Now here's a sad story. It's sad in general but especially with Mardi Gras season underway along the Gulf Coast.
AL.com's Dennis Pillion reports that crawdad harvests are way down this year.
Now, I realize some folks are already thrown by the vocabulary, so let me clarify: For the purposes of this newsletter, if it's being cooked or it's on the plate, it's crawfish. If they're in the mud or they're being dug or sifted out of the mud, they're crawdads.
Afterward, we'll all go back to our fancy friends and discuss the price of crayfish.
But whatever you call them, there aren't as many many of them coming out of south Louisiana this year. An extension agent with the LSU AgCenter said December's production was likely less than 5% of what might be considered normal. (That doesn't mean it's that low elsewhere or that the next couple months won't bring the numbers back up.)
The agent, Mark Shirley, blames the record drought Louisiana had in the summer and fall. During a drought, a crawdad will dig deeper to stay alive in moist dirt, like an earthworm does. But the record drought dried out the earth well beneath dry ponds, killing more crawdads (just like the folks song says).
What does that mean to us in Alabama? There will be a lower supply of crawfish, meaning higher prices if you can find them. So when you go to order a plate of steamed crawfish and next to it on the menu it says "market price," make sure you inquire before you order.
