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[verdigriss]

Is there any way to do something to a rock tile that will create soil on top of it that will grow grass and/ or trees and can be used for a pasture?  I know about wetting stone floors to make mud, but in testing it doesn't seem that created mud, above ground, exposed to the light will ever grow grass.

Does created underground mud grow moss and fungi and trees once the cavern has been breached, or is that only exposed soil floors?

Any way to create surface pasture over exposed soil tiles?  Any trick, no matter how glitchy or involved?

Thanks for your help.

[coalboat]

It creates mud whether it's above or underground, but only on natural rock  (or obsidian). Constructed floor cannot be mudded.

[mightymushroom]

Someone may come along with more information, but to the best of my knowledge putting mud on the floor is the trick. Usually the only thing to trip over is that plants do not self-seed on top of a constructed floor tile, only natural ones.

Any way to create surface pasture over exposed soil tiles?

Assuming you mean actual "soil" here and not only muddied floor, then you may be experiencing a biome problem rather than a surface problem. Glaciers, mountains, or oceans don't have any grazing plants and won't grow new ones, for instance; some evil biomes have only 'dead' grasses that do not grow either. If you have more than one biome on your embark you could try a different corner.

Underground plants should start growing if you breach the caverns. This has also been known to be occasionally buggy, but it's something I would expect to work until proven otherwise for any given game.


On the "no matter how involved" side you could try extending your farm plots. If you are worried about your grazing animals starving, then anyone who owns a grazing pet should be able to feed their pet with regular dwarf food when it gets hungry. Dwarves with the animal caretaker labor can feed non-pets, I believe. However this seems to be a lower priority than most players would like, so be sure any caretakers and pet owners are not super busy with other jobs.

[Seolferwulf]

Once you breach a cavern muddy floor tiles in your fort will grow moss and underground plants.
Apparently grazers can feed on moss, so this should work for them.
Keep in mind that constructed and smoothed stone floor won't work since dwarves will clean those tiles, removing the mud.

[anewaname]

The soil layer below the surface is linked to the surface biome, and the biome you are attempting to use may be the problem.

This thread might be worth the read for you.

[PatrikLundell]

Unless the logic has changed (testing made with 0.40.X, probably 24), floors can be muddied and grass and very sparse shrubs (but not saplings) can grow on it, as well as it being possible to create farm plots on the mud. The new cleaning behavior can cause the mud to be cleaned away (I've heard, but never seen any mud cleaned away: blood and vomit, yes, but not mud), but I believe that can be disabled for the outdoors.
However, the air biome* does not support grass or shrubs, although plants legal for that biome can still be grown on farm plots.

*For some reason, the biome a number of Z levels above the ground is set to not support spontaneously growing flora and does not follow the biome boundaries on the ground. Due to a bug the biome is the one of the world tile to the NW of the embark's world tile (it may be the same biome if both world tiles have the same biome). Due to another bug it's possible for the air biome to have patches of other neighboring biomes in it, but still with the no-grow flag set.