SOUTHERN ILLINOIS FARMER DIVERTS 300 ACRES TO RICE PRODUCTION

MCCLURE, Ill. -- There's only one rice farmer in Illinois, and even he is a relative novice in a state where corn and soybeans prevail.

But Blake Gerard says he has high hopes for his unique crop this year.

He planted more than 300 acres of rice near McClure. Employees at the state's farm statistics service had to search before they came up with Gerard's name and acreage. They initially forgot about him.

After all, Illinois farmers hadn't grown rice for more than a century, when homesteaders planted it as a food crop.

"We have a lot of water here," said Gerard, who lives in Cape Girardeau but farms more than 1,400 acres of land in an area between Cape Girardeau and McClure. "I decided to take advantage of it."

He experimented with a 40-acre plot of rice last year, added acreage for this season and hopes to have even more in 2001.

Rice is common just across the Mississippi River from Southern Illinois, where Missouri farmers sowed more than 180,000 acres in 1999 and more than 175,000 acres this year.

Gerard, who also raises soybeans and corn, has established an irrigation system for his rice fields, which are the farthest north of any rice crop in the United States.

"It's a labor-intensive crop," said Gerard. "We have to check the levees almost every day during the growing season. And three weeks ago, the fields were drained in preparation for harvesting. We're about half way through the harvesting season now."

Gerard has been around farming all of his life but took over farm operations 10 years ago. He said it's not easy being Illinois' sole rice farmer.

"I had to learn about rice," Gerard said. "During the first year, I spent a lot of time in seminars and meetings. There's a lot to learn."

His land had to be leveled, levees had to be built and irrigation systems had to be installed. Rice requires an abundant water supply.

Gerard has plenty of water. There's the Mississippi River, which floods on occasion, and Gerard's grandfather installed some water wells on the property more than two decades ago.

Gerard planted half of his newly leveled ground in rice this year.

"Next year, we'll plant the remaining 300 acres in rice and rotate this year's rice cropland with corn or soybeans," he said.

Although Gerard sells some of his rice to a rice mill, he is developing a market for "seed rice."

Gerard harvests and stores his seed rice for cleaning and will eventually sell it to farmers in Arkansas and Missouri.