Louisiana Life May/June 2024 - louisianalife.com

Crawfish Daze

Crawfish season is one of my favorite times of year. I can’t get enough of the spicy little mudbugs and will accept any invitation (and sometimes invite myself) to eat them. However, this year, we’re all a little dazed and…

Might Of The Pelican

We begin with a limerick about my favorite bird: A wonderful bird is the pelican, His bill will hold more than his belican, He can take in his beak Enough food for a week But I’m damned if I see…

Hatching a Way Forward The Work of the Natchitoches National Fish Hatchery

Found only in Rapides and Grant parishes, the Louisiana pearlshell mussel was listed as federally endangered in 1988. That listing was downlisted to threatened in 1993. In 2010, the Natchitoches hatchery started researching methods to propagate…

Cool Off This Summer

It’s hot out there. But we don’t have to tell y’all that. We do love our state, but summers can be long and a bit on the sweltering side. However, there’s good news. Throughout Louisiana there are numerous hotels offering…

Ironclad

Josh Guillory is a man of few words. Actions? Absolutely. One look at his masterful spiral stairwells, classic driveway gates, or sinewy, modern art-inspired floor lamps proves that. But the veteran iron craftsman’s dialogue is often choice and contemplative these…

Monroe Artist Jay Davis Returns Home

Novelist Thomas Wolfe once wrote, “You Can’t Go Home Again.” Well, that didn’t discourage Monroe artist Jay Davis who returned to his North Louisiana hometown after a long and successful career as an artist and animator that has taken him…

Contributors

Kevin Rabalais, an Avoyelles Parish native, writes and photographs the Natural State series for Louisiana Life. His work has appeared in The Los Angeles Review of Books, The Australian, the New Zealand Listener, and the Argentine magazine Revista Ñ. He…

Hurricane Protection via Coastal Conservation

Thanks to a generous grant administered by the Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Council, construction is underway for Phase 2 of the Houma Navigation Canal Lock Complex, led by the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority and the Terrebonne Levee…

Cat Island National Wildlife Refuge

Cat Island is home to a 1,500-year-old Champion Bald Cypress, the largest bald cypress specimen in the United States. At 96-feet tall, 17 feet in diameter, and 56 feet in circumference, it’s the largest tree in…

Warm Spot

Historic renovations require looking to the past and to the present. Such was the case when the homeowners purchased an antebellum raised center hall cottage on the Mandeville Lakefront and hired New Orleans architect and interior designer Wendy Kerrigan of…

Gliding Home

by Dustin Leblanc, Mandeville

How Breaux Bridge Sparked Our Crawfish Obsession

We take our state crustacean for granted, routinely imbibing crawfish at those enormous family crawfish boils or enjoying the more sophisticated crawfish étouffée or bisque in a white tablecloth restaurant. But serving up those popular crawfish experiences wasn’t always a…