NEW ORLEANS (AP) - With prices less than half the usual amount for alligator skins, the recent wild harvest in Louisiana was slow.

  

Totals aren't yet in, but the head of the state's alligator program estimates that about 18,000 were taken from the wild, down from 33,600 two years ago.

  

Jeb Linscombe of the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries says low demand cut prices to between $7 and $8 a foot for the past two years. That's the lowest since 2009, and the recession.

  

John Currier of Port Allen is a representative for hunters on the Louisiana Alligator Advisory Council . He says he usually gets tags for 22 alligators, but only hunted one this year. He says that one was because one of his daughter's friends wanted to hunt an alligator.