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[didgameta]

I can get a decent little fort going, supplying the dwarves food through fishing and farming. Along come the first group of migrants, giving me around 15-20 dwarves instead of the initial 7. Even with 3 dwarves fishing, 2-3 gathering plants, and maybe 1 hunting, I still cannot supply enough food for my dwarves. It usually ends up with everyone going crazy and at least one dwarf going on a killing spree and the sheriff running around beating folks up. Anyone got any tips on keeping the masses well fed at the beginning of the game and averting total chaos?

[Slappy Moose]

You are processing the plants and fish properly, right?

And the farms have food-related plants being sown? And you have seeds?

If you answer yes to every question, the only advice I can give is this: dedicated fishermen/farmers, or bigger farms and more farmers.

I start off with at least 50% farming and 10% fishing. This seems to be a good food production level.

If not, just keep making more food production until you get a big enough supply.

[Derakon]

Typically I start with 26 or 51 of each seed type, plus 101 turtles, 1 each of the other cheap meats, and around 200 booze. The turtles provide more than enough buffer room to get a decent farming operation going. Just make plump helmets to start, since they can be eaten straight (i.e. without any further processing). Every other cave-based food type requires at least one additional step before it becomes edible, so those extra seeds are just for when I've gotten things established and want more variety.

How big are your farms?

[didgameta]

I've only got one 10x10 farm going. Too small? My population has rapidly dropped from 35 to 7 in about 15-20 minutes. I think I'm going to have to scrap this fortress. So plump helmets should be grown all year round for the first couple of seasons?

[JoRo]

10x10?  That's a plenty big farm right there.  I usually have one or two 5x5s that provide enough for years before I start branching out into dimple cups and pig tails.

[Derakon]

When you start, you should have at least one, probably two dwarves "maxed out" (five ranks) in the Farming (Fields) skill. Unskilled farmers can easily waste seeds while taking up space on the field. This is the only skill-based factor that determines field output. The only other thing I can think of is that maybe your farm plot is partially exposed to light; underground plants can't be planted in "outside" squares.

Or maybe you're just brewing all the farm output before you get to eat it.

Usually I make a set of 4x4 or similarly-sized farm plots, and plant different things in them. 10x10 is huge; you could easily feed a massive fortress by using such a farm plot correctly.

[Metal Chao]

I really don't understand how anyone manages to run out of food.
I always sell my anvil at the start and spend my points on four dogs, two picks, and axe, 60 beers, 40 plump helmet seeds, and all other points into meat.

That's enough food to last for the entire first year.
A single farmer and fisherman on top of that provides enough for three years.

What are you doing? O_o

[Solara]

I think we need some more details to figure out what the problem is, under normal circumstances a 10x10 plot should provide much more than a fort the size of the one you're describing would need.

[Khosan]

quote:Originally posted by Metal Chao:
<STRONG>I really don't understand how anyone manages to run out of food.
I always sell my anvil at the start and spend my points on four dogs, two picks, and axe, 60 beers, 40 plump helmet seeds, and all other points into meat.

That's enough food to last for the entire first year.
A single farmer and fisherman on top of that provides enough for three years.

What are you doing? O_o</STRONG>

I almost ran out of food after the first year on my current fortress.  Partly my fault, as I'd set Plump Helmets to be cooked and had my chef churning out roasts, so I was losing quite a few seeds.  The rest was a couple botched farming plots where I didn't get enough return for my seeds to keep farming for a while.

That caused some problems, since I had to get all my food from trading.

[Fedor]

As said by the previous poster, we need more detail to analyze the problem.  However, the problem will certainly be some inefficiency; DF makes it easy to get food on any map with sand or soil or grass.

If you are having trouble growing enough food, then one or more of the following is likely at issue:

* You might lack any sort of soil or sand (this is rare), or have placed your farm in some inconvenient spot.  You may have failed to bring enough seeds.  The solutions in these cases include trade, hunting, fishing, and gathering.

* You might either have no-one assigned to farm, or the dwarves that are allowed to farm may have been told to also do other things (like hauling) that keep them away from the fields.

* You may be making your dwarves walk too far.  Watch your dwarves and notice how much time they waste just walking about instead of actually doing the job you assigned them.  Dwarves are short-legged little guys who hate long hikes.

Put the seeds near the fields.  Put the fields near the harvest stockpile(s).  Put them near the workshops that use plants.  Put these near the edibles stockpile.  Put that near the dining hall.  Put the liquor stockpile near where most dwarves are most of the time.  Use vertical connections - they let you combine lots of work space and short walks.  Use these methods for all your industries.

* You may lack enough stockpile space for harvested crops, or enough space to store edibles and booze.  You may not have a still to make booze or a kitchen to make prepared meals.  You may have neglected to make enough barrels to store stuff, or enough bags to hold your seeds and certain kinds of prepared goods.

---

Farming in DF is extremely productive; I personally think it is /too/ productive.  Once you optimize your farming and food-processing, it is quite possible for two or three sufficiently skilled dwarves (one farmer-cook; one or two farm-brewers) to grow, harvest, cook, and distill enough food and liquor for eighty.

[RogerN]

Perhaps you only chose a crop for the first season?  It's easy to make that mistake.  You must manually designate a crop for each season.

A 10x10 farm plot is *huge*.  You should never run out of food with a farm plot that size.

[Logical2u]

My last fort failed because the farmable ground was too far from the food stockpiles/beds, so they ended up walking around a ton.
Then goblins came and killed my farmers. That was a pain.

Anyways my current fort has farms right next to the beds and food stockpiles (although the magma forge is a few z levels and about 100 steps away)... My miners never seem to actually mine. *shrug*. At least this one is mostly sand. My old fort has farms a z level down and stockpiles next door.

[DonerKebab]

It sounds like you're doing it just about right.  Once you figure out farming you'll be set.  Then when you master traps you'll get bored.

[Earthquake Damage]

quote:Originally posted by JoRo:
<STRONG>10x10?  That's a plenty big farm right there.  I usually have one or two 5x5s that provide enough for years before I start branching out into dimple cups and pig tails.</STRONG>

I tend to use a row of 5x1 plots myself, each assigned to no more than one seed type at one time (so most plots lie fallow for one or more seasons each year).  It's pretty easy to manage that way, as I never have to build more plots and I can avoid an excessive surplus.

[Benitosimies]

The wiki says rock nuts provide loads and loads of meals.

Leather bags are cheap (especially if you ask for every kind, low priority) so you shouldn't have trouble Processing Plant to Bag /R, and then Prepare Fine Meal/ R.

I have ~60 dwarves and like 3000 meals. Most of them are quarry bush stew.

Also ask the traders for food a lot and make sure you have an indoor food stockpile and loads of barrels.

Maybe it's just me but I don't have a lot of luck with Plant Gathering. I take all plant gatherers and convert them into Farming (Fields) + Plant Processing.

Make sure you have at least one butcher to process animals brought back from hunting.

I noticed that if my fishery workers have fishing turned on, they will go fish instead of cleaning fish. YMMV.

I make at least two cook/brewers and food seems to get taken care of as long as there's barrels.