On his farm near the ghost town of Castleton, Kansas, C.J. Blew has his combine for sale.

Across the heartland, a global glut of grain has depressed commodity prices. And Blew, a fourth-generation farmer who came back to the family operation 22 years ago, hasn’t been making money on irrigated corn—or any other commodity, for that matter.

“I’ve seen red ink but not as bad as we’ve had the past couple years,” he said.

Yet, even in tough economic times, his cattle still had a profit margin. So, Blew did something unprecedented in these parts. He turned to cows to save the farm.

“This will be the first year in my lifetime that we’ve never harvested grain,” Blew said.