Fun Facts

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

The journey from the time a calf is conceived to the time beef is consumed takes 24-30 months and thousands of miles—from ranches, farms, feed yards and packing plants to grocery stores and...

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.

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

One dairy cow can produce more than 3,000 gallons of milk in a year. There are about 160,000 dairy cows in Kansas. That's a lot of milk!

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

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

About four percent of the land in Kansas is part of conservation or wetland reserve programs.

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

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!

Cotton can be found in much more than clothes and other fabrics! Cotton by-products can be used to make paper currency, cosmetics and feed for dairy cattle and livestock.

There are more than 29 cuts of beef that meet government guidelines for lean, including tenderloin, T-bone steak and extra lean ground beef.

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...

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.

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.

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

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

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.

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!

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.

One bale of cotton can make 4,312 mid-calf socks.