This movie earned its "PG" rating due to one of Maggie's (Roseanne Barr's) lines about her udders ("Yeah, they're real. Quit staring.")
This movie marked the beginning of a five-year hiatus of traditionally animated Disney feature films. During its theatrical release (first-run and sub-run) in the United States, this movie reportedly earned less than half of its estimated production cost. This was one of the final factors that led to the decision to make this the last traditionally ("hand-drawn") animated Disney feature for theatrical release. In early 2006, at the urging of professionals both inside and outside of Disney, plans were being considered for resuming traditionally animated features for theatrical release, starting with The Princess and the Frog (2009) which ended and restarted the hiatus.
This movie was so poorly received by critics and audiences that Art Director Michael Giaimo was fired from Disney.
Screenwriters Will Finn and John Sanford originally pitched this movie as an animated feature film based on the myth of the Pied Piper. Maggie the Cow was originally written as a deaf girl. Michael Eisner immediately hated the idea, because he thought no parent would take their children to see a movie where children are murdered. So Finn and Sanford wrote this movie, which contains elements from the Pied Piper myth.
Patch of Heaven is said to be a dairy farm. Yet before Maggie came along, it had exactly two cows.