NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Louisiana got welcome rain Monday as farmers worried about vulnerable crops and some areas considered whether to shut down fireworks stands and order residents not to set off their own fireworks. But rainfall was still well below average, the National Weather Service forecasters said. Shreveport got about a half-inch of rain Monday, but across northwest Louisiana, rainfall probably ranged from about an inch to nearly nothing, said Gary Chatelain, a meteorologist in the weather service’s office in Shreveport. “So far, we’re 4½ inches behind for the year, and for the month, we’re almost every bit of that — 3½ inches,” he said. “We were doing pretty good through May. June’s been a real disappointment.” Price Bundy of Ida, who grows cotton and corn, said corn ears are just starting to fill out and may be stunted without more rain.”For us, since it was a fairly decent rain, we were able to turn off some of our irrigation equipment” for a day or two, Bundy said.”The bad thing is it was not area-wide. It was pretty well isolated,” he said.
This time of year is also crucial for soybeans, hay and pastures, said Bundy’s father, John Bundy Sr. of Bundy Farms near Benton. Meteorologist Tim Destri of the weather service office in Slidell said the New Orleans area is more than 10½ inches below normal — or about two-thirds the usual amount for the first half of the year. Much of the New Orleans area got a good soaking, he said, but he didn’t know whether Lafourche Parish, where Parish President Charlotte Randolph has said she might have to ban the sale and use of fireworks, would get enough to avert that possibility. Randolph had not made a decision Monday, an aide said. State Fire Marshall Butch Browning said West Baton Rouge Parish has ordered such a ban. Browning said about 40 percent of Louisiana’s municipalities and five parishes — St. Charles, St. Bernard, Orleans, East Baton Rouge and Terrebonne — allow only approved community fireworks displays, barring individual sales and use.