Do I need to pet my chickens and cow to increase their happiness? If I don't will their happiness decrease?
If you do not pet them their happiness will decrease and so will the quality of items they produce as well as possibly not producing anything at all.
Yikes! So does anyone have any tips on the best way to wrangle 6 chickens, a duck and a cow to get them all petted daily? I'll add more animals but it already takes me half a day just to gather eggs, get Clara milked, pet everyone. Thank goodness for sprinklers...
I currently have 4 chickens 2 ducks 2 rabbits, 2 cows 2 goats 1 sheep and 5 pigs. To manage them I suggest the autograbber is great yes its pricy but its a time saver. Also I do not open the door till I have pet them all. That's why there are so many suggestions about some sort of Autograbber for the coop or having the children gather the coop when older.
Excellent suggestion, @Ltfightr! I hadn't heard of that item and researched it on the Wiki after you mentioned it. I only have one barn animal at the moment but I will definitely remember that item once I add more to the group. I'm getting married to Alex in two days so eventually those kiddos will be able to help out with the chores!
Right now all the kids do is get in the way and need to be spoken with everyday to gain hearts. The thought that they should help with chores has been suggested many times but as of today it remains a suggestion. It is not implemented in the game.
I wondered about that. The wiki didn't mention the kids helping with chores. I have enough trying to get my farm growing without having to deal with children who don't help out. Maybe later when things are running smoothly. My current task is to fence off an area I'm trying to grow grass so I can get the chickens off my front lawn! *laughs*
Technically you do not "need" to pet your cows or chickens if they eat grass outside since that causes a huge surge in mood. But if they spend the day in the barn/coop their mood will decrease if they aren't petted. Actions that affect Mood are as follows (every 10 minutes refers to ingame minutes): Petting (+32 to +36 dependent on animal type, double amount if player has chosen the Shepherd or Coopmaster Profession and the animal is of the relevant type) Eating Grass Outside (Sets Mood to 255) The Season is Winter and the animal is in an area with a Heater, and has mood 150 or higher (+4 to +8 every 10 minutes past 6PM the Player stays awake, up to 255. Only one heater required. overrides all other "every 10 minutes" effects) Animal was fed (+4 to +16, dependent on animal type, Calculated when the Player sleeps, checks whether the animal ate either hay or grass) Animal outside after 6PM, but before 7PM, and has less than 150 Mood (+4 to +8 every 10 minutes does not stack with any other "every 10 minutes" effect) Animal outside in the rain or Winter (-4 to -8 every 10 minutes does not stack with any other "every 10 minutes" effect) Animal outside past 7PM (-4 to -8 every 10 minutes does not stack with any other "every 10 minutes" effect) Animal slept outside (-Half of current Mood, Calculated when the Player sleeps) Animal was not petted (-20 to -40, dependent on animal type, Calculated when the Player sleeps) Animal was not fed (-100 Calculated when the Player sleeps)
Thank you for the information! I just read that the largest chicken coop has an automatic feeder so I have the carpenter working on that now. The chickens and cows have loved the grass I let grow for them all summer. But come fall, I don't want to be wondering if Alex (husband) fed them all. I will definitely gete the heater this year. Didn't last winter. I keep my barn and coop open all the time. Should I close it? Maybe only in the winter?
Yes leave them open. If you accidentally trap an animal outside overnight by closing the door, there is a risk they get eaten by wild animals. They are happier outside eating grass anyway. The animals wont go outside in the rain even with the doors open, but that also means they need to be fed indoors. Keep the doors closed in winter and possibly the first few days of spring so you can get some grass growing (because they can possibly eat it all before it can spread).
Yes, I learned an expensive lesson about them eating grass. I planted two plots of it (400gp) right outside their coop. It was gone the next day. So, Now I'm working on fencing areas off of where I want them to graze and other areas I'm growing grass. It's almost fall now so I will work on a better plan/layout for next spring. I will keep the doors closed in winter (thanks for the tip) and get them a heater. Want my little animal family to be super happy!
Animals have two stats, which you can see by right clicking them a second time after petting them: mood (the "<Name> is very happy today" or "<Name> feels fine today" or whatever) and friendship (the number of filled in hearts). Both high mood and high friendship result in better quality items (and higher chance of special items from the ducks/rabbits). As @Sventex says, mood will automatically be set to max if they eat fresh grass, so the mood loss from not petting isn't really a big deal if you let them out most of the time and they have a heater in winter. However, not petting them will also decrease their friendship with you, and although you do get some back from them eating fresh grass, if you're already at low friendship levels then the loss from not petting them is bigger than the gain from eating grass. Plus you don't get the grass bonus in winter, and having a heater only improves mood, not friendship. Low friendship, unlike low mood, can't actually stop an animal from producing, but it will produce worse quality items. TL;DR: if you don't pet them mood might be fine but friendship will go down eventually, and you'll get worse items. You can see all the formulas in the Animal Care section of https://stardewvalleywiki.com/Animals. I prefer to close the doors at night so that I can easily find all my animals for their morning pets. The coop animals are pretty hard to see when they're in the middle of long grass. However, that does require more planning: you need to remember to open the door after you've petted them on sunny non-winter days so they can eat grass, and you need to remember to close the doors at night *after* checking that all the animals have gotten in. Theoretically, if you exit and enter the farm after I think 6 or 7 pm (which can be done easily by entering and then leaving the coop/barn, since the insides of buildings aren't the same as the farm map), your animals should all magically teleport to their respective homes. But I like to count my animals just in case. Still, if you're fine with looking for them outside, that works too, and it does reduce the chance for accidentally closing one out of its home.
Excellent information. Over the second spring/summer/fall, I only petted them on rainy days when they were inside. During the second winter, I'm petting them daily. This seems to have resulted in all my animals being very happy and most of them 5 heart friendships. As for opening and closing the barn doors, I opted to leave them open until winter. I don't know how these people do it with tons of animals. As it is, it takes me nearly 2 hours to get everyone petted and gather resources. I'm a level 9 farmer now so I think I get an auto-collector at level 10. That should help quite a bit.
I don’t worry about petting each and every animal each day. Just pet any that are convenient to reach. Grass tip number 1: When you plant grass you can put a fence post on top of it and the animals can’t eat it, but it can still spread. Grass tip number 2: Grass planted on the last day of Winter will spread explosively on the first day of Spring.
Thank you for the excellent tips Ringeltree. I wish I had known about growing grass the last day of winter 1 game day ago. I'll know for next year! During my second year, I did fence off an area and bought two plots of grass. It spread very well. I think I will plant some fields of it further away from my main area for the purpose of harvesting and get a second silo. That should be more than enough for next winter.
