of the river we had a lot of tributaries that come in, and those are overflowing. We went over a number of the main roads...the culverts could not handle the water and the ice pack as it let loose here on Tuesday."

That area has also caught the attention of the Water Security Agency, said spokesperson Patrick Boyle.

"It's (runoff) a bit more advanced in that Long Creek area from Radville down to Estevan," Boyle said. "With some flows rising rapidly on the lower portion of Long Creek, Boundary (Dam) reservoir levels are rising."

"We did make a diversion from Boundary to Rafferty as those flows started to arrive, and made an operation there to help with that."

Ziehl-Grimsrud said the road entering her farm has been washed out.

Photo supplied by Pauline Ziehl-Grimsrud.

"We often have water going over that road, it's low and it goes through a big coulee," she said. "But this year the difference was it busted so quickly, and we've never seen that much kind of ice flow come before. We have chunks that are 12 feet by eight feet and they're a foot deep of ice."

"We've never seen it quite come like that...it's quite the sight, these mini icebergs laying along the road."

Ziehl-Grimsrud and her husband are the third generation at their farm, having celebrated 100 years in 2008. She said there was no damage to the farmhouse itself.

"The water seems to be staying all low and running through the coulees, so we have no problem, we're up high so we didn't have any issue with that," she said. "But it did really tear up the road pretty good."

Ziehl-Grimsrud added that the RM is currently out trying to repair the roads. She hopes people avoid the area until it is safe to navigate.

"Just making sure that we have some signage up from the RM perspective and making sure people are safe and don't take chances, because you never know what's underneath that water," she said.

She said they could access their farm again as of Thursday.

"We're just moving stuff out now, getting set up for seeding," she said. "Come Friday, it's my last day here at the rink for the season, so I'll be out at the farm full time."