This is not a game — it’s our economy, it’s our lives!
Tariffs on foreign goods may sound like a way to protect American industries, but in reality, they will devastate Louisiana’s farmers and rural communities.
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It’s everyone’s favorite time of the year again... crawfish season!
“During crawfish season, we are harvesting about six days a week, six out of seven days. We have 2,000 traps across three ponds across this farm; it takes about six or seven hours a day to pick up all the traps, sack the crawfish, deliver the crawfish to a crawfish dock where they are distributed,” Burt Tietje, a local crawfish farmer, said.
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Cotton found a rollercoaster ride on the week, slipping down to the 63-cent level that we forecast. But a bit of profit taking on the heels of a solid export sales report saw a triple-digit price increase back to the 65-66 cent prior lows. May fell to a low of 62.54 low at midweek and settled the week at 66.07. The rally then ran into the nine-day moving average in the 65.75 cent area on Thursday and could go no higher.
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Louisiana has more than doubled the amount of hunting tags allowed during the state's second annual black bear season.
According to the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, 26 tags will be available. In 2024, only 11 were up for grabs. The hunt has expanded to the southern part of the state.
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The month of March is upon us already! Can you believe it? There are some dates during March that can have an impact on our cattle markets.
Mardi Gras on March 4, will be the last big event until Easter. Ash Wednesday on March 5, is the start of Lent when historically it reduces the demand for meat.
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The first vessel carrying about 30,000 metric tons of imported organic soybeans, wheat and other grain is expected to arrive at the Alabo Street Wharf in Holy Cross this summer.
It will take a full-time crew of 17 — six facility workers, seven dock workers and four security officers — to run the operation for Canada-based Sunrise Foods International.
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LSU’s Agriculture Center and LSU School of Plant, Environmental and Soil Sciences (SPESS) presented the 22nd annual Baton Rouge Spring Show at the John M. Parker Coliseum this past weekend.
The LSU AgCenter was established in 1972 by the LSU Board of Chancellors with the intention of giving the university system’s agricultural programs their own distinct identity.
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Newly enacted tariffs on Mexico and Canada are expected to create ripple effects across Central Louisiana, affecting key industries such as agriculture, manufacturing, and transportation. Local businesses are bracing for increased costs, while consumers are already seeing higher prices at grocery stores.
At Mac’s Fresh Market in Pineville, shoppers like Kurt Gautreaux noticed rising costs for essentials such as eggs and meat. “Prices of meat and everything else went up,” Gautreaux said.
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In 2023, Anna Timmerman, a horticulture agent for St. Bernard and Plaquemines Parish, had to think swiftly to deal with a salt wedge that was rising up the Mississippi River. There were concerns about this causing issues for nursery irrigation systems, Timmerman was particularly worried about how the saltwater would affect one segment of her clientele: Plaquemines Parish citrus producers.
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A raging fire destroyed the historic Lake Charles Rice Mill on North Kirkman Street, engulfing the central warehouse and a rice dryer in flames on April 26, 1984, and forcing the evacuation of more than 200 families from their homes.
The seven-story facility was gutted by fire when a 440-volt fuse box exploded, triggering a massive fire in the 59-year-old building, according to that day’s front page of the American Press.
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The Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries (LDWF) is alerting the public of three additional chronic wasting disease (CWD) positive captive deer in pens permitted by the Louisiana Department of Agriculture and Forestry (LDAF).
The recent detections in Concordia, St. Landry and Tangipahoa parishes are linked to trace outs from a captive CWD positive deer pen in Jefferson Davis Parish, where CWD was first confirmed in a captive deer back in November.
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President Donald Trump introduced some changes to the way the timber industry handles business.
Over the weekend, the president signed a pair of actions to increase domestic lumber production.
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Each year, the U.S. rice industry produces approximately 20 billion pounds of rice. Most of that rice is grown on family farm operations, creating more than 125,000 jobs nationwide, primarily in the top six rice producing states where small communities depend on the agricultural industry.
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The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced loan interest rates for March 2025, which are effective March 3, 2025. USDA Farm Service Agency (FSA) loans provide important access to capital to help agricultural producers start or expand their farming operation, purchase equipment and storage structures or meet cash flow needs.
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This report projects corn, soybeans, wheat and rice futures prices for the United States for the first quarter (Q1) of 2025. Our analysis utilizes historical data on both cash prices (the price for immediate delivery) and futures prices (the price agreed upon for delivery at a future date).
We aggregate the daily futures prices into quarterly averages to simplify our analysis. Using this dataset, we train several machine learning models to predict futures prices for all the four commodities.
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