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[Deathworks]

Dear Greycat,

I recall having seen extensive fertilizer experiment threads in the past. I did a search on the forums, and the first promising one was this:

http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=87721.msg2813394#msg2813394

However, I am pretty sure that I have seen other extensive experiments in this field, and it would be nice if their authors could speak up (as the search function is not really easily applied to this problem, it seems).

Yours,
Deathworks

[blakecarl]

Thanks for the write up.

[kelumhi]

edit, posted in wrong thread.

[orius]

Does anyone know how many tiles of farm plot a single farmer can effectively handle?

[Garath]

depends on skill, since skilled farmers plant/farm faster. I don't know any science on this, I only know I usually have too much produce anyway

[brainfreez]

a legendary farmer is a good farmer .

[vanatteveldt]

Newb question: how do you handle the processing of plant produce?

I generally setup a seed+plants pile near the fields and a food (minus seeds/plants) pile near the dining hall. In between them I build a millstone, farmers workshop, still, kitchen and on another side of the plants pile a loom, dye, and cloth workshop.

Now, I would wish all plants to be milled to get flour + seeds, and the seeds to be cooked; and applicable plants to be processed into cloth and dye.

What I do now is disable cooking plants, and use the manager to queue up 30 of each job (milling, processing etc.), assuming they'll be done as stuff becomes available. However, this generates a lot of cancellation messsages and I have the feeling that a lot of plants are eaten instead of milled. I guess I could forbid eating the plants, but this will lead to problems if the kitchen has no second ingredient as flour needs to be cooked (right?).

What do other people do to avoid these issues?

[FuzzyZergling]

Newb question: how do you handle the processing of plant produce?

I generally setup a seed+plants pile near the fields and a food (minus seeds/plants) pile near the dining hall. In between them I build a millstone, farmers workshop, still, kitchen and on another side of the plants pile a loom, dye, and cloth workshop.

Now, I would wish all plants to be milled to get flour + seeds, and the seeds to be cooked; and applicable plants to be processed into cloth and dye.

What I do now is disable cooking plants, and use the manager to queue up 30 of each job (milling, processing etc.), assuming they'll be done as stuff becomes available. However, this generates a lot of cancellation messsages and I have the feeling that a lot of plants are eaten instead of milled. I guess I could forbid eating the plants, but this will lead to problems if the kitchen has no second ingredient as flour needs to be cooked (right?).

What do other people do to avoid these issues?

You shouldn't cook seeds or plants, only their products.
I just set up the jobs to be [r]epeated, not through the manager.
The only plants that can be eaten raw are plump helmets (not counting surface plants). All others need to be cooked or processed first.

[vanatteveldt]

Maybe I'm just confused with the terminology, but I though that the cycle went something like:

Seeds --[Plant]-> (Plot) --[Harvest]-> Plant --[Mill/Distill/Process]-> seeds + (flour/drinks/...)

Am I misunderstanding something?

If I set to repeat, and at some point they can't find a X to process, the job will cancel, no?

[FuzzyZergling]

Maybe I'm just confused with the terminology, but I though that the cycle went something like:

Seeds --[Plant]-> (Plot) --[Harvest]-> Plant --[Mill/Distill/Process]-> seeds + (flour/drinks/...)

Am I misunderstanding something?

If I set to repeat, and at some point they can't find a X to process, the job will cancel, no?

That's all correct.

[vanatteveldt]

Seeds --[Plant]-> (Plot) --[Harvest]-> Plant --[Mill/Distill/Process]-> seeds + (flour/drinks/...)
If I set to repeat, and at some point they can't find a X to process, the job will cancel, no?

That's all correct.

So... if that is all correct, how do you avoid using the manager to set 30 jobs and get tons of cancellation messages? Or do you just assume that some stock will build up and give an [R] job to work away the stock, and check every so often? Or is a good farming operation flooded with plants so all will go alright? (and how do I achieve this?)

I'll try again tonight hopefully and post a save if I still can't get it to work, I'm probably missing something silly..

[Mushroo]

Seeds --[Plant]-> (Plot) --[Harvest]-> Plant --[Mill/Distill/Process]-> seeds + (flour/drinks/...)
If I set to repeat, and at some point they can't find a X to process, the job will cancel, no?

That's all correct.

So... if that is all correct, how do you avoid using the manager to set 30 jobs and get tons of cancellation messages? Or do you just assume that some stock will build up and give an [R] job to work away the stock, and check every so often? Or is a good farming operation flooded with plants so all will go alright? (and how do I achieve this?)

I'll try again tonight hopefully and post a save if I still can't get it to work, I'm probably missing something silly..

Correct, you let the plants build up and then use the manager (at least this is how I do it). For example 1 lavish meal needs 4 ingredients, so you can cue up 120 process plant (bag) jobs and 30 prepare lavish meal jobs.

It is much easier (in my opinion) to store food in plant form, and then process it as-needed, rather than to store food in processed form in case you need it.

[vanatteveldt]

Correct, you let the plants build up and then use the manager (at least this is how I do it). For example 1 lavish meal needs 4 ingredients, so you can cue up 120 process plant (bag) jobs and 30 prepare lavish meal jobs.

It is much easier (in my opinion) to store food in plant form, and then process it as-needed, rather than to store food in processed form in case you need it.

Aha. Won't the dwarfs eat them before I can process them in that case? Or will they always prefer nicer meals (and if they really prefer the plants let em graze?)

I guess this requires having enough seeds as you get the seeds back on processing, but maybe a mature fortress has way too many seeds anyway?

[Mushroo]

Aha. Won't the dwarfs eat them before I can process them in that case? Or will they always prefer nicer meals (and if they really prefer the plants let em graze?)

I guess this requires having enough seeds as you get the seeds back on processing, but maybe a mature fortress has way too many seeds anyway?

Dwarfs will starve to death before they eat an unprocessed quarry bush. The only plants they can eat raw are plump helmets and berries.

The game has a cap of 200 seeds per type, therefore if you process hundreds of plants at once, you are essentially wasting the surplus seeds. Better to process 30 plants, get those seeds in the ground, then process another 30 plants when you need them, etc.

[vanatteveldt]

According to the stock screen I have 13 plump helmets, but the miller says there are no millable unrotten plants. Also, I can't find the plump helmets on my plants stockpile (and all other piles should have plants disabled).

Are plants "in the field" counted as plants in the stock screen? If not, where are my plump helmets and why can't they be milled?

If so, is there any way to know how many plants are ready to be processed without counting barrel contents?