re: Why isn't Louisiana an agricultural powerhouse?

I drive by a lot of fields next to the Pearl river where nothing is grown. Sure wish we had some rice farming near the river where I duck hunt.

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You would think we would rank higher for some reason due to the fertile soil, abundant water supply, and long growing season but we don't. Any ag people care to comment?

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The fertile soil is really only found along the major rivers. The prairie, where most rice and crawfish production occurs, is relatively infertile. Alot of our soils aren't well suited to growing crops at all. There's alot of sugarcane in South Central and southwest Louisiana being grown on soils that aren't suited to sugarcane production at all.

Abundant water doesn't matter when the majority of your cropland acres aren't irrigated.

The long growing season is what allows us to grow sugarcane, but it doesn't give us any real advantage on any other crops, save for maybe rice where you can get two crops in a single growing season if you plant early enough.

Even within the crops you would think we would lead in, we don't. We're 2nd out of 3 for Sugarcane; and 3rd out of 6 for Rice. The only one we lead in would be crawfish, but those don't even have their own category in these statistics. It's probably lumped into "Miscellaneous animals and products" where we are 4th out of 50.

We don't even rank in Strawberries, blueberries, pecans, or sweet potatoes, and those are some pretty decent markets in Louisiana, so I'm not 100% sure how all of this data is gathered.

Regardless, the amount of ground that cannot be or is not farmed is a big part of why we aren't higher. Add to that the significant amount of our farmable ground that is dedicated to rice, soybeans, or corn--none of which fetch particularly great prices, which is why they get replaced with sugarcane if the ground can grow it--and it's pretty easy to see why we don't rank higher.

ETA: The 2020 overview from NASS for Louisiana shows that 8 million acres are in agricultural production. That's good for 33rd in the country. So honestly, we are probably right where we should be considering the acreage devoted to agriculture.

ETA2: This is also only for food agriculture. So it does not account for forest products, which is Louisiana's largest agricultural sector.

Vote No to Casino
Vote No to Crops
Vote No to Cops

Was watching moonshine, and Richard was gathering Louisiana sugar cane.

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That’s why the NE corner, with its Mississippi alluvial plain, is the greatest part of the state.

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We're just country boys and girls gettin down on the farm up in the Delta in Tim McGraw Country.

Any question about Louisiana and why its not better at something.. The answer is politicians. Politicians are viruses that will get attached to something and kill it off if it doesn't get what they want. But hey as long as a certain party is elected it doesn't matter despite the fact they are all in the same game. But people keep electing the same representatives and then when their term is up, they elect someone else that representative backs and its a continued cycle

At the grocery store I see alot of local products . Beer hot sauce sorghum, rice , crawfish , catfish , shrimp . Shall I go on . Timber

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I don’t know how much of that goes on now but it apparently paid more than getting up at 4:30 and heading to the fields to ride a tractor all day.

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I don't know how this is decides, but I have heard this happens to some sugar cane farmers. They are paid to not grow so much. I don't know how they decide what farmers this applies to, but they pretty much make more money growing less cane.

Because, at least in NE LA, people die and their heirs don’t want to farm. And instead turn land that was giving 3 bales of cotton/acre into trees. Because they are lazy and the government paid them to do so.