Wyoming’s farms are still mostly family-run — but the state sits mid-pack nationally

If you’ve been following the national “Big Ag is taking over everything” conversation, here’s a reality check: most American farms are still family-owned. The latest USDA Census of Agriculture data shows the US farm landscape is more complicated than the corporate takeover storyline — and Wyoming is a good example of that nuance, Wyoming News Now reports.

Researchers at Farm Flavor, an ag news and information company, dug into the newest USDA numbers to see how many farms are family-owned, how much they produce, and which states rely most on family operations. Their takeaway: family farms still dominate the map — but the share of production coming from those farms varies a lot state to state.

By USDA definition, a family farm is one where the principal operator and their relatives own the majority of the business. That includes everything from small, one-family operations to big, multi-generational outfits structured like corporations — but still family-controlled.

According to USDA data highlighted in Farm Flavor’s analysis:

• 94.7% of US farms are family-owned;
• Those family farms account for 80.7% of total agricultural output.

Small and midsize family farms — under $1 million in annual gross income — make up the bulk of operations:

• 90.8% of all farms;
• About 30.2% of total output.

Then you’ve got large family farms (over $1 million annually): fewer in number, but they generate 50.6% of US agricultural output. In other words: plenty of farms are small, but a lot of the production comes from the bigger family players.

Non-family farms? They’re a small slice:

• About 5% of farms;
• Around 19.1% of output.

Farm Flavor ranks Wyoming 37th nationally when looking at how much the state’s agriculture relies on family-owned farms.

Here’s the Wyoming snapshot from the analysis:

• Share of farms that are family-owned: 93.3%;
• Share of sales from family-owned farms: 84.6%;
• Family-owned farms: 9,842;
• Total farms: 10,544;
• Family-owned farm sales: $1,494,969,885;
• Total farm sales: $1,767,866,387;
• Average family-owned farm sales: $151,897.

So yes — Wyoming is absolutely a family-farm state by ownership. But compared with some parts of the country (especially Appalachia and the South), Wyoming’s family-farm share isn’t at the very top.

For comparison, here’s what the full US picture looks like:

• Share of farms that are family-owned: 94.7%;
• Share of sales from family-owned farms: 80.7%;
• Family-owned farms: 1,800,363;
• Total farms: 1,900,487;
• Family-owned farm sales: $484,439,894,072;
• Total farm sales: $599,995,091,745;
• Average family-owned farm sales: $269,079.

Wyoming’s family farms actually account for a higher share of sales than the national average (84.6% vs. 80.7%), even though the state ranks 37th on the “family farm share” metric Farm Flavor used across states.

Farm Flavor notes that while family ownership is high almost everywhere (roughly 90% to 98%), the share of total output produced by family farms is where things get interesting. Some states have a big gap — lots of family farms, but a larger share of production coming from non-family operations due to scale or high-value specialization.

That’s why places like West Virginia (97.6%), Tennessee (97.5%), and Kentucky (96.8%) lead the country in family-farm ownership, and also have very high output shares from family farms. Meanwhile, states like Texas and Oklahoma show strong family ownership but a noticeably smaller share of sales from family farms — a sign that non-family operations can punch above their weight in certain markets.

At the extreme end, Alaska and Hawaii are the only two states where family farms account for less than half of total agricultural output.

Wyoming may not crack the top tier nationally, but the state’s agriculture is still overwhelmingly built on family operations — thousands of them — generating the vast majority of farm sales. The corporate-farm story exists, but the data still says: in Wyoming and across the U.S., the family farm is very much alive.