LOUISIANA, USA — Were your Thanksgiving stuffed mirlitons missing something this year? How about your étouffée?
You may have noticed Louisiana crawfish are hard to come by so far this season, and the future crop is uncertain.
The plates are overflowing with fresh Louisiana catches at Kenner Seafood, but the shelves, the conveyor belt, baskets, and boilers normally filled with crawfish, are empty.
“This is the time when we basically have lots of crawfish that we'd be sending out, 10 to 20 sacks on a daily basis. The phones are ringing off the hook. Still no crawfish, with no date promised,” said Kenner Seafood owner, Trudy Alexander.
The business is off 35 percent. Restaurants they ship to nationwide, as well as local customers, have been asking why, since the season started before Thanksgiving.
When asked if she knows there is a crawfish shortage, Christina Wilson, who was dining at Kenner Seafood said, “No, I didn't, but I know that I haven't been able to eat them. That's all.”
“I've come to the realization that it's hard to get, but I'm always looking for it,” said Andrew LeBlanc, who was also having lunch at Kenner Seafood.
Over in Vermillion Parish, Don Benoit has been running the farms, processing, and peeling of crawfish for nearly 30 years, producing four million pounds a year. He says those mudbugs hated the dry, sweltering weather earlier, just as we all did.
“We didn't get any rain in this parish. I don't think we got one drop September and October. Another factor, we've never seen before, is this heat that we had in September,” said Don Benoit, owner of D and T Crawfish.
His production for November and December was only at five percent. He says those kinds of numbers could also affect crawfish producers' ability to grow their rice crops as well.
Add this year's shortage to recent financial hits: COVID, fuel, equipment and mandated labor cost hikes, and the lost sales to cheaper, lower quality imported tails from China. He says the state's nearly $650 million crawfish industry is in trouble.
“Without government assistance, or some kind of aid, I don't know how many crawfish processors, or farmers are going to be left after this year,” said Benoit.
Crawfish producers say that we may be getting some crawfish in, in the next few weeks, but they're going to be smaller, and they're going to be expensive, maybe more than $7 a pound live, but as production ramps up, then the prices should come down.
But will it be in time for the Super Bowl, Mardi Gras and Lent, which are all just around the corner?
Crawfish farmers also grow rice. So, the low production of crawfish will likely affect the ability to produce rice, and its price.
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