Fun Facts

Did you know the corn humans eat is different from the corn that cattle eat? Most of the corn people eat is sweet  corn. Cattle and other livestock eat field corn.

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

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

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...

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

There are about 60-80 pods on a mature soybean plant. Each pod contains three small soybeans.

One acre of soybeans can make 82,368 crayons!

One bale of cotton can make 3,085 diapers.

Beef from cows and steers are used in two different ways. Cow meat is used primarily as ground beef for hamburgers and the majority of steer meat is used as steaks.

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...

Cotton bolls, which are the puffs of white produced by cotton plants, are technically fruit.

The majority of oil used for cooking in our country is U.S.-grown 100% soybean oil!

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.

Small engines like lawnmowers and boats can use E10 fuel.

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

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.

There are 7 different breeds of dairy cattle. Farmers choose their breeds based on milk production, size and even personality.

Fertilizer contains a lot of helpful nutrients, thanks to Mother Nature! Potash, which is salt from ancient evaporated oceans, is used in fertilizer to feed our soil.

In Kansas alone, pig farmers raised over 3.2 million pigs in 2015, producing over 600 million pounds of pork!

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.

Dairy farmers work with animal nutritionists to create recipes that meet the specific nutritional requirements of their cows. A cow’s diet is a combination of hay, grain, silage and proteins,...