Louisiana strawberries may be scarce and pricey around Valentine's Day, but the freezes delaying the winter harvest could mean a sweet bounty for Easter and the Ponchatoula Strawberry Festival in April.
Mark Liuzza said he double-covered his 30 acres of berries in Amite, setting older torn "blankets" over the newer ones already in the fields, when temperatures dropped into the teens.
"I keep all my old blankets and save 'em for years like this," he said.
Strawberries are the state's most valuable fruit crop. The $14.5 million harvest in 2012 made up nearly 45 percent of the year's total value from fruit, on 17 percent of the land planted in fruit.
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