THIBODEAUX, La – Louisiana is the crawfish capital of the universe.
Nobody eats more.
Nobody farms more of the lovely little lobsters.
WGNO News with a Twist fun guy Wild Bill Wood says to a man he happened to bump into, “most people in Louisiana eat crawfish, but you?
The guy says, “I study crawfish, I love crawfish for the ecological importance and their aquatic and ecosystems in Louisiana.”
Wild Bill says, “I have to ask do you also eat crawfish?”
The guy says, “I do, I love crawfish, my favorite seafood.”
The guy is Chris Bonvillain
He’s a college biology professor.
And a busy guy at Nicholls State University.
He’s serving his students.
And while he’s serving his students, he’s also serving his crawfish.
He’s not serving them for dinner.
He’s serving them up for studying.
It’s the professor’s passion.
Professor Chris Bonvillain says, “we really don’t understand everything ecologically about these crawfish, so important to Louisiana yet we know very little about.”
And when you you dedicate your life to the Louisiana state crustation, you might just get what Professor Chris Bonvillain just got.
He got appointed to an exclusive, seven member crawfish club.
Wild Bill wonders if it’s called, “the International Crawfish Board?”
Professor Chris Bonvillain corrects Wild Bill and says, “actually the International Association of Astacology….astacology is the study of crawfish….in case you never heard of it.”
In his Louisiana lab working with his graduate students, Professor Chris is measuring crawfish.
He and his team do here what he does on the big international board he just joined.
They’re on a mission.
To preserve and conserve the crawfish.
To keep it crawling.
Bigger.
Better.
Wild Bill wonders what happens when you spend all day looking at a crawfish under a microscope.
Professor Chris Bonvillain proudly says, “it makes me want to spend all night eating crawfish out of a boiling pot.”