09/29/2026
Crawfish economist put numbers on something every boil customer argues about: why crawfish cost what they cost.
It is not a restaurant price list. It is a farm budget for one acre of Louisiana crawfish for the 26/27 season. They asked a simple question. If a farmer does the work the usual/normal way, does that acre pay?
They figured about 650 pounds to the acre and about $1.25 a pound at the farm. Not what you pay for a sack from your distributor. What the farmer gets before the truck, Diesel, the ice, and other expenses.
On crawfish-only ground, the money coming in and the daily bills almost cancel out. After bait, fuel, labor, and repairs, they show about $23 left on an acre. Then they count the land and the equipment. That acre goes in the hole about $200.
That is why so many crawfish come out of rice fields. Rice in the summer. Water on the stubble in the fall. Crawfish in the winter. Two crops sharing one pump. On paper, the combined year can stay in the black. Crawfish by itself still looks thin.
Here is the part that matters right now. Crawfish economist built that budget on diesel at $2.80 a gallon, last years prices. Diesel in Louisiana this month has been running over $6 a gallon. The pond still has to be pumped. The boat still has to run. The sack still has to roll to different states.
So when somebody says crawfish is high this winter, it is not automatically greed. The farm sheet was already tight when fuel was cheap. This next season is being flooded this month. The price you see in January will be that budget plus a worse fuel number.
