Sugarcane around Kaplan.
 

Seems like every year we are seeing more and more land going to sugarcane. I believe this will have negative long term effects on the waterfowl hunting in the area. Henry is a perfect example of this. Ducks and geese used to be plentiful in that area. Now if your not in the marsh or at least bordering the marsh don't even waste your time. What's y'all opinion??

I was just thinking about this the other day... Cant be a good thing to lose duck habitat

Bob your gonna have to get out of the cattle and start farming rice and crawfish to help supplement for the lost habitat lol

My buddy and I were having the same discussion. Even a fallow field will grow up in goat weeds and at least attract doves. A sugar cane field is a wildlife desert not a dessert.

I killed my first duck 200yds from my house when I was about 9. Big ole drake pintail. Use to wait for the bus with a shotgun shooting geese. Not gonna say how long ago that was but now it's all a combination of houses and cow pastures where it used to be rice and soy beans. Lucky to hear a goose fly over anymore. I miss those days...

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I feel the same way.. Sugar cane seems to be easier to farm with a larger profit, so more farmers are going that direction. My grand parents live between Kaplan and Cow Island so I grew up traveling from Scott to Kaplan often. Durning the winter we would go on 35 to see all the geese on the refuge and there was always some on the SE and SW corners of 700 and 35 but now it's cane fields on that intersection. It pisses my dad off every time we pass and there is a new cane field!!

Whenever I drive past cane fields, I usually see a few rabbits.

theres some new ones this year in the area for sure

They do attract droves and droves of blackbirds. :)

Yep they planting right next to one of my dads crawfish ponds right now. That can't be good with all the chemicals they spray.

Plenty of wildlife in sugarcane fields, one of the few places you can actually see quail

Also, plenty of chemicals used in rice farming as well, so the chemical comment is null and all those chemicals and wastewater gets drained off several times a year and goes right down the bayou, and they use a TON of water to pump those fields and many of them pump from groundwater = drinking water
And diesel prices to pump those fields is pretty high

Sugarcane farming seems a lot less intensive than rice

don't do any rice just crawfish. Not a chemical one in the ponds.

Gotcha, was talking about rice fields:)

I'm surronded by cane, they fertilize once a year and a few weeks before harvest the spray some chemical to almost kill it to make the sugar yeild go up. Chemicals cost and farmers aint down with spending a ton of money.

Yep they spray it to imitate a freeze. If they do happen to get a hard freeze they don't have to.

I have been hunting around Henry since I was a small kid and I can tell you first hand that the number of ducks that use to be in that area before all the cane started popping up to now are a lot diffrent. Still have some good hunts in the marsh if we get a cold enough winter

you learn something new everyday, never knew dat

Welcome aboard



You are gonna have some really good hunts dis year cher, we be hearing its gonna freeze soon:rotfl:

We had a great season back there year before last.

We always do pretty good the past 3-4 years have been really good for us hopefully it keeps going that way.