Fertilizer

Fertilizer is the main method you will use to make your rice even better, and is the best way to increase the stats of your harvest.

Fertilizer is taken from the outhouse by the side of the house - yes, you think correctly - taking it to the fertilizer pit next to the rice paddy, and waiting for it to age. As unpleasant as the process is, fertilizer is vital for the growth of your rice and is by far the best way to deliver nutrients into the soil and the harvest. It is recommended that every night you put your items into the fertilizer, and every morning you spread it, as rice does most of its growing during sunlight hours, and stat gains from fertilizer in Sakuna: Of Rice and Ruin are effective for 10 hours per batch.

There are two steps to creating fertilizer. The first base step is the leaf, root, and kernel fertilizer, which are the main nutrients of the fertilizer. The second step is adding additonal items to raise various other stats of the rice.

Step One: Base Components - Leaf, Root and Kernel Fertilizer

The first step is putting in leaf, root and/or kernel fertilizer. Keep in mind that instead of pressing an action button to do this, you select an item by using the up and down directional buttons, and press the left and right directional buttons to determine how much of each component to use for the fertilizer.

Leaf, root and kernel fertilizer are represented via a radar chart:

And your main sources of these will be:

Beast Hoof (Leaf - added from Sprouting phase onwards)

Beast Manure (Kernel - added during Offshoots phase)

Fallen Leaves (Root - added during Seedlings phase)

Oil Cake (All three)

The fourth item you add to it is Amber; the more you put in, the more potent the effects of the leaf/kernel/root fertilizer added at this step, thus adding more nutrients to the fertilizer.

It is important that these stay topped up as the lack of nutrients will diminish the rice's ability to absorb stat increases via items put in in the second step, and this leads to underdeveloped rice. During each stage of the rice growing process, different aspects of the fertilizer will decrease; in the early stages of the rice growing process, you will need more root fertilizer, during the middle growth stages, you will need more kernel fertilizer, and during the last stages of rice growth, you will need more leaf fertilizer.

Be warned, however - putting too much fertilizer and overfilling the fertilizer triangle can lead to your rice becoming overgrown and spindly, which is detailed in Rice Disorders. So be sure not to put too much in - if you put fertilizer in your field at night as well as in the day, this is worth taking into consideration.

Step Two: Additional Components - What else should I add?

The second step is to put in any stat-boosting items - it is these items that will provide yield, aesthetic etc. to your rice. While the nutrients in your rice go down much more slowly, it is these stat boosts from items that will last only 10 hours from the moment you put the fertilizer in the rice paddy, so as above, it is recommended to put fertilizer on your rice paddy in the morning when the rice is more active to gain the full benefits of the stat boosts. Here is an example:

And in fact, note the additional numbers on kernel fertilizers here - in this step, some items can offer further boosts to kernel, leaf and root fertilizers:

Item	Leaf Fertilizer	Kernel Fertilizer	Root Fertilizer
Wood			+5%
High Quality Oak			+5%
Ironwood			+5%
Bamboo			+5%
Hemp		+5%
Sedge		+5%
Hemp Palm		+5%
Cork Tree Branch		+5%
Murasaki Root		+5%
Madder		+5%
Indigo Scale	+5%	+5%
Deer Antler	+10%
Boar Tusk	+10%
Badger Leaf			+10%
Bean
Kombu Kelp			+10%
Vegetable Oil	+5%
Fish Oil	+5%

Miscellaneous Stats

The Immunity stat alters the rice's susceptibility to diseases, the Herbicide stat alters the rice's defenses against weeds, the Pesticide stat alters the rice's defenses against pests, and the Toxicity stat alters the toxicity of the soil; these can all be determined by what you put into the fertilizer in the second step. for further details, refer to Rice Disorders, Stats, and Weeds and Pests.

I put the wrong items into my fertilizer - can I start again?

After you've put in stat boosting items, you can still put in more, up to the limit of items - however, if you want to adjust the root, leaf or kernel fertilizer, or if you want to remove any stat boosting items in, you can also do so. You will have to discard the fertilizer and restart from step one, but you will get back everything that you have put in.

You will have to make another trip to the outhouse to put more fertilizer in, but it's a forgiving mechanic and you do not lose any of the components.

In any case, let us move onto the next element of growing rice: stages.

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