Still Growing: A Louisiana Rice Family Holding On to Land, Legacy, and the Future
BY KURT D. LAROSE
On a warm Louisiana morning, the Broussard farm looks like a patchwork of past and present — laser and Satellite leveled fields stretching toward the horizon, crawfish traps stacked beside tractors guided by satellite, and a family whose roots in rice run deeper than the soil they work. For Mary Katherine Broussard and her husband Robbie, farming isn’t a profession so much as an inheritance, a rhythm passed down through generations who learned to coax a living from the flat, water‑rich land around Crowley.
“My grandfather cut his last field at eighty‑two,” Robbie says, a mix of pride and disbelief in his voice. “He farmed from sixteen until the day he retired. Born in 1937, passed in 2021, he was still running the combine two years before he died.” Mary Katherine adds, “we still have the photo of him driving the combine and it’s a conversation piece every time our family gets together.”
That memory — an old farmer grinning like a kid in a candy store as he climbed into a modern combine — is the kind of moment that anchors the Broussard story. It’s a reminder that farming here isn’t just work; it’s lineage.
A Family Built on Rice and Crawfish
The Broussard’s connection to rice runs on both sides of the family. Robbie grew up around the Broussard Rice Mill, founded by his grandfather (his dads father). It was the first commercial rice mill in Mermentau somewhere through the mid-to-late 20th century. Robbie’s other grandfather (moms father) farmed his own land, then passed it to his uncle, and eventually tohim and his brother. Mary Katherine spent most of her childhood summers and weekends on her uncles farm; with combine rides, shucking corn, and peeling crawfish. “It’s always been part of us,” he says. “It’s what we know.”
But LouisianA farming has changed. Where soybeans once thrived, crawfish now dominate, at least for the Broussards. Weather shifts, soil changes, and market realities pushed the region toward aquaculture. What began as a small family crawfish operation has become a commercial necessity.
“We almost have to sell crawfish to make ends meet,” Robbie says. “Some years rice makes money, some years it doesn’t. Crawfish is how we make it.”
The two crops are intertwined — crawfish feed on rice, and the cost of growing rice for crawfish is the same as growing rice for market. Breaking even is often the goal. Profit is a bonus.
Modern Farming, Old Roots
Planting season begins with precision. Tractors equipped with satellite‑guided hydraulics level the fields, replacing the water‑leveling blades of decades past; it’s an update that has changed 3 times – from the blade, to laser leveling and now to Satellite. Seed purchased from local companies goes into drills, tucked into moisture where blackbirds can’t steal it. The work is efficient, but still grueling.
“The hardest part today is the cost,” Robbie says. “Input costs are high, and the rice market is low. You’re always trying to make the numbers work.” In the dry season, it costs a lot more to produce rice as water has to be pumped to the fields, affecting labor, energy, water levels and the cost for electricity.
Yet Louisiana gives them advantages too. Water is abundant, and the flat land makes irrigation easier. Dry years produce better rice, though they punish the crawfish. And the region’s identity — Acadia Parish, home of the International Rice Festival — keeps rice culture alive even as the economics shift. The community has to change annually when anywhere from 100,000 to 300,000 people converge for one of the oldest and largest agricultural celebrations.
Tracks instead of tires
The new combines equipped with tracks reduce rutting, preserve soil structure, and improve second‑crop potential. It’s a small detail with big implications for sustainability and long‑term land stewardship.
Precision leveling with satellite guidance
The shift from water‑leveling blades to laser systems was transformative. Now, satellite‑guided hydraulics take it further, reducing labor, improving water efficiency, and creating more uniform fields — a critical factor for hybrid rice performance. It’s the same for the changes from tires to tracks; tires leave ruts – tracks do not.
Where Tradition Meets Technology: A Modern Farmer’s Lens
For farmers across the country, the Broussard’s operation reflects a broader truth: the future of agriculture isn’t about abandoning tradition — it’s about upgrading it. It’s about adjusting to the changes in climate, diversification and relying on the latest seed and chemical variety upgrades.
Louisiana rice farming has always relied on water, timing, and generational knowledge. But today, the Broussard’s are part of a quiet technological revolution reshaping how small and mid‑sized farms survive.
Hybrid varieties as economic strategy
Their use of RiceTec hybrid isn’t just about yield; it’s about risk management. Hybrid offers consistency in a climate where hurricanes, floods, and unpredictable rainfall can erase a year’s work overnight. Provisia PVL03, with its red‑rice suppression, is a tool that protects both yield and long‑term field health.
Crawfish as diversification
What began as a family food source is now a strategic buffer against volatile rice markets. For Modern Farmer readers, this is a familiar story: diversification isn’t optional anymore — it’s survival. While the rice is sold wholesale only, crawfish are sold to locals, retailers, and it’s also sold wholesale. Crawfish were a natural for rice farming, “since the crawfish eat rice” added Robbie.
A future built on adaptability
The Broussard’s aren’t chasing trends. They’re adopting technologies that solve real problems: labor shortages, rising input costs, and climate variability. Their farm is a case study in how innovation can coexist with heritage — and how small operations can stay competitive without losing their identity.
Farming in a Place That’s Changing
The Broussard’s grow hybrids from RiceTec for higher yields, and they experiment when availability forces their hand: CL19, Provisia PVL03, and others. Provisia, Robbie notes, is a lifesaver for controlling red rice, the invasive “bad rice” that can choke out a field.
Pests and vegetation are managed with water, chemicals, or both. Hurricanes and floods remain the biggest threats, flattening fields and damaging facilities. Droughts don’t hurt rice much, but they devastate crawfish.
Still, the family keeps going.
“It’s a love for doing it,” Robbie says. “It’s all I know how to do.”
Mary Katherine adds something quieter, but just as powerful: “Betting and praying for the next year. Knowing God is going to give you what you need.”
Generations in Motion
The Broussard farm is a living classroom. Mary Katherine and Robbie’s three boys are learning the same lessons they learned: responsibility, work ethic, how to manage money, how to manage land. Farming, according to Robbie, teaches every trade — welding, mechanics, electrical work, plumbing. “We’re always dealing with something.”
Robbie sees the next generation stepping up across the region. High schoolers and college kids working alongside their dads. Older farmers riding around, supervising, making sure things run the way they should as the next generation continue the traditions.
Mary Katherine’s favorite memory is watching her son climb into a tractor for the first time. Now he drives the biggest one they own. Like Robbie’s grandad on the combine, the moment their son took to the tractor was captured on film.
A Community Woven Into the Fields
The Broussard’s donate crawfish to local causes, share rice with festival floats, and educate school groups who want to learn how rice is grown. They see themselves as part of a larger effort to keep Louisiana agriculture alive.
What people misunderstand most, Robbie says, is the idea that farmers are wealthy. “People see new trucks, new equipment and think we’re rich. But there’s debt. We live and work in those trucks. We’re always evolving — from blades to lasers to satellites — and all of that costs money. Farming isn’t cheap.”
Looking Ahead
In ten years, Robbie hopes the farm looks exactly the same — except with his boys running it. He hopes rice fields still exist, even as sugarcane creeps into the region and pressures the crop.
Technology excites them: satellite leveling, track‑equipped combines that prevent rutting and improve second crops. But the heart of their hope is simpler.
“That Louisiana rice is still here,” Robbie says. “And that people know it’s the best.”
The Moment That Says It All
Ask Robbie what he’ll never forget, and he goes back to 2019. His grandfather, eighty‑two years old, climbing into a modern combine and marveling at how far the machines had come since his youth.
“He was amazed,” Robbie says. “Like a kid in a candy store. He got to see how combines had evolved before he passed.”
It’s a perfect image of the Broussard farm: tradition sitting inside innovation, past and future sharing a seat in the same machine, cutting the same fields that have sustained the family for generations.
And as Mary Katherine puts it, with a laugh that carries both grit and grace: “What surprises me most is that we’re still doing it.”
BY KURT D. LAROSE
