Planting knowledge

The 56th Annual Rice School and the 49th Annual Soybean School were hosted in Ville Platte this past Wednesday for Evangeline Parish and St. Landry Parish farmers.
The event brought out guest speakers that ranged from Natural Resource Conservation Service (NCRS) State Resource Conservationist John Pitre to Pathologist at the Rice Research Station for the LSU AgCenter Dr. Don Groth.
Everything from rice fungicides to feral hogs was discussed at the event, which began registration at 7:30 a.m. and lasted until lunch was served.
When it came to updating farmers on the feral hog problem, Pitre, a former resident of Ville Platte, addressed the farmers that filled the Ville Platte North Side Civic Center.
Pitre began by stating, “Our mission is to help people help the land, and our primary goal is to provide technical assistance, as well as financial assistance to farmers so that we can help control the feral hog population here.”
According to Pitre, feral hogs were “first brought to Florida by the Spanish Explorer Desoto” and today these hogs, that at one time could only be found in one state, now “can be found in 45 states in the U.S. and four Canadian Provinces.” Pitre said, “Experts guess that there are around six-million Feral Hogs in North America, and Evangeline Parish and Avoyelles Parish have some of the highest populations of these animals.”
Pitre pointed out that although people enjoy hunting these animals, they are not a good thing to have around. Pitre said, “These feral hogs can carry scary diseases that are transmittable to live stock, dogs, and even humans.”
When it comes to the damage that these hogs can cause to land, Pitre said, “Feral hogs increase soil erosion and degrade the water quality on land, which leads to reduced diversity of species as well as their richness. This leaves you with a very simplified landscape, and the land that suffers the most from Feral Hogs is land that we have a lot of here in Louisiana, wetlands. Because of how the animal completely uproots plants, the soil becomes loose and is more easily swept away by water.”
Along with informing the audience about the problems that feral hogs cause, Pitre also took the time to share with local farmers the different ways that this problem is being addressed.
Pitre said, “We would like to remove about 58 percent to 70 percent of the feral hog population each year to try and at least stay even on the current population here in Louisiana.”
The ways they plan to do this, according to Pitre is by “ariel hunting, which would be done by someone who is certified to shoot feral hogs from a helicopter,” by “using cameras to point out problem areas to focus on,” and by “setting traps.”
The NCRS has also begun helping individuals, financially, that have feral hogs on their land. To close his presentation Pitre said, “At the NCRS, we understand that we have to do more than just provide the equipment to take care of this problem, we need to help financially because not everyone can afford to purchase the equipment. Now we are able to help land owners financially by paying for their hog traps.”
The feral hog problem was not the only topic discussed at the school last Wednesday.
Groth informed local farmers about rice disease and ways to manage it. When it came to chemicals used to destroy fungus that may be on a farmers crop, Groth said, “there have not been any big changes in the types of fungicides we have.”
With no new types of fungicides to discuss, Groth spent much his time sharing the best ways farmers can manage and treat fungus on their crops.
Groth said, “When it comes to using rice fungicides, timing is everything. It has to be done at the correct time so that it is able to take care of fungus on crops.”
According to Groth, the perfect time for blasting fungicide on a crop is going to be “when 50 percent to 70 percent of the plant head is out.” Groth then continued, by saying, “If the plant is more mature and the fungus has spread, then the fungicide will not be able to destroy all of the fungus.”
Groth’s final suggestions concerning the management of disease or fungus on crops is to “know a plants susceptibility to diseases, scout for presence of a disease, identify disease correctly, pick correct fungicide to treat disease, and perform treatments in a timely manner.”
Other speakers for the event included: local farmer Jeffery Sylvester, Southwest Regional Director for the LSU AgCenter Dr. Steve Linscombe, Agronomist Dr. Dustin Harrell, Ag Economics Professor Dr. Mike Salassi, Weed Scientist Dr. Eric Webster, Soybean Specialist Dr. Ronnie Levy, Wildlife Biologist Phillip Vasseur, and LSU AgCenter County Agent Todd Fontenot.