Fun Facts

In pre-refrigeration days, hogs were harvested in the fall and cured for six to seven months, just in time for Easter dinner. That’s how ham came to be the traditional Easter favorite.

There are four main types of sorghum: grain, forage, biomass and sweet. Their most popular uses are: for food (grain sorghum), as livestock feed (forage sorghum), to produce bioenergy (biomass...

Did you know that in Kansas cows outnumber people 2-to1? There are almost 3 million people and more than 6 million cattle!

In 2018, farmers in Kansas planted 165,000 acres of cotton, which produced about 335,000 bales!

Mexico and Japan are our top international corn buyers. They buy 50 percent of U.S. corn exports.

All the wheat grown in Kansas in a single year would fit in a train stretching from western Kansas to the Atlantic Ocean.

Drink local with milk! It takes about 48 hours for milk to travel from dairy farms to the grocery store.

For a dessert to officially be considered ice cream, it must contain at least 10 percent milkfat.

The top five agiculture commodities in Kansas are cattle, corn, wheat, soybeans and sorghum.

A common ingredient in fertilizer is phosphate, which comes from ancient sea life. Phosphate is one of many natural ingredients used to keep soil — and plants! — healthy.

Within an hour of birth calves are up and ready to nurse. A baby calf will drink a gallon of milk a day.

Sorghum can be used to make environmentally-friendly packing peanuts, fencing materials, floral arrangements, brooms and more!

Did you know Kansas farmers grow about 330 million bushels of wheat each year? That’s enough to make 23 billion loaves of bread!

Grains can be categorized into food grains (for people) and feed grains (for cattle). Cattle eat feed grains like field corn and grain sorghum. An average of 4 ½ pounds of grain is used to produce a...

Cattle are great recyclers. They convert natural resources that would otherwise be wasted into beef, an edible protein containing 10 essential nutrients such as zinc, iron and B vitamins.  

Wheat flour is a good source of complex carbohydrates and contains protein. Plus, it’s low in fat and sodium.

One acre of soybeans can make 82,368 crayons!

Did you know Kansas has more than 2 million pigs?

Did you know some of the fertilizer farmers add to the soil comes from the air we breathe? Companies can convert nitrogen in the air into nitrogen to nourish the ground.

Did you know cotton is becoming a big crop in Kansas? Last year, farmers here produced over 164 million pounds of cotton! 

About a third of a steer is used for beef production. The rest of the animal is used to make by-products found in medicines, cosmetics, detergents, insulation, and much more!