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[Hans Lemurson]

Embarking with seeds?  That's a great idea...why didn't I think of that! 
They're dirt cheap, so you can start with all you need.

[Inatun]

Yeah, I may have gone a bit overboard on the seeds. 162 plump helmet spawn I think.

Also, grapes. So many grapes. Just brew them into wine and you have grape seeds for the surface.

I think I'm going to refound the fortress though, since for the life of me I can't seem to find the caverns. I need to install DFhack and just use the reveal command. Thankfully I saved the embark profile.

That being said, I have work tomorrow, and homework, and I need to work on a DnD campaign I'm DMing, so the science might have to wait a while.

[Inatun]

How big do you think the farm plots should be? Ideally I want as many seeds planted as possible for the sake of sample size, so the hope is to have the planter in a constant cycle of planting and harvesting. That being said, are there potential downsides to making the plots obscenely large? Mainly I'm worried about whether planting or harvesting takes priority and if that could affect the test.

Also, should I have standing orders set to allow all dwarves to harvest? Are the experience gains from harvesting negligible enough to make it so the planter won't lose out on skill levels over the course of the season?

[Blue_Dwarf]

How big do you think the farm plots should be?

If nothing has changed since version 42 or so, a dabbling farmer can handle around 14 farm tiles, while a legendary+5 around 30. You can see my tests on this in my signature.

Also, I'm not sure how useful your test will be if you use dabbling planters. Their plants will mostly be stacks of 1, which defeats the purpose of comparing stack sizes between different soil types. Maybe you can test if bad soil actually destroys seeds planted in it that way.

[Inatun]

I've switched plans from using a bunch of dabbling planters to a single proficient one. I've set up a 2x2 embark with enemies turned off and brought a boatload of plump helmet spawn and grapes. I'm making sure the planter doesn't do any planting until the test plots are set up. Once they all are, I'll make a save and do a season's worth of farming in each plot before reverting to the initial save. The planter's bedroom and the communal dining hall will always be right next to the test plots to minimize time away from the farms.

[Inatun]

Okay, the test fort is almost ready to go. I'm just going to run the procedure by the rest of you to see if there's anything I should change.

I have the various farm plots set up and I've used DFHack to give a single dwarf max skill in planting. This dwarf will be the only one interacting with the farm plots, including harvesting. I'm doing this because farm plot output is what I'm interested in, so any differences will be amplified by having such a skilled dwarf working them. Fastdwarf is also enabled, which basically means teleportation and insane work speed. This is to ensure a high turnover rate of crops. More data is better.

When the season is about to change, I'll make a save to revert to for every test run so that the dwarf is in roughly the same mental state for every run. I'll have them farm each plot for a season and leave it fallow the next, then tally the crop results after the last bunch has been harvested, taking note of number of stacks and stack sizes. Just for kicks I'll do runs with and without fertilizer.

There will be eight plots in total. Two for each cavern layer and two for the layers near the surface. Each cavern layer will have a plot made up of natural cavern soil and a plot made up of mined out and irrigated stone on the same z-level. The surface layer will include normal soil and a layer of irrigated stone. This is just to check if there's any advantage to farming in the lower and more dangerous levels.

Once all the tests have been done with plump helmets, each plot will be exposed to the sun and the process will be repeated with grapes, just to see if the cavern soil bonus applies to surface crops.

Sound good to everyone? Anything about the procedure that needs editing?

[Hans Lemurson]

I think that's a pretty well thought through testing protocol. 

I look forward to seeing the results once you have the time to run the experiments and analyze the data.

[Inatun]

I think that's a pretty well thought through testing protocol. 

I look forward to seeing the results once you have the time to run the experiments and analyze the data.

It shouldn't be long. The results will probably be in by the end of the week.

I also linked this thread to r/dwarffortress asking for feedback and I got some good replies. For one, I'm adding a plot just above the magma sea as an additional way to test for relationship to z-level. Also, chipathingy has cooked up some modded plump helmet clones so that I can run all the plots at once and keep track of each plot's production. To accommodate this, I'm going to have 50 legendary planters with physical and mental attributes maxed teleporting around taking care of each plot.

Seyeght also mentioned they were curious about level of mud affecting yield, but I'd rather nail down the relationship between types of cavern soil, z-level, and yield before I jump into that.

[Hans Lemurson]

So many potential variables!

[Inatun]

So many potential variables!

Indeed!

Who wants to bet that cavern soil just means any irrigated stone or natural cavern soil, and that z-level makes no difference? Even if that's the case, at least we'll get hard data on how much better cavern soil is compared to non-cavern soil.

[Hans Lemurson]

My bet is that the fertility indicator is just a simple binary about whether a subterranean floor is muddy.

Now for my personal preferences (believing that agriculture is too abundant), I want to find out what the LEAST fertile farming environment is.

[Blue_Dwarf]

Who wants to bet that cavern soil just means any irrigated stone or natural cavern soil, and that z-level makes no difference?

It does mean that, the way I interpret Putnam's comments. But it never hurts to do some !science!.

Irrigated surface soil layers are still just as crap as regular non-irrigated surface soil layers, though.

[Inatun]

Farm plot setup complete.

50 dwarfs acquired and given max planting skill plus ideal physical and mental traits.

Dwarf teleportation enabled.

Modded plump helmets acquired for synchronous testing of farm plots.

Potash acquired for fertilized test runs.

Currently late Autumn. Preparing to create backup save just before Winter begins.

Commence testing cycles.

[Inatun]

Preliminary results suggest that such an elaborate experiment was a bit of a waste. Cavern soil seems to be defined as any area where the little warning of "poor soil" doesn't pop up, including naturally generated cavern soil and any irrigated stone, regardless of z-level. Crop yields are also the same regardless of z-level as long as it's cavern soil, and cavern soil produces twice as many crops as non-cavern soil.

I'm still working on getting the numbers for surface crops, mainly because I designed the test fort poorly and the shafts to be dug to expose each plot to sunlight intersect multiple rooms, workshops, and constructions. Even with DFHack it's a bit of a hassle. With what I know from the first phase of the experiment I could probably be fine with just a surface plot and exposed irrigated stone, but the scientist in me won't be satisfied unless I perform the entire experiment as planned.

[Blue_Dwarf]

That was the expected result, but it is not a waste. You never know what might be actually happening here until you do some !science!.