​Authorities say more than 260 dolphins have stranded across the U.S. Gulf Coast since Feb. 1, triple the usual number.
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists say it's too early to know the cause but they're investigating whether salinity changes from high rivers and a Louisiana spillway opening contributed to the deaths.
NOAA says on its website that a number of the dolphins stranded from Louisiana to the Florida Panhandle had open sores consistent with freshwater exposure, but such sores are "not uncommon" in the spring.
A Mississippi scientist says the spillway opening is at least partly to blame for 126 deaths across Mississippi's coastline, calling it worse than the BP oil spill in 2010, when 91 dead dolphins were found in Mississippi during the entire year.

​BATON ROUGE — Steve Gleason, the New Orleans Saints legend whose off-the-field work for those stricken with ALS earned him the Congressional Gold Medal this year, may soon be honored with a Team Gleason specialty license plate.
Members of the House Transportation Committee unanimously approved a bill by Rep. Walt Leger to create the specialty plate.
Proceeds from the plate would benefit the Team Gleason Foundation, which funds research for assistive technology for those rendered immobile from neuromuscular diseases like Gleason himself.
Gleason will always be remembered for his blocked punt on the night the New Orleans Superdome reopened for the first time after Hurricane Katrina against arch rival Atlanta.

According to the USDA, 1 in 6 Louisiana households with more than 784,000 family members struggle to put food on the table. 1 in 20 households report skipping meals because they don’t have enough money for food.

In Louisiana, 23% of seniors, nearly 1 in 4, face the threat of hunger. This ranks Louisiana as the second worst state for senior hunger.

Feeding America estimates that 1 in 4 Louisiana children live in households that are food insecure. In several rural parishes one-third of children are food insecure.

Louisiana offers a Feeding Hope specialty license plate. Feeding Louisiana opted to not use the John Lennon self-portrait image that is used on the 'Imagine' license plate for Feeding Florida, which has raised nearly $4 million so far.
​
​In FY 2016, 4 'Solving Hunger, Feeding Hope' specialty license plates were sold in Louisiana, in FY 2017, 1 was sold and in FY 2018, 6 were sold.
​Michael Towner

Currently, Louisiana has 185 special license plates. ​The state has about four million registered cars and trucks. Louisiana license plates are produced at the state prison, and by a machine invented in the early 1900s at Angola, a maximum-security prison farm in Louisiana operated by the Louisiana Department of Public Safety & Corrections. It is named "Angola" after the former slave plantation that occupied this territory. 

​1 World Champion Saints 1,047
2 Antique Vehicle 954
3 LSU @ Baton Rouge 872
4 Army Veteran 828
5 Environmental Education 757
6 Professional Firefighter 479
7 Marine Corp Veteran 398
8 White Tail Deer 364
9 Navy Veteran 355
10 Active Duty Army 290
11 Air Force Veteran 281
12 I'm Cajun 280
13 U of Louisiana @ Lafayette 274
14 Black Bear 218
15 300th Anniversary New Orleans 209
16 Protect the Wild Dolphins 183
17 Louisiana Tech 145
18 Retired Army 140
19 Choose Life 125
20 Zulu Social Aid & Pleasure Club 111