9/86Combined debt of Iowa farmers: $16,300,000,000
1/87Average earnings per acre of farmland in Massachusetts: $1,613
1/87Percentage of the fish and shellfish harvested in the United States in 1975 that came from farms: 3
1/88Total U.S. aid to Iowa farmers in 1986: $3,700,000,000
3/89Percentage of Iowa farmers who support an independent Palestinian state: 40
Percentage change, since 1945, in the amount of insecticide used on U.S. crops: +900
7/90Number of foreclosures initiated by the Farmers Home Administration during the first three months of 1989: 103
9/90Number of snails that animal-rights activists liberated from a snail farm in England last March: 153,000
8/91Ratio of the average amount of pesticide used on U.S. lawns to the amount used on U.S. cropland, per acre: 5:1
9/91Percentage of farmers who say they’d “do nothing” if they learned their pesticide tank was spilling into a creek: 9
Percentage who say they’d “wait and see if a problem developed”: 19
5/92Percentage of U.S. Department of Agriculture employees who provide services to farmers: 21
7/93Ratio of the value of the marijuana crop destroyed in Kentucky last year to the value of the tobacco harvested: 5:3
3/95Minimum price of a competition-level koi, a Japanese show carp, from Konishi Koi Farm in Hiroshima: $100,000
7/96Farm subsidies received since 1985 by the Montana Freeman whose ranch became the group’s stronghold last March: $676,082
9/97Annual amount the U.S. government spends to maintain a one-acre medicinal-marijuana farm in Mississippi: $250,000
3/98Percentage change since 1996 in the acres of U.S. cropland planted with genetically engineered crops: +300
5/98Number of years Britain’s Prince Charles has farmed organically: 12
7/98Number of field hands working at Mt. Vernon this summer as Pioneer Farmer Interns: 7
9/98Percentage change since 1996 in the income of North Dakota farmers: -98
11/99Percentage of turkeys tested by the Agriculture Department in 1996 and 1997 that were infected by campylobacteria: 90
Rank of campylobacteria among the most common bacterial causes of diarrheal illness in the U.S.: 1
9/99Number of millennia before humans first farmed that farmer ants were farming the spongy fungus on which they feed: 50,000
1/00Acres of hemp grown by “patriotic” U.S. farmers in 1942 at the behest of the U.S. government: 36,000
10/00Average number of corpses per acre at the University of Tennessee’s “body farm,” for the study of decomposition: 10
12/00Ratio of the number of bushels of wheat one barrel of oil could buy in 1950 to the number it could buy today: 1:10
12/00Rank of the United States among the world’s largest exporters of grain and importers of oil: 1
6/00Ratio of the average 1850 price in Texas of a healthy male slave to that of 200 acres of prime farmland: 1:1
8/00Amount by which last year’s WTO accord is projected to increase annual U.S. grain sales to China: $1,000,000,000
Percentage of last year’s U.S. grain sales to the European Union this represents: 96
10/01Estimated number of mink released from a Spanish fur farm in July by unidentified activists: 13,000
11/01Number of sparrows requested by Chinese farmers in September to help end a plague of locusts: 20,000
3/01Amount of Montana’s total net farm income in 1999 that did not come from government assistance: 0
4/01Number of people protesting genetically engineered crops who occupied a Monsanto farm in Brazil on January 26: 1,300
6/01Estimated percentage of U.S. pre-harvest crops lost to insects in 1945 and last year, respectively: 7, 13
7/01Percentage change in the size of Colombia’s coca crop since its “Plan Colombia” coca-eradication campaign began in 1999: +11
11/02Percentage change since 1965 in the number of hog and pig farms in the United States: -92
Percentage change since then in the number of hogs and pigs on U.S. farms: +18
4/02Percentage by which genetically modified seeds increase a farm’s economic yield, according to a study of 300 Iowa farms: 0
6/02Total amount of federal farm subsidies received by Kenneth Lay since 1996: $12,038
10/03Chances that farmed salmon contains PCB levels that are 4 times higher than those found in beef: 7 in 10
4/03Percentage in import duties on Vietnamese catfish sought from the Commerce Department last year by U.S. catfish farmers: 190
4/03Percentage of California’s economy that is accounted for by agriculture: 7
Percentage of the state’s water that is used for agriculture: 43
10/06Estimated amount that a farmed tiger could fetch if sold for parts, according to an Indian free-market think tank: $120,000
3/06Number of weapons that have been turned into tools for African farmers by a British nonprofit since 2001: 2,200
Number of farm implements that a rocket launcher yields: 5
7/07Amount that a Colorado state prisoner is paid to work a day as a field hand at a local farm: 60¢
9/07Number of Brazilian farms whose pig waste a St. Louis company is using to generate electricity: 40
Amount it could earn each year with a wind turbine on it: $10,000
3/09Number of days in November that a family farm near Denver opened up its fields for free picking: 1
Number of people who showed up: 40,000