431 



There are now seven steam rice mills in operation in the rice-growing 

 liortions of Louisiana, and two in New Orleans, all provided with the 

 latest improvements for thoroughly cleaning and polishing rough rice 

 or j)addy. Mr. Wood thinks that if the cultivation of rice continues to 

 increase in the same ratio that it has in the past few years Louisiana 

 will soon outstrip Georgia and the Carolinas in the production; and 

 that with a little more enterprise rice could be raised that would com- 

 pare favorably with any from the Caroliuas or the Indies. As yet most 

 of those engaged in rice culture are indifferent to the improvement of 

 the quality of the seed used. The varieties commonly grown are the 

 white Creole rice, the golden rice, and the white bearded rice. Last 

 season two or three enterprising planters sent to Honduras for another 

 variety, which, judging from the samples cleaned and shipped to New 

 Orleans, is equal in quality to the best Carolina. About 300 acres of 

 the Honduras seed are under cultivation this season. 



Mr. Wood estimates the rice crop of this year at one-fourth less than 

 that of 1869. The stage of the water was such in the latter piirt of 

 spring and the beginning of summer that in the parishes of Lafourche, 

 St. James, St. Charles, and St. John the Baptist, the fields suffered 

 severely for want of irrigation. Li Plaquemines, which is the great 

 cereal parish of Louisiana, rice was flooded freely the whole sensou, and 

 there the yield will bo up to the average. So far the atmospheric con- 

 ditions have been highly favorable to the curing and stacking of tho 

 grain. 



MARKET PEICES OF FAEM PRODUCTS.* 



Eecord made as near the 1st of the month as practicable. 



