As we move into fall in Louisiana, the rice harvest is essentially complete. It appears that about 35 percent of the southwest Louisiana crop was fertilized and reflooded for the production of a second crop. The second crop harvest will begin in mid-October.

According to the latest U.S. Department of Agriculture numbers, the Louisiana rice crop will set a per acre yield record at 6,400 pounds per acre. Overall, the crop was a good one, notwithstanding issues of salt water and disease control breakdowns in certain areas. In addition, it appears that the initial milling on new crop rice shows the overall quality to be good as well. While there are some quality issues with certain varieties, the head rice turnout looks high, and the amount of chalk looks low, especially when compared to the previous couple of years.

Here at the Rice Research Station, we are wrapping up our field research as well. In the Rice Breeding Project, at this writing, we have only our last seeding date (June 15) in our annual date of planting studies to harvest and quite a bit of second crop studies beginning to mature. Even as we complete our field research, our research activities do not slow down. The fall and winter months are crucial in our preparation for field research anew next season.

Mr. Bill Leonards and his crew have been busy preparing next year’s fields to facilitate planting next summer. At the Rice Station, we plant our research areas every other year and our foundation seed production fields every third year to minimize issues with volunteer and weedy rice. Most of these fields have been tilled as well as laser-leveled. Brent Theunissen and Rick Zaunbrecher have been fertilizing the breeding project fields with basic fertilizer (that containing phosphorus, potassium and zinc) as weather will allow. This fall application of fertilizer eliminates one additional task next summer and could get us planted a little quicker. They also have marked off our planting date study area for next year, which will be no-till planted. We need to have this area ready to go because our first planting date will be in mid to late February.

Things are busy indoors as well. Mr. Herman Hoffpauir is milling research samples in the Rice Station’s milling lab. Herman has a great deal of experience and does an excellent job in our milling research. Rice quality is a critical part of our variety development efforts, and the milling data are invaluable as we make decisions on which experimental lines to advance and which to eliminate. While most of the milling samples Herman works with are from our variety development efforts, he also mills samples from collaborative research we have with scientists from other rice producing states. In addition, he recently milled the entries from the International Rice Festival’s rice milling contest, which recognizes those samples of rice with the highest quality attributes. Herman also runs our greenhouse research activities, and these efforts definitely ramp up during the winter when we cannot grow rice in the field on the research station.

Ms. Karen Bearb runs the Breeding Project lab. She is perhaps the busiest person during our off-season because she is responsible for analyzing all the data from this summer’s research, preparing all samples for various analyses conducted during the winter, as well as preparing all seed samples for next year’s planting. This is a daunting task when you consider that between Dr. Sha’s breeding efforts and my own, we will plant more than 115,000 individual breeding rows and several thousand yield plots next growing season. Karen has already milled several hundred samples that have been sent to the USDA Quality Lab in Stuttgart, Ark., where they will be analyzed for various cereal chemistry attributes, which will also be critical in making selections for next year’s plantings.

We also grow rice throughout the winter at our nursery in Puerto Rico. Our first rice was planted there in early August, and we recently traveled down to evaluate this material and spray NewPath on our Clearfield breeding populations. We are preparing seed for a second planting in October. All told, we will travel to Puerto Rico six to seven times between now and next June.

Needless to say, off-season is somewhat of a misnomer at the Rice Research Station. While you might not see rice growing in the field, the research efforts are ongoing.

Permission granted Oct. 15, 2011 by B Leonards (LA Farm & Ranch) to republish article on www.lsuagcenter.com.