Which states sell the most farm-raised trout? Tap them most-to-least.
Tapping assigns 1→4 in order
It's a fish, so… a state on the coast! North Carolina? 🐾
2Answer
Among the states USDA lists, the order is…
Idaho — a state with no ocean at all — sells more than half of America's food-size trout, about 8.54× as much as North Carolina, the next state on USDA's list. Trout are a cold-water fish, and Idaho has cold water in a strange place: underground. Rain and snowmelt sink into the cracked volcanic rock of the Snake River Plain and pour back out of the canyon wall as big springs, at nearly the same temperature summer and winter. That is exactly the kind of water a trout farm needs. Idaho is also America's #1 potato state — same volcanic plain, different crop.
📚 BackgroundA fish champion with no ocean. Idaho sells more than half of America's food-size trout — and trout are a cold-water fish, so the secret is underground. Rain and snowmelt soak into the cracked volcanic rock of the Snake River Plain and come back out of the Snake River canyon wall as big springs: cold, and at nearly the same temperature all year. That is exactly the kind of water a trout farm needs. It is also the same volcanic plain that makes Idaho America's #1 potato state.(USDA NASS Quick Stats)
It's a fish, so… a state on the coast! North Carolina? 🐾
3Compare
Food-size trout sold (pounds, 2025)
🇺🇸 United States (national)39,617,000 lb
Idaho#122,200,000 lb
Most: Idaho (22,200,000 lb); least shown here: Utah (164,000 lb).
Note: pounds of trout 12 inches or longer sold by fish farms in 2025. 2025, USDA NASS. USDA publishes a separate number for only these six states and reports all the others added together as one “other states” total. Idaho is bigger than that whole combined total, so it really is the national #1 — but the combined total is bigger than the second state here, so the places after Idaho are the order among the states USDA lists, not the national order.