A PA28 pilot on a long cross country suffered an engine failure possibly due to fuel starvation as he approached his destination.

Narrative

I was cruising at 5500 feet VFR with flight following. As I neared my destination I requested to descend down to 2000 feet. About 20 miles before the destination; the engine was running rough; making noise; and no power. I turned the fuel pump on and switched tanks; it was still the same with no power. Aircraft was going to stall; so I made sure wings were level and lowered the nose to get airspeed. However; ahead of me was water and the bay. There was no way that I could make it to the airport; so I looked for a good field to put the airplane down in. I spotted a dirt road in a cattle farm; so I made the emergency landing on the dirt road in the farm with no power. No one got hurt; and nothing was damaged on the ground; and also the airplane was not damaged. I visually inspected the fuel tanks; and they had about 4 gallons in each tank. We added more fuel; just to be safe; then moved the aircraft to a safe location for further A&P mechanic evaluation. However; I think that fuel starvation was the problem. There was a strong head wind of about 30 knots; so the airplane burned more fuel than anticipated. I will never fly the airplane that low on fuel again.