Carrot Seeds

Carrot Seeds

Type	Seed
Grows	Carrot
Season	Spring
Growth Time	3 days
Sell Price	15g

Carrot Seeds are the one spring packet that no counter in the valley will sell for gold. Every route to them is a found route: a tile dug up, a chest cracked open, a prize claimed, or a trade with the raccoon living in the Giant Stump. Worse, most of those routes only hand out carrot seed inside a narrow stretch of the calendar that opens late in Winter and shuts in the fourth week of Spring. The crop itself is the fastest thing that can be put in spring soil, which is exactly why a small bag of these is worth keeping rather than spending. Two sources sit outside the window and never dry up, the raccoon's barter shelf and the Seed Maker, and between them they turn a one-off find into a steady supply.

Growing

A carrot seed in watered soil comes up as a Carrot in three days, which is quicker than anything else sown in Spring. The plant is pulled once and leaves bare ground behind, so a plot given to carrots has to be sown again after every pull.

Three days is short enough to make the end of Spring genuinely useful. Sowing on the twenty-fifth still finishes on the last day of the season, so a strip of soil that comes free in the final week does not have to sit empty. Nothing in the ground survives the turn into Summer, ripe roots included, so the final pull belongs on the twenty-eighth rather than the morning after.

The awkward part is that the supply stops before the sowing does. The dug spots, the chests, the barrels and the monster drops only yield carrot seed up to the twenty-third of Spring, which leaves the last two useful sowing days with nothing to put in them unless a stack was set aside earlier. Buying the window out, rather than planting every seed the moment it is found, is the habit that pays.

Under the Greenhouse glass the season rule falls away, and a three-day cycle makes carrots a tidy way to use a bed that is waiting on something slower. The same is true of a pot indoors.

Buying

The raccoon's wife is the nearest thing to a shop. Her stall opens behind the Giant Stump the day after the first of Mr. Raccoon's requests is finished, and she takes no money at all: the price of a packet of Carrot Seeds is a single Maple Seed. Maple trees shed those for free across the farm and the forest, so the trade is as close to costless as the game gets, and her shelf stays open all year once the raccoon storyline is underway. Anyone who wants carrots in quantity should finish that first request before Spring rather than after it.

Seed Spots are the other dependable route. They look like the small dug patches that hold artifacts and they answer only to a Hoe, but they pay out seed instead of relics, two or three packets at a time, and a good luck reading pushes the count up. One is placed in the Backwoods on the ninth day of every season, which makes a single walk on that date worth the detour. What comes out of a Seed Spot depends on the date, which is where the Winter and Spring window comes from.

The rest of the routes are luck. The Prize Machine in the Mayor's Manor hands out Carrot Seeds as its very first prize, so the first Prize Ticket earned from a quest or bought with Star Tokens at the Stardew Valley Fair turns straight into a planting. Mystery Boxes opened at the Blacksmith sometimes pay out in seed packets, carrots among them inside the window. Barrels and crates broken open underground hold them now and then, whether in the Mines, below the desert or inside the volcano, Iridium Golems drop them often when they appear, and the treasure chests reeled in while fishing can hold them too. Finishing further Raccoon requests pays in carrot seed as well.

A Seed Maker closes the loop. A harvested Carrot fed into the machine comes back out as seed, and the machine ignores the calendar entirely. One good find early in Spring, run through the Seed Maker, becomes a supply that never needs the window again.

Uses

One machine touches this packet, and it runs backwards: a Carrot goes into the Seed Maker and carrot seed comes out. That is the whole reason to keep a few roots back from the shipping bin rather than selling every one.

A stack also has a use that has nothing to do with the soil. The Carrot grown from it can be fed to a horse, which lifts the horse's pace for the rest of the day, so a farm that rides to the mines keeps a handful in the saddlebag. The seed itself is the start of that chain.

As a present the packet lands badly. Everyone in the valley with an opinion on a bag of carrot seed dislikes it, so the gift box wants something else entirely.

Notes

Finish Mr. Raccoon's first request as early as possible. One Maple Seed per packet turns a crop that cannot be bought into a crop that is effectively free, and the shelf stays open after the window shuts.

Walk the Backwoods on the ninth of each season. A Seed Spot is waiting there every time, and a Hoe is all it takes.

Hold a few Carrots back for the Seed Maker before the twenty-third of Spring. After that date the found routes stop, and the machine is the only thing that still makes seed.

All Seeds

Every entry in this group, with its key details.

Name	Grows	Season	Pierre
Acorn	Oak Tree	All	-
Amaranth Seeds	Amaranth	Fall	70g
Ancient Seeds	Ancient Fruit	Spring; Summer; Fall	-
Apple Sapling	Apple	Fall	4,000g
Apricot Sapling	Apricot	Spring	2,000g
Artichoke Seeds	Artichoke	Fall	30g (Year 2+)
Banana Sapling	Banana	All on Ginger Island; Summer in Stardew Valley	-
Bean Starter	Green Bean	Spring	60g
Beet Seeds	Beet	Fall	-
Blue Grass Starter	Blue Grass	Spring; Summer; Fall	-
Blueberry Seeds	Blueberry	Summer	80g
Bok Choy Seeds	Bok Choy	Fall	50g
Broccoli Seeds	Broccoli	Fall	-
Cactus Seeds	Cactus Fruit	All	-
Carrot Seeds	Carrot	Spring	-
Cauliflower Seeds	Cauliflower	Spring	80g
Cherry Sapling	Cherry	Spring	3,400g
Coffee Bean	-	Spring; Summer	-
Corn Seeds	Corn	Summer; Fall	150g
Cranberry Seeds	Cranberries	Fall	240g
Eggplant Seeds	Eggplant	Fall	20g
Fairy Seeds	Fairy Rose	Fall	200g
Fall Seeds	Blackberry, Common Mushroom, Hazelnut, or Wild Plum	Fall	-
Fiber Seeds	Fiber	All	-
Garlic Seeds	Garlic	Spring	40g (Year 2+)
Grape Starter	Grape	Fall	60g
Grass Starter	Grass	Spring; Summer; Fall	100g
Hops Starter	Hops	Summer	60g
Jazz Seeds	Blue Jazz	Spring	30g
Kale Seeds	Kale	Spring	70g
Mahogany Seed	Mahogany Tree	All	-
Mango Sapling	Mango	All on Ginger Island; Summer in Stardew Valley	-
Maple Seed	Maple Tree	All	-
Melon Seeds	Melon	Summer	80g
Mixed Flower Seeds	Varies	Spring Summer Fall	-
Mixed Seeds	Varies	Spring Summer Fall	-
Mossy Seed	Green Rain Tree	All	-
Mushroom Tree Seed	Mushroom Tree	All	-
Mystic Tree Seed	Mystic Tree	All	-
Orange Sapling	Orange	Summer	4,000g
Parsnip Seeds	Parsnip	Spring	20g
Peach Sapling	Peach	Summer	6,000g
Pepper Seeds	Hot Pepper	Summer	40g
Pine Cone	Pine Tree	All	-
Pineapple Seeds	Pineapple	All on Ginger Island; Summer in Stardew Valley	-
Pomegranate Sapling	Pomegranate	Fall	6,000g
Poppy Seeds	Poppy	Summer	100g
Potato Seeds	Potato	Spring	50g
Powdermelon Seeds	Powdermelon	Winter	-
Pumpkin Seeds	Pumpkin	Fall	100g
Qi Bean	Qi Fruit	All	-
Radish Seeds	Radish	Summer	40g
Rare Seed	Sweet Gem Berry	Fall	-
Red Cabbage Seeds	Red Cabbage	Summer	100g (Year 2+)
Rhubarb Seeds	Rhubarb	Spring	-
Rice Shoot	Unmilled Rice	Spring	40g
Spangle Seeds	Summer Spangle	Summer	50g
Spring Seeds	Wild Horseradish, Daffodil,; Leek, or Dandelion	Spring	-
Starfruit Seeds	Starfruit	Summer	-
Strawberry Seeds	Strawberry	Spring	-
Summer Seeds	Grape, Spice Berry,; or Sweet Pea	Summer	-
Summer Squash Seeds	Summer Squash	Summer	-
Sunflower Seeds	Sunflower	Summer; Fall	200g
Taro Tuber	Taro Root	All on Ginger Island; Summer in Stardew Valley	-
Tea Sapling	Tea Leaves	All	-
Tomato Seeds	Tomato	Summer	50g
Tulip Bulb	Tulip	Spring	20g
Wheat Seeds	Wheat	Summer; Fall	10g
Winter Seeds	Crocus, Crystal Fruit,; Snow Yam, or Winter Root	Winter	-
Yam Seeds	Yam	Fall	60g