About half of DeKalb County’s top crops of corn and soybeans are fed to livestock. The leading livestock in the county are pigs and cows.
Local farmers market over 954,000 hogs each year. Now that’s a lot of hogs! At any one time there are 276,000 hogs and pigs on farms.
The second largest number of livestock in the county would be beef cattle with over 18,100 on farms and about 23,000 marketed annually. This includes cattle, cows and calves.
Behind beef cattle are dairy cows and calves with about 1,800 raised on a few farms. Sheep and goats would be the next in line as well as chickens and other assorted farm animals.
The livestock industry generates about $132 million annually, a valued enterprise of DeKalb County agriculture.
Sources: USDA, NASS, 2020 Cattle Inventory, 2017 Census of Agriculture