If you don't pet your animals, but you feed them, do they lose hearts?

[Duplo]

Thanks for the answer friendos.

[I Kinda Fail]

I don't think so, but if they do, it's really slow.

You'd want a heater for winter, though.

[Honorable_D]

I think they get happiness from two sources: being let outside for the day and being pet. So, what I'd like to know is, if you let them out can you just ignore petting them?

Or do they actually LOSE happiness when not pet each day? I do have heaters for winter.

[Uncle Cam Wants YOU]

Originally posted by Honorable_D:

I think they get happiness from two sources: being let outside for the day and being pet. So, what I'd like to know is, if you let them out can you just ignore petting them?

Or do they actually LOSE happiness when not pet each day? I do have heaters for winter.

Animal Friendship increases the likelihood that the animal will produce higher quality products. The more hearts they have, the higher the chance of getting Silver/Gold/Iridium quality. Petting them, feeding them (feeding them Hay does not increase Friendship, but its doesnt decrease it either), and shearing/milking them (not milking/shearing will not decrease Friendship).

Mood works similarly to Friendship, but it only gets calculated at the start of the day. Mood increases/decreases the percentage chance of the animal producing the following day (or more days depending on the type of anime i.e Goat produces every 2 days). Petting, milking/shearing, feeding, heater (during winter) are all ways to increase their mood.

Stage 1:
Mood 0-29: *animal name* looks sad.
Mood 30-199: *animal name* looks fine.
Mood 200-255: *animal name* looks really happy today!

Note:Mood is scaled from 0 - 255. Letting your animals eat Grass outside puts them at Max Mood (*animal name* looks really happy today!). However, if you Pet them AFTER they eat grass, it resets their mood (*animal name* looks fine today).

Basically, an Animals day ends at 6pm. If you yourself stay awake past 6pm, their mood will go down every 10 ingame minutes that goes by after 6pm (their mood will drop to 150 and will not go any lower). Friendship is not negatively affected during this time frame.

Originally posted by Duplo:

If you don't pet your animals, but you feed them, do they lose hearts?

As for this, Animal Friendship may or may not go down if they are not pet. If you ONLY let them eat grass outside, that is a +8 in friendship. By not petting them, the animal will lose -5 to -10 friendship, so there is a chance that the animal may gain or lose friendship by the end of the day. However, if it is a Cow/Goat/Sheep, shearing and milking give +5 friendship. Add this with the grass eating and you get +13 friendship that day, and will not lose any friendship if not pet (though getting them to 5 hearts will be a very, very, very slow process.

[Honorable_D]

Okay, so it looks like I'll need to pet them every now and then, even when letting them out, to offset that potential -2 friendship. Man, this is why I only have 1 coop and 1 barn—dealing with animals it a lot bigger pain than farming.

[nash]

however it is important to note that petting after eating grass resets their happiness more or less entirely. See the starbound stardewvalley forum for more details. So if you want to let them outside it is important that you pet them before opening that door. If you forgot to close it the last night just dont pet them at all.