The Sims 4 Gardening

Plant List, Fertilizer, and Grafting Plants

Gardening allows you to grow and harvest Plants

Gardening Overview
The Sims 4's Gardening Skill offers you a means of growing plants to make money or make your own ingredients for meals, boosting their quality while pursuing completion of the Plants Collection. You can also use produce as bait. This Guide to Gardening will teach you about fertilizer, evolving plants, quality levels, cuttings and grafts, and how you can grow a big garden at home while still giving your Sims an active life.

If you like, you can jump to the Plant List. If you want info only on grafting combinations, head to the Grafting & Take Cutting Guide.

Good Traits & Aspirations for Gardeners

• The Loves Outdoors Trait will give your Sim a happiness boost when they're outside, which will help keep mood positive and synergize with the next:
• Genius Trait - helps Sims get Focused - this Emotion is very helpful when Gardening and can help you gain skill faster, as demonstrated by the Research Gardening Interaction on the Computer.
• ???? - all kinds of other traits could work for Gardening, but maybe save your third slot for a little personality!
• Freelance Botanist Aspiration - This is a natural choice, since you can gain loads of Satisfaction for the purchase of Rewards by completing the objectives of this Aspiration. The Collector Trait that comes with it will likely help you find more rare plants out in the world.

You can Graft to produce a Death Flower Plant

Starting Gardening & Skill Level Unlocks
The Four basic skills of Gardening are Plant, Water, Weed, and Harvest. All these are self-explanatory, but necessary to help your plants to grow. These are the skills you get at the beginning, and starting is a simple matter of buying seeds or harvesting plants from the wild. You may also read Gardening skill books to raise your level. As you gain levels in Gardening, you'll unlock new abilities:

• Level 2 - Research Gardening at Computer (Web > Research Gardening). Do this to get Focused, which will help you gain more Gardening Experience.
• Level 3 - Your Gardener may now Fertilize Plants. This will help them to Evolve faster.
• Level 4 - Talk to Plants. This will allow you to talk to Plants to fill your Sim's Social Need, while also granting Gardening Skill experience!
• Level 5 - Take Cutting and Graft abilities unlock, which allow you to get otherwise unattainable plants.
• Level 6 - Other Sims may Compliment your Garden.
• Level 7 - Sim has a Green Thumb, which evidently means they get the Tend Garden ability, allowing them to Water and Weed the Garden by clicking a single plant. This is a big bonus, as tending many plants and finding what ones need watered/weeded can be a chore. You still need to choose when to harvest and fertilize, however.
• Level 8 - Get the ability to spend $50 to re-grow a Bonsai Tree in order to re-shape it.
• Level 9 - More efficient gardening interactions - Sims water plants and weed faster.
• Level 10 - Nothing of note happens, aside from the ability to buy Farmer's Seed Packets from the Computer/Gardening Pot that contain a mixture of seed types. It's very random, but you may get plants for your collection that you don't yet have. Buying a number of them is wise.

Buy Seeds from the computer or a Garden Pot to get started

Buying Seeds
The only way I found to Buy Seeds is by either purchasing them on the Computer (under the Order Menu) or by clicking on Gardening Pots. These are found in Build Mode, Objects by Function > Hobbies & Skills > Miscellaneous. Garden Pots cost $50 while holding only one plant, while Garden Planter Boxes cost $200 and hold either 4 plants or one tree. These aren't necessary for your budding Gardener, as you are able to drag plants to the ground to plant them on your lot. However, both forms of these planters will let you grow plants indoors.

When you Order Seeds, you get to choose from 4 packets. Each will give you a variety of plants of that type. You're able to choose from Starter Flowers, Fruits, Herbs, or Vegetables. These will give you random common items from each category, so buying more can increase the diversity of your yield.

Create a line of Seeds and your Sim will Plant them all

Planting
Drag fruits/vegetables/herbs/flowers from your inventory to the ground or a gardening pot/planter box. Lay it out the way you want, as many plants as you want, then select one and choose Plant. Your Sim will go about planting all of the seeds, which you can then water and gain loads of experience doing so. Later, they'll grow weeds so look out for that by clicking plants here and there. Find one with weeds and the Sim will take care of all Weeds, same with Watering. Keep taking care of your garden and plants will eventually be able to evolve to a higher quality level.

Eating Produce
Raw produce may be eaten directly from your Sim's inventory as of the Patch that came with Outdoor Retreat. That's great news for all players, regardless of whether they own the game pack. Eating Perfect plants may give your Sim a +3 Happy moodlet for 4h, so it's very much worth keeping some plants on you for a quick bite to eat and a pick me up in terms of mood. This can help your Sim to become Very Focused for their Gardening, further boosting Skill gains, even when you eat a 'Very Nice' or other medium-quality Plant.

Plant Mood
Plants with weeds around them or who go without water a while will have their mood drop. If it drops too low too long, the plant will die. Keeping your plants in a good 'mood' will allow you to evolve them. There is a certain time a plant must be happy, reduced by fertilizer, before it can evolve.

Evolving a Plant raises its Quality Level

Evolving Plants
After taking good care of your plants for a few days, you'll start to see them sparkle. This is when the Evolve option comes up. Evolving a plant will result in higher-quality produce from that plant in the future. It will go up one level when you select Evolve, resulting in higher value harvestables that can be replanted or sold.

There is no point waiting to harvest until after you've evolved a plant. The harvestables' quality will be based on where the plant was when they grew. It's better to harvest them to get ready for the next evolution, so you can start getting profitable Superb-quality Plants.

Fish make excellent Fertilizers.

Fertilizing Plants (Gardening Skill Level 3)
Other plants can be used as Fertilizer, but the best Fertilizer seems to be Fish. The rarer the catch, the better a fertilizer it is - so The Sims 4's Fishing Skill works very well with Gardening. Plants that are Fertilized will not grow faster necessarily, but jump in quality faster. Getting to Perfect Quality Plants quickly means using Fertilize as often as it is available.

Plant Quality
Plants come in the following quality levels: Normal, Nice, Very Nice, Good, Great, Excellent, Superb, Magnificent, Pristine, Perfect.

Sims can prune Bonsai Trees to gain Gardening experience

Bonsai Trees
Bonsai Trees are decor that regrow but allow for a continual source of Gardening experience. However, talking to plants or reading about Gardening is a better means of gaining experience. You can trim them into multiple designs once you've gained some levels. These may serve as unique indoor decorations. You can change the color of the stand by clicking on it.

One of many Pictures you can get from taking Microscope Samples from Plants

Collect Microscope Sample
You can make money with Gardening another way if you're willing to invest in a Microscope (which is massive and costs $1630). Clicking a Plant and selecting to take a Microscope Sample will give you the ability to analyze it with the Microscope. This often yields a painting that can be worth hundreds of Simoleons or work as decor for a geek's paradise. This will, in turn, raise your Sim's Logic Skill.

Harvested Plants can be sold through the Sim's Inventory
Click and Drag the Plant to the Simoleon icon.

Taking Care of your Garden: Tending Garden and Harvest Yields
There is no magical set time of day for plants to grow, need watering, or weeding. These appear throughout the day. Don't fret, however, as it doesn't mean you need to tend your garden constantly. A plant will only grow unhappy if it is neglected for a time. It's safe to come back and deal with your garden once a day, so that all the plants need water/weeding. Plants will gradually grow up to their maximum of 10 harvestables. Waiting is good as plants will provide more harvestables the longer you wait and harvesting immediately will yield fewer fruit, while resetting the timer, causing it to take longer for them to produce fruit again. Keep an eye on fertilizing, however, and try to keep that effect active on your favorite plants, so they can evolve quickly.

Take Cutting lets you Graft Plants at Home

Take Cutting Ability (Gardening Level 5)
Plants must have grown a bit to use this ability. Using it two times in a row can kill a plant, resulting in a fee to revive it, else you dispose of the dead plant. Cuttings are used with the Graft ability, which is unlocked once you have some Plant Cuttings in your inventory. These all go into one stack. If you try to Take Cutting from a plant that has many others grafted on it, the original is the cutting you will get (the first on the list is the original plant type).

A Spliced Plant produces multiple Fruits, Flowers, Etc.

Graft Ability - Combine Plants (Level 5)
See the table below for special grafting combos to unlock plants you haven't yet found. This will start a plant over at its same level of quality, but adding the ability to also grow the plant whose cutting you grafted onto it. You can use this option a number of times on a single plant to make it give you a mixture of produce. The plant must grow a bit again before the Graft option will reappear. This is a good ability that allows you to minimize the work your Sim needs to maintain your garden, allowing you to eliminate some plants if you like. If you're going for maximum profit, you'd likely be better off having high-price plants that are NOT grafted in your garden, while grafting plants to condense the size of your garden and simultaneously cut back on the amount of fertilizing and garden tending you need to do.

Cow Plants can be acquired from Grafting Snapdragon with Dragonfruit

The Grafting option is very good for busy Sims that like to cook meals with good ingredients. However, remember that you get only 8-10 harvestables out of a plant and grafting too many to one plant will result in a mixture - 1 of a few of them, 2 of another, and maybe 0 of another kind on a particular harvest. It's totally random and doesn't really increase your yields. Best use of grafting is to do 2-3 type of plants, maximum, so you're sure to pick up a few of each when you harvest. Also note that harvesting right away will yield you few fruit, while waiting to harvest a grafted plant several hours after it first shows fruit (like normal plants) will give it time to make a larger variety of produce, and thus a better yield.

Mushrooms are the main type that can't be cut/grafted. They tend to grow faster than other plants, so this may be part of the reason. Trees grow more slowly so they are not great picks for grafting other plants to. Graft your slow-growing plants onto faster growing types using the Plant List below.

Wild Plants & Growth
In order to find Uncommon and Rare plants that do not come from seed packets and neighborhood gardens, you must look for plants in the Wild. Below, I've listed where I found plants but we have a much more thorough plant locations guide that can help you to find plants. Plants are not always harvestable, as they are not ready. Know that plants only grow in the neighborhood your active Sim is visiting. So if you want one to grow in another area, you need to hang out there a while. Plants grow fairly fast, so find a way to spend some time in that area while you wait for them to grow - make some friends, collect, and fish for fertilizer.

The Green Thumb Achievement

Sometimes they aren't even ready for you to Take Cutting. The trick is to stay in the area long enough for them to grow a tad (Plants grow fast in TS4) so you can take a cutting, then graft it onto one of your own plants. Your Plant will then produce that type of fruit/vegetable and allow you to plant one once that type has been harvested. I have never seen seeds on the ground in this game - it's all about finding plants in the wild and combining with existing plants to get the fruit you need to put in the ground to make your own. You will sometimes find wild plants harvestable, it's just not as efficient to collect them that way given they will usually start at normal quality and you'd be better off skipping all that evolving.

Tomato is found near Slipshod Mesquite in Oasis Springs

Making Perfect Plants Faster
Keep the plants you start with, and gradually evolve them by taking care of them and clicking Evolve each time it comes available. It's easier to see sparkles on game speed 2/3. When you later find a rare plant in the wild and take a sample, then graft it to your high-quality plant, you'll get a high-quality result and be able to plant it. This will let you skip leveling a plant at normal quality (assuming you harvest it in the wild) and is the fastest way to get a Perfect Blackberry bush or Dragonfruit.

Freelance Botanist is a Gardening Aspiration

Making a Death Flower
You need to do the following Grafts in order to make a Death Flower:

• Graft Cherry to Apple to make Pomegranate
• Graft Lily to Snapdragon to make Orchid
• Graft Pomegranate to Orchid to make Death Flowers
• Harvest the Death Flowers, Plant one, and enjoy unlimited Death Flowers, which can be exchanged to the reaper to avoid death!
• You can get locations for the listed plants below.

Grafting for Efficiency
Charlottecupcake wrote in to me to tell me she'd made a guide to make a garden with one of each plant type that is also efficient. She optimizes this by grafting slow-growing plants onto fast ones, so that one of each is present for consumption by Sims or completing the Gardening collection. I've zipped up the PDF guide to combining plants that she wrote, and you may download it here. Inside you will see the plants to combine with, and how many cuttings you'll need to follow her plan. Big thanks to her for sharing this with the community. It is updated for Get to Work's alien plants.

Note: you cannot take cutting of Bonsai Buds, so this means that you can't graft that onto the #3 plant with Dragonfruit and Cow Berry. Contrary to the plan, you should keep the plant with Strawberry, Daisy, and Bonsai Buds to maintain the efficient nature. Because of this issue, it's one more plant but is also a minor problem. Just don't graft strawberry on to anything else except when making the dragonfruit by combining strawberry with snapdragon, and Daisy doesn't need to go on plant #2.

Plant List

The following are all 32 plants in the base game.

Seed Packet means you can get it from the starting seed packet, purchased on the computer or by clicking a planter pot. What they give you is random. Farmer Packets unlock later, and provide a larger quantity of the same produce. Buy them at Gardening level 7 to get 'Good' quality seeds from them. It seems a bug prevents these from retaining their quality after that level, but we hope it will be fixed in a future patch.

Note on Growth Times
These are rough estimates, and indicate how long after being planted you can expect a plant to begin producing fruit. They will then produce fruit at a rate relative to their original growth time, until they reach the maximum of 10 harvestables. Again, if you harvest too early, you're harming your efficiency and resetting the clock. Expect plants with long growth times to take around 3/4 that time to begin producing fruit again. Plants with long growth times grow produce faster when grafted to a Plant with a short growth time.

The Unidientified Fruit Object, aka Intergalactic Growth Pod, Grows Slowly

Note on Values & Making Money with Data
Values are what I saw after planting all perfect variants without Grafting. To maximize profit, I suggest you take cuttings from high-value plants and Graft them onto fast-growing plants. A regular Blackberry bush takes a long time to grow harvestables. If you graft it to a Tomato plant, you'll get much better results. This is especially true of the U.F.O. Plant, which seems to grow slowest of all the Plants in Sims 4.

Grafting for Special Plants
In the table, you'll see grafting combinations that can create special plants when you take either type and splice it to the other. The plant will show the original two, plus the new type when the combos are used. It is OK if other plants are already spliced, so long as the one you take cutting from or graft it to has the proper type listed first.

Finding Plants
Many of the plants listed below can be found in various neighborhoods in The Sims 4. See the Plant Locations Guide for a much more thorough list of places to find plants.

Sims 4 Plant List
Icon	Plant Name	Rarity	Base Value	Growth	Where to Find/Special Graft Combo
	Apple	Common	$13	36h	Seed Packet
	Basil	Common	$3	24h	Seed Packet
	Blue Bells	Common	$11	36h	Seed Packet
	Carrot	Common	$8	24h	Seed Packet
	Chrysanthemum	Common	$11	36h	Seed Packet
	Daisy	Common	$3	24h	Seed Packet
	Grapes	Common	$33	48h	Seed Packet. You may also produce these by grafting Bluebells with Strawberry.
	Lemon	Common	$12	60h	Oasis Springs - Across the street from Rattlesnake Juice in the dirt area. Also at end of road by Museum.
	Mushroom	Common	$4	24h	Seed Packet
	Parsley	Common	$5	24h	Seed Packet. Graft Sage and Basil.
	Plantain	Common	$16	72h	Found in Seed Packets, but you may also Graft Pear with Lemon.
	Sage	Common	$5	24h	Oasis Springs, end of road by Museum. Also across from Sandtrap Flat in the garden area.
	Snapdragon	Common	$13	36h	Willow Creek, Garden Essence Home (BFF Household)
	Spinach	Common	$3	24h	Seed Packet
	Chamomile	Common	$14	24h	Found in Granite Falls National Park. Used in Herbalism. Eating gives +1-3 4 hour Happy Moodlet (Quality-determined)
	Toxic Chamomile	Common	$15	24h	Found in Granite Falls National Park. Used in Herbalism. Eating gives +2 Tense Moodlet for 2h
	Elderberry	Common	$6	18h	Found in Granite Falls National Park. Used in Herbalism. Eating gives +1-3 4 hour Happy Moodlet (Quality-determined)
	Noxious Elderberry	Common	$7	18h	Found in Granite Falls National Park. Used in Herbalism. Eating gives +2 Sad Moodlet for 2h
	Cherry	Uncommon	$15	60h	Oasis Springs - Behind the Park by Springscape.
	Lily	Uncommon	$18	36h	Willow Creek Park, also in front of Oakenstead
	Onion	Uncommon	$14	48h	Willow Creek, Rendle Rose (House), also across the stream from Agave Adobe in Oasis Springs
	Pear	Uncommon	$14	60h	Willow Creek Park, also behind Umbridge Manor (Mansion)
	Potato	Uncommon	$10	24h	Willow Creek, Garden Essence Home (BFF Household)
	Rose	Uncommon	$18	48h	Willow Creek, Behind Umbridge Manor (Mansion)
	Strawberry	Uncommon	$8	24h	Willow Creek, Garden Essence Home (BFF Household)
	Tomato	Uncommon	$12	24h	Oasis Springs, up the road from Slipshod Mesquite (the home that looks like a trailer) are planter boxes. There you will find Tomato and some other plants.
	Tulip	Uncommon	$11	36h	Oasis Springs, near the abandoned mine down the hill behind the Landgraab Mansion.
	Huckleberry	Uncommon	$8	18h	Found in Granite Falls National Park. Used in Herbalism. Eating gives +1-3 4 hour Happy Moodlet (Quality-determined)
	Muckleberry	Uncommon	$9	18h	Found in Granite Falls National Park. Used in Herbalism. Eating gives +2 Dazed Moodlet for 2h. Dazed Sims are better targets for Romance.
	Fireleaf	Uncommon	$13	18h	Found in Granite Falls National Park. Used in Herbalism. Eating gives +1-3 4 hour Happy Moodlet (Quality-determined)
	Poison Fireleaf	Uncommon	$11	18h	Found in Granite Falls National Park. Used in Herbalism. Eating gives +2 Angry Moodlet for 2h
	Bird of Paradise	Rare	$10	36h	Graft Tulip with Chrysanthemum
	Blackberry	Rare	$55	96h	Oasis Springs - near the dirt path beside the big Park.
	Bonsai Buds	Rare	$10	24h	Graft Daisy and Strawberry or Grapes and Roses. May be made into a Decorative Bonsai Bush for $25.
	Cow Berry	Rare	N/A	24h	Graft Dragonfruit with Snapdragon. Cow Plant berries have been found while Fishing at the glimmering stream with a cave in Oasis Springs' Big Park, as well as Sylvan Glade's larger body of water. These may also be found while on missions in the Rocket Ship via the Rocket Science Skill. More on Cow Plants Below.
	Death Flower	Rare	$1	48h	Graft Orchid with Pomegranate. It does not stop a Sim's death immediately as it did in TS3. In The Sims 4, you need another Sim to give Grim a Death Flower after he's done arriving to take the soul. He'll accept it and bring the dead Sim back to life. Death Flower is also used in the Gourmet Cooking Ambrosia Recipe (to resurrect Ghosts Sims).
	DragonFruit	Rare	$80	96h	Graft Strawberry with Snapdragon.
	Orchid	Rare	$22	36h	Graft Lily with Snapdragon. This is also found after completing the Space Rock collection from the Rocket Science Skill.
	Pomegranate	Rare	$18	72h	Graft Apple with Cherry. These have been found while Fishing in Magnolia Blossom Park, Willow Creek. I caught one in the central pond where you can also look for frogs while fishing without bait.
	Trash Fruit	Rare	$4	24h	Have your Sim take out the trash, but cancel the interaction. Let this trash sit in your yard (it can be moved in buy mode), and it'll become one very unhappy trash plant. Water it fast, and one day you'll have your very own Perfect Trash Plant.
	U.F.O.	Rare	$120	112h	These evidently don't need watered, but do need weeded. Unidentified Fruit Object is what you harvest, but the plant is actually named Intergalactic Growth Pod. U.F.O. Fruit has been found while on adventure in the Rocket Ship. I got one while an Astronaut in an encounter with the Green Man (like Yoda). I took the weapon and defeated the Nega-Sim and got a Cowplant Berry along with an U.F.O. as a reward!
	Morel Mushroom	Rare	$17	24h	Found in Hidden Area of Granite Falls. Used in Herbalism. Eating gives +1-3 4 hour Happy Moodlet (Quality-determined)
	False Morel Mushroom	Rare	$19	24h	Found in Granite Falls National Park. Used in Herbalism. Eating gives +2 Uncomfortable Moodlet for 2h
	Fang Flower (Tentacle Tree)	No Rarity	$50	120h	Get to Work Found on the Alien Planet Sixam.
	Glow Orb	No Rarity	$100	100h	Get to Work Found on the Alien Planet Sixam.
	Quill Fruit	No Rarity	$100	80h	Get to Work Found on the Alien Planet Sixam.

Cow Plants - Caring for them and Essence of Life

Do not 'take the cake' - this Cow Plant is hungry and Sims are delicious.

Cow Plants are a special type of plant, grown from a Cowplant Berry. Cowplant Berries can be found a few ways, mentioned in the table above. They are the only type that can't be harvested normally and do not display their status when you hover over them. Feeding, Petting, and Playing with the Cow Plant will give your Sims Gardening Skill experience. Taking frequent care of your Cow Plant is essential both to its life and your Sims'.

Here you can see a Dead Cow Plant so you don't need to neglect it just to find out.

If a Cow Plant is growing hungry, which happens after about 12 hours of not being fed, it will offer up cake. Sims cannot play with the Cow Plant at that point, but only choose between Feeding the Plant (wise) or eating the cake (foolish). Guests to your home or your own Sims with autonomy might just go for the cake if they're hungry themselves, and this can cause death. If the cow plant isn't fed after about 8-10 hours of this happening, it will die, leaving behind a rather cool-looking skeleton.

A Cow Plant spits out one lucky Sim. It can now be milked to get a drinkable Essence of emotion.

When a Sim is swallowed by a Cow Plant by going for the Cake, one of two things will happen. The first time they take the cake, they'll get spit out, upon which case they will leave the cow plant feeling disgusting and unnerved; an emotionless husk. There will be a Drained Moodlet that lasts two days. Milking the Cow plant will give you an essence that will give your Sim whatever Emotion that Sim was feeling at the time. According to Forum Member Reubenhood, death only comes if a Sim already has the Drained moodlet that comes from being spit out, so a second encounter with the Cow Plant will kill the Sim.

The Grim Reaper cuts a Sim's Soul free of the Cow Plant

When the Sim dies, the Cow Plant can be milked to get an Essence of Sim's Life. Drinking this will extend the Sim's lifespan by putting them back to the beginning of the current life stage. It's better to save for when your Sim is close to aging up, as you'll get more days out of it.

Drinking the Essence of another Sim's Life increases your Sim's Lifespan

Gardening was the first guide I made for The Sims 4. I love making farms in games, and also have a guide to farming in the indie farming RPG Stardew Valley.

Learn More

• Cheats - Gameplay, testing, and building cheats
• Careers - All job levels, promotions and rewards
• Skills - All skills, ideal moods, and their benefits
• Expansions, Stuff, and Game Packs - All Sims DLC Features
• Babies - Caring for an infant in The Sims 4
• Children - School grades and child skills
• Tips - Gameplay tips and tricks
• Sims' Needs - Caring for your Sims
• Money - Ways of making money in The Sims 4
• Building Tutorials - Learn tricks to make your houses look great.
• Get to Work: Open for Business - running a business
• Emotions - Getting your Sims in the right mood
• Relationships and Weddings

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