VIDALIA, La. – It’s too cold for farm workers to work outside even if there was something for them to do this time of year, in the opinion of Whitehall Plantation Owner Percy Rountree Jr. But he’s not complaining about the weather – instead, it has given him high hopes for this year’s crop yield.

&uot;A prolonged cold snap is going to kill hibernating insects, and that’s definitely going to help us this year,&uot; Rountree said.

&uot;Cold weather like we’ve had lately will definitely push stinkbugs back, although we won’t know how much until spring,&uot; said Jack Baldwin, an extension entomologist at Louisiana State University.

That is good news for today’s farmers, who have trouble making ends meet due to rising production costs and low crop prices, and for Concordia Parish, whose economy depends largely on agriculture.

Temperatures that stay below freezing for at least 24 hours straight tend to have a significant effect on the bug population, Baldwin said.

But since winters have been unseasonably warm for the last three years, many more stinkbugs than usual have survived the winter, emerging in the spring.

In past years, 40 percent or less of northeast Louisiana cropland has had to be sprayed for stinkbugs. But last year, that number jumped to 79 percent, Baldwin said.

Stinkbugs eat the seed pods of emerging plants, causing lower crop yields. Their stings could also be a cause of &uot;green bean syndrome,&uot; or soybeans not reaching full maturity – a condition that was seen more often this past year than in previous years.

It will be weeks before gardeners and farmers will be able to see how this year’s stinkbug problem compares with last year’s, Baldwin said. &uot;You usually start seeing (the bugs) in gardens in early spring and in the corn fields in late spring or early summer,&uot;&160;he said. &uot;We’ll know then what effect this weather has had on them.&uot;