Farming Guide

The core principle: mini-farming

The single most important farming technique in Scrap Mechanic is mini-farming: planting small groups of crops at least 64 blocks apart so that each group lives in its own grid cell. Cells are 64x64 blocks, and the aggression counter checks each cell separately. A single crop in a cell produces no aggression. A 6x6 farm in a single cell produces a raid timer immediately.

How planting works

1. Place a Soil Bag on a flat terrain surface. It becomes a square mound of soil.
2. Left-click the Soil Bag with Seeds in your hand. The crop is planted.
3. Throw a Water Bucket’s contents on the crop. The crop starts growing.
4. (Optional) Throw Fertilizer on the crop. Growth time is halved.

Crops take between 4 and 12 in-game hours to grow, depending on the crop and the use of fertilizer.

Crop tiers

Crop	Growth time	Restores	Tier
Wheat	4 hours	10 hunger	Basic
Beet	4 hours	12 hunger	Basic
Carrot	6 hours	15 hunger	Medium
Tomato	6 hours	18 hunger	Medium
Pineapple	10 hours	60 hunger + 60 thirst	Advanced
Broccoli	10 hours	60 hunger + 60 thirst	Advanced

The mini-farming pattern, in practice

For a safe, undetectable farm:

1. Place a single Soil Bag in the centre of one 64x64 cell.
2. Plant a Wheat seed.
3. Walk at least 64 blocks in one cardinal direction.
4. Place another single Soil Bag.
5. Repeat.

You can place up to 16 single crops per 256x256 area (four cells per quadrant) without triggering a raid timer.

When to upgrade to a defended farm

Once you have enough Crops to sustain your hunger bar, you will want to build a defended farm. Use the four-layer template from the defensive base guide. This lets you plant a 6x6 farm behind metal walls with Spud Gun turrets.

Defended farms are faster to maintain (one harvest = many crops) but require a constant supply of Spud Gun ammo and wall repairs.

Cooking your harvest

Raw crops are useful, but cooked crops restore significantly more hunger and (for Pineapple and Broccoli) refill your thirst bar on top. Use a Cook Bot to convert raw crops to cooked crops. For the full cooking recipe list, see recipes and crafting.

Common farming mistakes

• Planting too many crops too quickly. Trigger a raid before your walls are ready.
• Forgetting to water. Crops without water do not grow.
• Skipping fertilizer. Without fertilizer, growth time is doubled.
• Leaving crops on fire. Harvesting a burning crop destroys it.

Automation

Once you have a defended farm, use controllers to automate the cycle:

• A Conveyor belt from a Refinery Bot to a chest.
• A Cook Bot triggered by a timer.
• A Raycast sensor that detects mature crops and triggers the Cook Bot.

This turns your farm into a passive food source. The 1.0 patch’s frozen-bearing system keeps even large automated farms running smoothly.

For the defensive side of the farm, see the defensive base guide.