Orange Sapling

Orange Sapling

Type	Seed
Grows	Orange
Season	Summer
Growth Time	28 days
Pierre	4,000g
Cart	3,000 to 5,000g
Sell Price	1000g

The Orange Sapling is the affordable half of Summer's orchard. Pierre's General Store sells it beside the Peach Sapling at two thirds of the price, and the tree it becomes drops an Orange on every day of Summer once it is grown. Gus loves Oranges, which turns a single tree into a year-round friendship supply if one is tucked into the Greenhouse. Four weeks separate the planting from the mature tree, and those weeks ignore the calendar completely, so Spring is the season to spend the gold. Lewis's Prize Machine also hands out one of these free, sharing its second prize slot with the Peach Sapling at even odds.

Growing

Plain ground is all the sapling needs. The Hoe stays in the bag, the Watering Can is never used, and the whole requirement is space: the eight tiles touching the planting have to stay empty of debris, flooring, paths and furniture until the tree is full size. Anything sitting in that square costs a night, and the game reports the stalled night in the next morning's messages rather than letting it pass unnoticed.

Two saplings cannot share that square either. In a planned orchard that works out to two empty tiles between neighbours in every direction, which is worth pegging out with spare stone before the first purchase. The moment the tree is grown, the rule lapses and chests, Sprinklers and paving can crowd right up to the trunk.

Four stages across four weeks take the sapling to maturity, and Winter counts as a growing month like any other. That is what makes the sowing date pure arithmetic. A sapling in the ground on the first morning of Spring stands as a grown Orange Tree on the first morning of Summer, which catches every fruiting day the season has. Each day of delay in Spring shaves a day off that first harvest. Once Summer itself has begun, the sum stops working: the tree finishes in Fall, stands bare through Winter, and the first Orange arrives a whole year later than it needed to.

Quality is a matter of patience rather than care. The fruit comes out plain for the tree's first year, then climbs a grade a year until every Orange is iridium. Nothing on the farm speeds that up, which is the real argument for buying the sapling in the first year even if the orchard plan is half finished.

An Orange Tree that stands in the wrong place is not stuck there. An Axe fells it and leaves a sapling where it stood, graded to match whatever quality of Orange the tree was bearing. Graded saplings reach full size quicker when replanted, so shifting an old tree across the farm beats buying a new one outright.

Buying

Pierre keeps the sapling in stock in every season, Summer and Winter alike, so there is no window to miss and no reason to buy it early except convenience. Buying in Spring and planting the same morning is the whole routine.

Saplings turn up in the Traveling Cart's stock on her two forest days each week. Her figure for this one swings from well below the shop price to a quarter above it, which makes the cart worth a glance in passing and never worth planning around.

Free saplings do exist, and for a Summer tree they are unusually common. The Prize Machine in the Mayor's Manor keeps an Orange or Peach Sapling in its second prize slot and picks between them at random, and Prize Tickets come from marked Help Wanted quests, finished Special Orders and the festivals rather than from luck. Treasure rooms deep in the Skull Cavern hold stacks of seeds and saplings. Clint's Mystery Boxes can produce one too, although every kind of seed packet inside them is many times likelier than a sapling.

Once an orchard exists, the Axe is the cheapest supplier of all, since every tree felled gives its sapling back.

Uses

A shop will take a spare sapling back for a quarter of its shelf price, so a surplus is always worth more standing in soil. The best home for it is the stone border inside the Greenhouse, where the same tree fruits on every day of the year instead of twenty-eight of them without taking a single planting tile from the crops inside. The farm on Ginger Island treats a fruit tree the same way.

The fruit is what the purchase is really for. Gus loves an Orange, a Keg turns the crop into Orange Wine worth several times the raw fruit, and the Artisan Bundle in the Pantry will take one.

As a present the sapling itself falls flat, since the whole village dislikes being handed one.

Notes

Clear the planting site before the gold is spent. A sapling bought while the orchard corner is still under branches is four weeks of growth sitting in a bag.

Set an Orange and a Peach Tree side by side if Summer gold allows. The Orange costs less to start and the Peach is worth more per fruit, so a pair spreads the outlay across the season.

Buy the Greenhouse tree before the field trees. One sapling under glass produces in four seasons rather than one, which beats a second outdoor tree on every count.

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