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[Conflict]

I'm having a food crises and I can't figure out why! I need some tips/help on how I can repair this problem, here is some information.

Food Stocks...
Meat: None:
Fish: None
Plant: None

Population: 61
Designated Farmers: 15
Plump Helmets: 126 tiles
Quarry Bush: About 50 tiles

[Nonsapient]

You have 126 tiles designated for Plump helmets?  As in farm plots?

Also, please note,  you need to set crops for each season,  not just once per plot.  If the crop name is red,  that means it is too late to plant this season.

[Conflict]

Yeah, as in farm plots sorry.

Also yeah, I've set each season to have plump helmets, but it appears it's not turning up much. Sure it's making food and all but not enough to keep up with my demands obviously.

[Scarpa]

Are you processing the quarry bushes into leaves?

Do you have enough barrels for storage or are you losing lots of food to rot?

A quick fix would be to knock out a ton of stone crafts and buy out all the food/drink at the next caravan. That ought to give you a bit of breathing room. Honestly though, with that much PH production I don't see how you can be out of food.

[mareck]

First question..
Have you ever gotten anything from your farms?

if not. then make sure that the correct plants are selected and DONT fallow after you select a plat. It cancels it. (The last thread the dude did that.)

[JmzLost]

Have you been brewing the plumps into wine? 
Did you accidently forbid some of them? 
What is the skilllevel of your farmers, and are they set to "farming(fields)"?  Low skill can result in stacks of 0 or 1. 

Quarry bushes need to be processed to bags at a farmer's workshop, and then cooked.  Until they're cooked, your dorfs won't eat quarry bush leaves.  Also, they won't grow quarry bushes if you don't have rock nuts, which are the quarry bush seeds.

Speaking of seeds, how many plump helmet spawn do you have?  If you've been cooking the plumps, you won't get any spawn, so you won't be able to replant the crop.

61 dorfs shouldn't eat THAT much, if you have the spawn and "no-label" growers you should be swimming in plumps right now.

JMZ


edit: ninja'd by scarpa AND mareck

[Derakon]

Check for seeds, yeah. I bet you cooked all your plump helmets, which would destroy your seeds, thus prevent you from growing new ones.

You can't do that to quarry bushes, since you can't use them until they've been prepared, and seeds are generated at the preparation step. But you can't brew quarry bushes.

Until the next caravan, some secondary food sources:

 * Hunting. Good for a few bits of meat and fat from each creature
 * Fishing. Slightly smaller returns than hunting, but many dwarfs can do it in parallel and it's safer
 * Plant gathering. Could also get you some new crops to start planting (though you'd need an outdoor farm)

[Rysith]

I'm having a food crises and I can't figure out why! I need some tips/help on how I can repair this problem, here is some information.

Food Stocks...
Meat: None:
Fish: None
Plant: None

Population: 61
Designated Farmers: 15
Plump Helmets: 126 tiles
Quarry Bush: About 50 tiles

Another possibility: What is your "other" food line? If you have been preparing/brewing/cooking with 15 dwarves, I could see you having turned all of your plump helmets into -plump helmet biscuits- and such, which will cause those three lines to show 0 even though you won't actually be running out of food.

Beware, though, that the "other" line includes inedible ingredients, such as quarry bush leaves.

[Brhino]

Something that has caught me before is food stockpiles filling up with inedible items, such as fat (if you've done any hunting/butchering) or plants that need to be milled before they can be used.  If your stockpiles are full, you won't be able to harvest very many of the plants you're growing, and your food production and storage capabilities will be reduced.

If that's the case, make sure you're assigning tasks to deal with the inedibles (milling plants or rendering fat) or just dump the excess to free up room.

[Conflict]

First question..
Have you ever gotten anything from your farms?

if not. then make sure that the correct plants are selected and DONT fallow after you select a plat. It cancels it. (The last thread the dude did that.)

Yeah, but I'm not getting really much. I get the occasion of 4 or 5 per season it seems which from what I've heard, I should be getting *a lot* more.

Have you been brewing the plumps into wine?
Did you accidently forbid some of them?
What is the skilllevel of your farmers, and are they set to "farming(fields)"?  Low skill can result in stacks of 0 or 1.

Quarry bushes need to be processed to bags at a farmer's workshop, and then cooked.  Until they're cooked, your dorfs won't eat quarry bush leaves.  Also, they won't grow quarry bushes if you don't have rock nuts, which are the quarry bush seeds.

Speaking of seeds, how many plump helmet spawn do you have?  If you've been cooking the plumps, you won't get any spawn, so you won't be able to replant the crop.

61 dorfs shouldn't eat THAT much, if you have the spawn and "no-label" growers you should be swimming in plumps right now.

JMZ

A) On occasion I'll brew a little bit, but really I haven't brewed that much.
B) No
C) Adept Grower / Dabbling Grower / Adept Grower / Dabbling Grower / Novice Grower

^ I guess the skills are pretty crummy so perhaps I should assign more people to farming?

And ok for the Quarry bushes, I didn't know that. I'll have to do that for sure.

And currently it says I have around 200? plump helmet seeds.

Check for seeds, yeah. I bet you cooked all your plump helmets, which would destroy your seeds, thus prevent you from growing new ones.

You can't do that to quarry bushes, since you can't use them until they've been prepared, and seeds are generated at the preparation step. But you can't brew quarry bushes.

Until the next caravan, some secondary food sources:

 * Hunting. Good for a few bits of meat and fat from each creature
 * Fishing. Slightly smaller returns than hunting, but many dwarfs can do it in parallel and it's safer
 * Plant gathering. Could also get you some new crops to start planting (though you'd need an outdoor farm)

Right now under the 'Kitchen' tab for the plump helmet it has says Cook

Hmmm, I think with my excess workers I'll task them to fishing to bring in some temporary food until I'm back on track, living is nice afterall.

Another possibility: What is your "other" food line? If you have been preparing/brewing/cooking with 15 dwarves, I could see you having turned all of your plump helmets into -plump helmet biscuits- and such, which will cause those three lines to show 0 even though you won't actually be running out of food.

Beware, though, that the "other" line includes inedible ingredients, such as quarry bush leaves.

Well from time to time I'll see the message 'NAME is hunting for vermin' and I'll see the downpointing arrows on some of my dwarves.

Something that has caught me before is food stockpiles filling up with inedible items, such as fat (if you've done any hunting/butchering) or plants that need to be milled before they can be used.  If your stockpiles are full, you won't be able to harvest very many of the plants you're growing, and your food production and storage capabilities will be reduced.

If that's the case, make sure you're assigning tasks to deal with the inedibles (milling plants or rendering fat) or just dump the excess to free up room.

Well I have plenty of storage all assigned to carry certain items (to maximize effiency) so I'm not worrying about that really.

[Nonsapient]

Upload the save?

i would recommend against adding more growers.

How many squares are actually planted in your plots?  they'll look like a =

Also,  try dedicating a grower to ONLY farming.  That way he doesn't have any other labors enabled that can distract him.

[Bricks]

Probably not the main issue, but your farms should be much smaller.  You can probably feed an ~80 fortress on a 5x5 plot, depending on how talented your planters are.  It's possible your production is being hampered by simply having too much land to tend to.  And I could be wrong, but planters seem to train faster when you have smaller farms.

[Nonsapient]

When I start out,  I'll place two maximum size plots.  They rarely get fully planted,  but that way I can manage my crops per season easier. 

[Derakon]

You don't want lots of farmers. Two full-time farmers are more than enough to support a fortress of 80 dwarves. All that "farming" entails is planting seeds in the ground, and harvesting plants that have grown. The skill of the farmer determines how much of a return you get from each seed. For example, an unskilled farmer planting a plump helmet spawn will generally get 1 plant back (i.e. a "stack" of 1 Plump Helmet), but might get 0 or 2 instead. A highly-skilled farmer will frequently get 5 plants back (a stack of 5 Plump Helmets).

Having unskilled farmers around is just a recipe to waste seeds, though since you have so many that shouldn't be a problem.

Look at your farms. They should have one of two symbols on each square: either a doubled ~, or an =. The former indicates unplanted farmland, the latter planted farmland. How much of each do you have?

[JmzLost]

As others have already said, 2 or 3 skilled farmers is better than a dozen unskilled ones.  Turn off "Farming(Fields)" for the ones who are only dabbling or novice, and turn off everything else for the skilled farmers.  Also, I tend to set my orders to "Dwarves All Harvest", because harvesting will train growers without affecting the amount of food.  Stack size is determined when the seed is planted, so you want skilled farmers doing the planting.  Everyone harvesting means I have some emergency backup if something nasty Dwarfy happens to my farmers.

In the short term, gathering, fishing, and hunting are all good ideas, like Derakon said.  You might also try cooking some of your booze or seeds that you're not using (20 easy meals = 40 seeds).

The only problem with hunting/fishing is that they're high priority tasks, so don't expect those Dwarfs to do anything else, not even haul the food to a stockpile.  And raw fish need to be cleaned at a fishery, which Fisherdwarfs won't do.

Good luck with the food

JMZ