Despite a serious drought, 2007 will not be remembered as a bad year by many Maryland farmers.
Cash receipts (sales at the farm level) jumped 25 percent to just short of $2 billion in 2007.
A more meaningful number, net farm income, rose nearly 22 percent to $724.9 million last year, according to the Maryland Department of Agriculture's summary of farming in 2007, released last week.
Looking back on 2007, it seems that what Mother Nature took away in the form of lower production because of drought was offset by a favorable commodities market.
Severe drought prevailed throughout the 2007 crop year. At season's end, precipitation ranged from just 52 percent of normal in Western Maryland to 77 percent of normal on the Eastern Shore.
"Our gains were driven by price, not higher production," said Barbara Rater, chief statistician at Maryland's Agricultural Statistics office.
Maryland dairy farmers, who have been disappearing at an alarming rate the past three decades, were a big beneficiary of higher prices last year.
Cash receipts from milk marketing last year totaled $207.6 million. This was an increase of 37 percent from the $151.5 million for 2006.
Farmers received an average price of $20 per hundredweight for their milk last year, up from $13.80 the previous year.
The boost in farm sales came despite a drop in milk production. The state dairy herd produced 1.04 billion pounds of milk last year, down 5 percent from the 1.10 billion pounds produced in 2006.
There were 58,000 dairy cows in the state last year. This was down by about 6,000 head, but on average each cow produced more milk.
In 2007, milk per cow averaged 18,017 pounds, up 736 pounds per cow from the previous year.
Poultry is by far the largest farm business in the state. Maryland ranked seventh in the nation last year in the number of broilers produced.
Broilers continue to lead Maryland agriculture farm receipts, counting for 37 percent of total farm sales.
In 2007, the average price per pound for a broiler was 46 cents. The total value of production last year was $732 million, an increase of 36.8 percent over sales the previous year.
The average weight per broiler remained unchanged at 5.4 pounds.
Last year, 373 million broiler-type chicks were hatched in commercial facilities, a decline of less than 1 percent from 2006.
Egg production decreased to 702 million, down from 733 million in 2006.
