It isn’t every day that a former Time Magazine 100 Most Influential People of the Year and the subject of an Emmy-winning HBO movie speaks at an LSU AgCenter event. But that is exactly what happened when internationally renowned author, livestock welfare and autism awareness advocate Temple Grandin addressed the Louisiana Association of Extension 4-H Youth Development Professionals last week in Vernon Parish.
Read MoreA Tangipahoa Parish couple says their farm is struggling to recover after oily fallout from last week’s explosion at Smitty’s Supply in Roseland.
Lisa and Robert Friedley live about three miles from the oil company on a 71-acre farm. They raise cattle, sell hay and stock ponds with fish. They say all of it is now at risk.
Read MoreWhen Hurricane Katrina hit the coast on Aug. 29 and Hurricane Rita followed on Sept. 24, much of south Louisiana sustained tremendous damage. The storms caused more than 1,100 deaths, according to the Louisiana Department of Health; displaced several communities; and led to $108 billion in damage, according to the National Weather Service.
Read MoreAccording to the latest information from USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service, 99 percent of the Louisiana soybean crop was setting pods as of last Sunday, compared to 97 percent this same time last week. Leaves were dropping on 58 percent of the beans. The crop reported at one percent poor, seven percent fair, 82 percent good and 10 percent excellent.
Read MoreUniversity of Louisiana at Lafayette biologists and undergraduate and graduate students are examining the effectiveness of invasive carp as crawfish bait, research that’s being funded by the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries.
Read MoreCase Farms has acquired the Farmerville, La., chicken complex from Foster Farms, including fresh chicken and prepared foods processing, protein conversion, a feed mill and hatchery, according to a joint release sent to Food Processing this weekend.
Read MoreFarmers in Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi, pay four to six times more for crop insurance than their counterparts in the upper Midwest, and Hunter Biram wanted to know why.
Read MoreMeet Austin Fontenot—a small-town Louisiana kid who went from racing dirt bikes down gravel roads to flying turbine-powered crop dusters across America. In this episode of Flight Tales, Austin shares the unfiltered truth about becoming an ag pilot.
Read MoreBryce Trahan is no stranger to agriculture. He grew up on a rice, crawfish and cattle farm in Forked Island and participated in 4-H and FFA. But the recent Kaplan High School graduate still found plenty to learn at an internship this summer at the LSU AgCenter H. Rouse Caffey Rice Research Station.
Read MoreLouisiana corn producers are busy harvesting their crop, and it is a very large one. LSU AgCenter correspondent Craig Gautreaux has the story from northeast Louisiana.
Read MoreThe fire at the Smitty’s Supply Inc. site remains 90% contained. Overnight, additional resources, including specialized heavy equipment, arrived. Response crews began removing structural debris and addressing covered hotspots. A containment berm is being established around the site, and recovery operations will continue throughout the day.
Environmental response efforts are ongoing in the Tangipahoa River and surrounding waterways. Local, state, and federal agencies, along with contracted responders, have deployed approximately 1,900 feet of containment boom in the river and 100 feet in a nearby drainage ditch.
Read MoreU.S. Rep. Julia Letlow (R-Louisiana) paid a visit to Vidalia, Louisiana, this week to share updates from Washington, D.C., particularly on the 2025 One Big Beautiful Bill Act and the local impact it will have.
From the Vidalia Convention Center, at an event sponsored by Concordia Bank & Trust, Letlow shared how happy she was to be “home.”
Read MoreFoster Farms and Case Farms have finalized an agreement to transfer ownership of Foster Farms’ Farmerville, Louisiana, complex.
The transaction includes the Fresh Chicken, Prepared Foods and Protein Conversion facilities located in Farmerville, Louisiana, as well as the feed mill in Arcadia, Louisiana, and the hatchery in Athens, Louisiana.
Read MoreEach year, the LSU AgCenter tests commercially available wheat varieties at field sites across Louisiana. We collect data on resistance to common diseases, maturity, grain quality, and yield. These are some of the varieties we think are well-suited for consistent production in different part of the state, based on a balance between multi-year yield pefromance and test weight, maturity, and resistance to the diseases common in this state. These may not be the only varieties that will work on your farm, but we encourage you to consider them as part of a set of planted varieties.
Read MoreAmerican Farm Bureau Federation President Zippy Duvall commented today on the Environmental Protection Agency’s announcement regarding small refinery exemptions, which impact renewable fuel production.
“Renewable fuels have been a tremendous success story for the country and the rural economy. The Renewable Fuel Standard has reduced our country’s dependence on foreign oil, reduced air pollution, increased farm income, and provided good-paying jobs in rural America.”
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