Fun Facts

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

One cowhide can produce enough leather to make 20 footballs, 18 soccer balls, 18 volleyballs or 12 basketballs.

The cotton gin first came to Kansas in 1854 when a Polish immigrant wanted to gin local cotton near Valley Falls.

One bushel of corn makes 2.8 gallons of ethanol.

One bushel of corn fed to livestock produces 5.6 pounds of retail beef, 13 pounds of retail pork, 19.6 pounds of chicken or 28 pounds of catfish.

About one-third of the milk produced in the U.S. is used for making cheese.

The largest market for field corn is to provide feed for animals like cattle, pigs, chicken, and even catfish. 

Kansas is known for its sunflowers. They provide food for insects, birds and cattle, and make great cooking oil, biofuel and a delicious snack for people!

Farmers in Kansas grow more than 650 million bushels of corn each year. 

Did you know Kansas has more than 2 million pigs?

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

98 percent of all corn farms are family-run farms.

A finished bale of cotton weighs about 480 pounds.

Did you know that Americans consume about 132 pounds of wheat flour per person each year?

Soybean oil is a great source of omega-3 fatty acids and vitamin E.

Kansas is the top state for growing and storing wheat.

Kansas grows winter wheat that is planted and sprouts in the fall, becomes dormant in the winter, grows again in the spring and is harvested in early summer.

There are more than 300 licensed dairy herds in Kansas with about 143,000 cows total. In 2015 cows produced about 365 million gallons of milk, making Kansas the 16th largest milk producing state.

Enriched white bread and other enriched grain products are a good source of iron and B vitamins (thiamin, riboflavin, niacin and folic acid), as well as complex carbohydrates.

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.

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