Field Sizes

[Wai]

I have been playing about with pure, organic crop farming. No animals.

As of now, I am finding .4 ha to be the most advantageous as a full hectare controls too many resources for too long thus limiting variety. Having variety seems to me to utilise resources more effectively as both equipment and workers have less down time and fields needing attention have shorter waiting time.

I am wondering if smaller fields would be even more effective.

What is your preferred field size, and why?

[Panahasi]

Hmm I have not done any testing but I try to use as large as possible fields. The minimizes the time travelling to pick up and drop off equipment. Might be worthy of a test, 1 1ha fields vs 2 .5 ha fields. # of crops and speed of processing. might be a fun test.

[Wai]

Originally posted by Panahasi:

Hmm I have not done any testing but I try to use as large as possible fields. The minimizes the time travelling to pick up and drop off equipment. Might be worthy of a test, 1 1ha fields vs 2 .5 ha fields. # of crops and speed of processing. might be a fun test.

I have been experimenting with .2 ha today. Needs less machinery than the very big fields. or even the .4 ha. I suspect that the crops involved may play a part. I have been using the four perennial berry plants. I can't imagine using small fields for grass and cereal plants.

The problem is working out if less travel time is more or less wasteful than having big fields waiting for the equipment to become available.

[Joney-F]

This is very interesting data, but as far as I have tried various things, I think that 1 ha is better for crops that last for a long time because it costs money every month regardless of whether you use a machine or not.

For example, if the monthly expenses are 1000, the expenses will always be deducted every month. On top of that, for example, cassis is 50 days, so even if 1000 is deducted in the first month, it can be harvested in the middle of the next month.

However, for example, red pepper takes 95 days, so even if the monthly expense is 1000, it will not be enough in 3 months, and a total of 3000 will be deducted in 3 months. Therefore, if you harvest in the middle of the 4th month, if you can only get 1500, which is the same as Cassis, you will not be able to recover the expenses and will be in the red. If you don't take as much as you need to spend, you won't be able to catch up.

[Wai]

Well now, I have not sat down and done the maths on this one, but, so far I have found 0.125 and 0.25 ha is always significantly profitable for both tomatoes and peppers (multi crop annuals) even if you do not plant very early in the spring. I have, in fact, never bothered to convert to larger fields for these crops. If nothing else, you need less seasonal pickers if you use smaller fields.

Also, I have found I can run very profitable farms with fields of 1/8 and 1/4 ha for all but the major cereals, where I go for 0.6, usually. I find that the most a very expensive combine harvester can manage in a season is two full sized fields then they sit and wait. If you use smaller, they cycle smoothly though five or more crops so your two combines will harvest far more crops in total.

Just my unproven observation so only opinion.

[However, fields are charged for in ratio to their size, so if a field of 0.1 ha costs x then a field of 1 ha costs 10x. If you set up a single field on a virgin farm and then run it for a couple of seconds you will see your costs on the budget forecast for the year. Jot the costs down. Now abandon your game and set up a different sized field, using the same crop on another virgin farm and run that for a couple of seconds. If you now check the annual forecast you will see that the cost varies in ratio with the size. QED, one field of one hector will cost the same as 4 fields each of a quarter hector.

The base initial base charge is quite significant, (you can see this on the month tab) but, the monthly charge is not. (you can check this on the year tab.)]

[Panahasi]

I have been playing around with this a little, using berries, I really like the .25h as when harvesting it's a single trip to the field. No extra trips home to take a break. Going to try other field shapes and sizes. I am not into doing spreadsheets for fun so as long as I am profitable in hard mode, happy enough. Setting up .52 and .48 fields now. Hoping to find a combo I can use to easily start a hard map without animals.

[Wai]

Originally posted by Panahasi:

I have been playing around with this a little, using berries, I really like the .25h as when harvesting it's a single trip to the field. No extra trips home to take a break. Going to try other field shapes and sizes. I am not into doing spreadsheets for fun so as long as I am profitable in hard mode, happy enough. Setting up .52 and .48 fields now. Hoping to find a combo I can use to easily start a hard map without animals.

I don't do spreadsheets either. I used to lecture in IT and business studies which included Spreadsheets, retired now, I prefer to play than to analyse.

For animal free start on hard mode, I have found a couple of .125h fields of berries works, but, I have not tried other sizes or crops in hard mode. Will be watching for your results.

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/2032847057982394883/239FD6284B7AF748BA53699BE5F0696E54D84C20/?imw=5000&imh=5000&ima=fit&impolicy=Letterbox&imcolor=%23000000&letterbox=false

Field size .106h (6x11). This has been my most successful in hard mode.

[Hydguy]

Field size isn't the question everyone is after. It is how can I maximize my yield and/or net profit of a given crop? There are so many variables in this game and with each crop, it has been very time consuming to run these tests. However, I will answer your question about field size: if your crop can be (and you plan to) harvested with machinery, then the larger the field size, the better. If your crop (or greenhouse) is on'y sprayed and harvested by hand, then you have to balance the labor allocations, field size, maximum workers, available workers, etc. Items like cucumbers, watermelons, peppers, etc take a very long time to harvest by hand on a large field. Also caution for the chemical spraying..... the cost of chemicals and labor or machinery to apply in some cases results in a losses instead of net profits. Simply put....some crops are not a good financial investment at all even Medium game mode, unless you risk not spraying. Optimize returns with training, plowing, fertilizing, and level 5 trained workers when hand harvesting.