There's also a link to The Sugar Bulletin, the League's monthly magazine, and its advertising rates and subscrption information. The Sugar Bulletin has been published since 1922 and you can research the sugar industry archives by clicking here or in the drop list to the left. The American Society of Sugar Cane Technologists archives are also available.
Rodney Simoneaux of Assumption Parish is surveying a wet field on the north side of Highway 38. Even though it’s late November, he’s hoping it will dry up enough to plant sugarcane. The tract was filled with spoil from a summer Bayou Lafourche dredging project. It’s part of the plan to send more water down the bayou for coastal…
A conversation with St. John the Baptist Parish sugarcane farmer Pierre “Pete” Lanaux slips easily between the past and the present. At 88 years old, Mr. Pete may be the state’s eldest farmer. Certainly, his farming career, which spans 68 years, is older than the average age (55) of the American farmer. By Sam Irwin The octogenarian remembers when…
Donald Segura of New Iberia says he’s retired but he may be busier than ever. For a man that likes to stay busy, that’s saying a lot. The 76-year-old French speaker has concurrently been a sugarcane, okra, pepper, wheat and soybean farmer while he was a dairyman milking 100 cows twice a day, driving a school bus and operating…
Sugarcane farmer Dane Berard of Breaux Bridge runs his operation pretty much like the other 483 growers of the Sugar Belt. He and his partner, Glenn Thibodaux, have an investment in their sugarcane and soybean farm and have been successful for many years. The 3090-acre farm is located partly in the Au Large area around Breaux Bridge High School…
Grower Profile: The Eddie Lewis Family of Youngsville A lot has changed in southeastern Lafayette Parish since Eddie "Boss Man” Lewis Sr., 72, was a young man. Pinhook Road east of the Vermilion River was a two-lane highway all the way to Broussard. Sugarcane occupied the real estate populated by oil field support companies north of Pinhook to Hwy…
Ronnie Gonsoulin: Insuring Sugarcane’s Future South Louisiana land is good for many things, but it’s especially good for growing sugarcane…and it’s good for Iberia Parish farmer Ronnie Gonsoulin. Gonsoulin and his cane farming brethren can grow sugarcane in just about any soil type in the Bayou State. "I have all (soil) types.” Ronnie said. "I have the black stuff…
Lafourche Sugars Changing with the Times Lafourche Sugars, the sugarcane mill in Thibodaux, represents the changing nature of Louisiana’s 224-year old sugarcane industry. Many folks in the industry are the latest in a long line of sugarcane growers and millers, but modern agriculture, however, is driven by advances in science and technology. Sugarcane finds it must compete with newer…
Grower Profile Charles Guidry: A Change is Gonna Come Sugarcane farmer Charles Guidry of Erath, Louisiana knew that if he was going to get ahead, things would have to change. But as the old Serenity Prayer goes, one has to have the courage to change the things one can. Guidry’s parents, Clarence Sr. and Maudry Lewis Guidry, had that…
Many Louisiana sugarcane farmers say their farming operation is just a little ol’ family-owned farm, but the Mitchel J. Ourso family of Iberville Parish takes it to an extreme. There are no less than seven families involved in the operation of Ourso Farms. There's Mitchel and his wife, Amy. Their 29-year-old son, Robert, part of the next Ourso farming…
Ted Broussard: A Farmer's Farmer To suggest that St. Mary Parish sugarcane farmer Ted Broussard enjoys farm management is an understatement. He is, in fact, driven by a deep desire to continually test his knowledge, his skills and his equipment to be the best possible farmer he can be. His journey to the cane field is a bit different…
Do it yourself — that’s the only way that sugarcane farmer Lane Blanchard and his brothers, Harvey and Brant know how to make things happen down at their Iberia Parish farm. “We do everything ourselves,” Lane said. “From tire repair to oil changes — very seldom does something go to the shop. Anything mechanical, we pretty much do here.”…
Grower Profile: The Bubenzer Family Sugar News, July 2014 As a colony for the French and Spanish, Louisiana was pretty much a bust. The only thing Louisiana had going for it prior to 1795 was New Orleans. Whoever controlled New Orleans controlled the commerce of the Mississippi River. What happened in 1795? Sugar happened. When Etienne DeBoré perfected the…
