Having grown up in the central valley of California, I saw a huge variety in agriculture. Now, living in Iowa, there is some variety although in comparison to what I grew up with, there isn't much variety. My buddy, Cori, and I like to share statistics (maybe because we have the same line of work or maybe because were both stubborn). Anyway, I thought I'd share some of the statistics dealing with Iowa Agriculture. The information is ranked by the top ten states for several categories:
- Number of farms - ranks #3
- Cash receipts for farm marketing - ranks #3
- Ranks #1 in 6 of 11 categories based on crops (ie: Corn and Soybeans for grain production)
- Also ranks #1 in several livestock categories (ie: all hogs and pigs, Commercial hog slaughter, Value of hogs on farms [do you see a trend here] and surprisingly #1 in egg production)
With all that in mind, it really makes me think about where I live. Yes, we have lots of farms and I understand that to translate to small family farms which I appreciate. Yes, we have lots of corn and beans too - yipee! And the hogs, well apparently the state has lots of those too. Fortunately I live in a part of the state where the topography and geology help play a limiting factor in having millions of hog farms around. Sure, we have them, but they're not every farm you pass by. Okay, enough of that.
2 comments:
The #1 in egg production doesn't really surprise me- (north central iowa)
wow i don't think i knew that?
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