Will Bollich made the right move

Will Bollich began his lifetime in the rice industry at the LSU experiment station in Crowley, then at the Texas A&M experiment station in Beaumont, Texas, but he always wanted to operate his own farm.
In 1969, he decided to make the switch, picking the fertile soil of this Rapides Parish area rather than land closer to Mowata in Acadia Parish, where he grew up one of 13 children born to Frank and Barbara Zaunbrecher Bollich.
His move was a good one. Fifteen years later, he was the International Rice Festival’s Louisiana Rice Farmer of the Year.
He didn’t rest on those laurels.
To that point, he had farmed both rice and soybeans.
In 1985, he decided to produce only Lemont variety on his 740 acres of rice, taking a risk on the variety developed by a cousin at the Beaumont facility.
Two years later, after one last beating with soybeans (it was always either sorry market conditions or flooding woes) he dropped the beans and put all his eggs in the rice bowl, so to speak.
It turned out to be a wise decision.
The combination of rice and crawfishing farming was the right one.
Bollich, 80, died Feb. 5 in an Alexandria hospital.
Services are Saturday at St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church in Eunice. Arrangements are by John Kramer & Son of Alexandria
Survivors include Sylvia, his wife of 60 years, four sons and two daughters.
Four of his brothers and his six sisters also survive him.