"production caps" for forage items

Farthest Frontier General Discussion
1

As it stands, foragers will gather everything they can reach in their assigned forage area. But I have hundreds of berries in storage, am farming greens and want her to ONLY collect the willow. I can use the little UP arrow, to tell her that this resource is important so she will pick it first. And then she moves on to picking berries that will rot in storage.

How can I tell foragers to " pick all the herbs first, then eggs and nuts, then greens if you have time before winter. Do NOT pick berries or medicinal roots now." (If they knew their 'marching orders" then they could march themselves all over the place and we would not have to worry about moving the circles every season).

Or if you prefer to keep the circle moving system, then maybe extend the option to click on that berry bush and " remove target" for the FORAGER in addition to the laborers? I can use the option if I have selected a group of trees for harvesting and there happens to be bushes mixed in, then the laborers won’t pick them. but if it is within the foragers circle, SHE still will !

Side note for the Devs - I think it is interesting that the laborers can pick nuts and berries ( because they are connected to bushes ) and do not pick eggs or greens because they are not on bushes, and cannot be targeted using the Harvest command. The laborers to not chop the bushes ( although it gives you the same symbol as tree chopping when you target bushes to get laborers to pick nuts or berries ) so the bush remains and will stay selected for laborers to harvest from until you change it (or the forager gets it).
Willows ARE bushes, not just connected to bushes. But when harvesting an area with willows growing in it, laborers will not gather them. They do not even highlight as an active target even though it is a" willow bush".

2 Likes
2

At least here in Central Europe, willows are trees. Workers only harvest berries. I haven’t seen this happen with nuts yet.

3

Because when most people use the harvest command they are targeting either wood, stone or berries. No one wants a harvest command with 28 options. This is why forages exist.

4

I know, Right ! you always see photos of beautiful tall “weeping willows” as trees. But The game has them drawn short and bushy near rivers, lakes and marshes. But I have also had game maps where the label " willow" is clearly attached to a full-sized tree, in a lowland forest area. Soooo - when Teacher is confused, she researches!

White Willow - Native to Europe, Central Asia, North Africa, introduced to North America avg. 50 - 80 ft
Black Willow - East and Central North America - avg. 30 - 50 ft, sometimes up to 80 ft
Weeping Willow - Native to China, introduced to Europe and North America avg. 30 - 50 ft (and wide)
Goat willow - Native to Europe and Asia, introduced to Northwest US - up to 25 ft as a shrub, tree 30 - 45 ft tall
Pussy Willow - Native to Noth America 6 - 15 ft as bush, trees 15 - 30

So far, everything is big trees, or bushes the size of small trees. Which covers the trees marked as willow on lowland forested areas. However, these were generally NOT used for basketry ( even the weeping willow ) but instead for wood and for the medicinal properties in their bark.

However, if you look closely at one of the bushes on the edge of river or lake, you will notice a distinctive color that gives us a clue. These little beauties are actually …

Purple Willow - also commonly called basket willow - Native to Europe, Central Asia and Japan, introduced to North America - Northeast and Great Lakes Area. Typically, 6 to 15 ft, but dwarf species only 3 to 6 ft. (we will assume that the dwarf species is native to FF).

I was taught not to correct my betters, but the teacher in me is required to provide the information the Devs and let them take it from there. The Willow TREES are a good source of lumber and " medicinal plants" (might have to expand the label to include more than just roots) but technically only the bushes near the water are flexible enough for basket weaving.

5

Olaf - regarding the nuts : it depends if there are nut bushes in the area of trees you select to harvest, and if you leave all 4 boxes checked or only mark the area for wood.

ROBO - I was not asking for anything added to the current harvester’s menu. Although I did point out that the Harvest menu includes bushes, which is how laborers can pick nuts and berries. But they will not pick willow even though it is frequently also a bush.

The actual request was to add an option of “remove target” for items in the radius of the FORAGERS so they don’t waste time collecting resources you can’t use yet (like medicinal roots) or ones you already have too much of (like berries).

6

You may be confusing willow trees with the bush basket willow is made of

1 Like
7

Just up click the foragebles you want your forager to gather and he will prioritize those.

8

3 to 6 meters is 9 to 18 feet. That is a tree. Not sure how our villagers would gather the branches without ladders, but research does specify that these were used for basketweaving and sometimes turned into living sculptures and architectural features like archways and fences.

I left out the Scientific names for the different willow species as it was already a long post and didn’t want people getting lost in the Latin. But it is (Salix purpurea) for the purple willow, also a type of osier. Purple osier or blue osier.

And, because I have to …
PLEASE, for the love of teachers everywhere, PLEASE do not cite Wikipedia. If the information you want to cite from Wikipedia has a number next to it, use that to cite the original source. Otherwise, attempt to confirm the information you found in Wikipedia through another source, and cite from there instead. Just because somebody typed it into Wikipedia, does not make it correct.

9

https://www.thespruce.com/the-difference-between-trees-and-shrubs-3269804

“Trees have one trunk acting as a “stem” from which branches grow, while shrubs have multiple stems that originate from the same root base.”

image
image1280Ă—960 251 KB

I’d imagine they could just pull these down with their hands or with their weight, if they didn’t just cut the branches off from the base.

This is a forum post, not an academic paper or essay. Also, if you’re going to going to be that gung ho about sources, perhaps don’t post stuff with zero sources. Or maybe you could do a quick google like I did before giving out misinformation.

1 Like
10

Extremely sorry WhileyCat. I am sorry that my original source did not show the willow type you posted. Also sorry that I had focused on heigh and overlooked the detail about this being a shrub.

And you are right. You all here are not my students. I t is not my job to teach you or to correct you. There are other portions of your last post I would emotionally like to respond to. But this not the place for that either. Politely backing away now.

11

As a 20 year horticulturist this has me cracking up.

12

Despite the passionate discussion on the nature of willow, I honestly don’t give a rat’s patoot whether it’s a tree or bush. The game has a picture of a plant that it calls “willow” so that’s a willow, regardless of the species.

Getting back to the original post, I do agree a cap on the amount of each foragable item would be helpful. High quantities of one or two types can overwhelm the storage space, especially when you’re at a stage of the game when there’s little use for things like herbs and medicinal roots. You can occasionally dispose of the excess but that’s a level of micromanangement that adds nothing to the gameplay.