Guide:Farming resources

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This is a Guide page.
This is a Guide page.
This means the page will walk you through a specific task, strategy, or enemy/boss fight.
Status: Subject to revision (This Guide does not meet certain quality standards and may be heavily outdated.)
  • Issues:
     • Most likely outdated since 1.4(Desktop, Console and Mobile versions). Remember not to delete pre-1.4 content; use {{eicons}} and {{eversions}}!
     • Needs a guide on Chlorophyte Ore farming.
  • Farming is the practice of intentionally obtaining useful resources in a convenient area.

    Most resources can be found naturally within the world, while others, such as several plants or Crystal Shards, can additionally be grown in a convenient area for harvest.

    The following guide will focus on those resources that can be easily obtained or farmed in large quantities.

    Fully renewable

    In Terraria, an item is considered renewable if it can be created indefinitely within a single world.

    Wood

    Layered tree farm.
    Wood type Grows in
    WoodWood DirtDirt with regular grass
    Boreal WoodBoreal Wood(Desktop, Console, Old-gen console and Mobile versions) Snow BlockSnow
    EbonwoodEbonwood DirtDirt with Corrupt grass or Ebonsand BlockEbonsand
    ShadewoodShadewood DirtDirt with Crimson grass or Crimsand BlockCrimsand
    Rich MahoganyRich Mahogany Mud BlockMud with Jungle grass
    Palm WoodPalm Wood(Desktop, Console, Old-gen console and Mobile versions) Sand BlockSand
    PearlwoodPearlwood DirtDirt with Hallowed grass or Pearlsand BlockPearlsand
    Ash WoodAsh Wood(Desktop, Console and Mobile versions) Ash BlockAsh Block with Ash grass
    Stone BlockStone Block and GemGems Stone BlockStone, using GemcornGemcornGemcornGemcornGemcornGemcornGemcornGemcorns
    Glowing MushroomGiant Glowing Mushroom Mud BlockMud with Mushroom grass
    CactusCactus Sand BlockSand, Ebonsand BlockEbonsand, Crimsand BlockCrimsand, and Pearlsand BlockPearlsand
    BambooBamboo(Desktop, Console and Mobile versions) Mud BlockMud with Jungle grass under 2–5 tiles of water

    While trees grown by a player are significantly shorter than those generated naturally, building a farm for them provides a very simple way to obtain all different Wood types in one place.

    A typical Wood farm consists of a flat surface made with the block required to grow the respective tree. If building multiple layers, all layers will need to have the correct vertical spacing in order for the Trees to grow properly.

    In order to grow into a tree, Acorns require sufficient space both horizontally and vertically.

    • Most trees need at least one tile of empty ground (with matching soil) on either side of the sapling (Palm trees can get by without).
    • If saplings are to be placed near each other, they also need an additional tile of space between them.
    • Vertically, most tree types need 16 tiles of free vertical space above them; Jungle and Palm trees respectively need 24 and 30 tiles of space instead.
    • Trees will not grow Underground (below 0 depth) or in front of a wall. All except Palm trees will grow in front of fences.

    In addition to farming Gems via Gem trees it's also possible to obtain them via mining or by using the Extractinator on Silt, Slush and Desert Fossils. In contrast to trees however, these alternatives are finite. Geodes(Desktop, Console and Mobile versions), however, are not finite, and can be farmed infinitely through Granite Cave enemies. For more detailed instructions on Gem tree farming, see this Guide.

    Cacti, Bamboo, and Giant Glowing Mushrooms cannot be manually planted, but they will automatically grow on their respective surfaces if all conditions are met. Rich Mahogany Trees will grow automatically as well, but can be planted with Acorns on Jungle Grass. If you wish to farm Bamboo, you cannot make it indoors, as Bamboo will not grow in front of walls of any kind – even naturally generated ones. It is also recommended to acquire Water Walking Boots or their upgrades for farming purposes, and to make the farm quite big, as Bamboo takes a very long time to grow. At least ten blocks of vertical space is recommended.

    Herbs

    Herb Seed Planted in Bloom condition
    BlinkrootBlinkroot Blinkroot SeedsBlinkroot Seeds Dirt or Mud Random
    DaybloomDaybloom Daybloom SeedsDaybloom Seeds Grass, Hallowed grass During daytime (4:30 AM to 7:30 PM)
    DeathweedDeathweed Deathweed SeedsDeathweed Seeds Corruption or Crimson grass During a Blood Moon (Desktop, Console and Mobile versions) or Full Moon
    FireblossomFireblossom Fireblossom SeedsFireblossom Seeds Ash From 3:45 PM to 7:30 PM, if not raining, or when submerged in Lava (Old-gen console and 3DS versions)
    MoonglowMoonglow Moonglow SeedsMoonglow Seeds Jungle grass During nighttime (7:30 PM to 4:30 AM)
    WaterleafWaterleaf Waterleaf SeedsWaterleaf Seeds Sand During Rain, or when submerged in water (Old-gen console and 3DS versions).
    ShiverthornShiverthorn(Desktop, Console, Old-gen console and Mobile versions) Shiverthorn SeedsShiverthorn Seeds Snow None

    A well-planned herb garden will provide materials needed to create almost every buff potion – while many potions have other ingredients, they all need at least one herb.

    Herbs can be planted in soil, Clay Pots or Planter Boxes:

    • Herbs on soil can be automatically harvested with Dart Traps or Actuator mechanisms, but this will be inefficient until all planted herbs are blooming at once. Harvesting soil-farmed herbs by hand is difficult, since any tool will break all herbs in its range. However, wielding a seed allows you to instantly harvest and replant.
    • Clay Pots do not have terrain limitations, and allow every herb to grow on them, while also protecting them from being accidentally destroyed by a Player's or enemy's attacks, projectiles, or harvesting nearby herbs. Herbs must be explicitly broken with a pickaxe or Staff of Regrowth before they can be replanted.
    • Planter Boxes offer all the advantages of Clay Pots, and can also be placed without need for a supporting block. They can be placed anywhere a platform can.

    The Staff of Regrowth or Axe of Regrowth(Desktop, Console and Mobile versions) will greatly increase the amount of herbs and seeds harvested. It will also work on fully grown but not yet bloomed plants at a lower efficiency, making it very useful when harvesting natural Deathweed or Waterleaf. Note that the Staff and Axe of Regrowth(Desktop, Console and Mobile versions) require herbs in Planter Boxes to be in bloom, not just mature. Regular pickaxes can still harvest mature (and not blooming) plants, but they will not drop seeds as usual.

    Mushrooms

    Mushroom Grows in
    MushroomMushroom Grass SeedsGrass or Hallowed SeedsHallowed grass
    Vile MushroomVile Mushroom Corrupt SeedsCorrupted grass
    Vicious MushroomVicious Mushroom(Desktop, Console and Mobile versions) Crimson SeedsCrimson grass(Desktop, Console, Old-gen console and Mobile versions)
    Glowing MushroomGlowing Mushroom Mushroom Grass SeedsMushroom grass

    All Mushroom types will grow naturally on their respective Grass surface. Usually, mushroom farms consist of several layers of dirt with 3 block tall gaps in between.

    Note that vines will grow down from strips of grassy dirt, preventing the growth of other layers below them. A layer of Wooden platforms below the dirt layers will prevent their growth while allowing the player to walk through them, allowing layers to be packed more tightly.

    Regular Mushrooms are only used for Lesser Healing and Regeneration Potions, however their sell price is significantly higher than the other three, giving it the small use of a limited money farm as well.

    Vile and Vicious Mushroom farms are used for Vile and Vicious Powder, which are required to summon the Eater of Worlds or Brain of Cthulhu, respectively. Make sure to contain the farm properly, otherwise the Corruption/Crimson may spread out of the farm. A good idea is to build these farms in the sky, where there is no chance of spread occurring.

    Glowing Mushrooms are much more useful in comparison, being used for furniture, and Shroomite Bars in Hardmode. They also grow at a faster rate than usual, and Giant Glowing Mushrooms may grow if given enough space (see above).

    Mushrooms can be automatically harvested with Dart Traps or Actuators. On the Old-gen console version Old-gen console version and Nintendo 3DSNintendo 3DS version version, Glowing Mushrooms have the unique ability to grow on actuated Mushroom grass; they will be immediately harvested as soon as they spawn, having their usual chance to drop as an item and/or seeds. This can be taken advantage of by building a large mushroom farm in the surface layer and letting it produce and harvest Glowing Mushrooms without player intervention. Note that such a farm may crowd the limit for loose items (which is 400), causing other loose items to despawn unexpectedly.

    Bait farm

    See also: Bait
    A player standing in a Jungle bait farm.

    A bait farm is used to gather large amounts of bait used for fishing, by spawning many critters, some of which will be suitable. With a Water Candle and/or Battle Potion, spawning in general can be increased, including natural spawning of critters. If any golden critters (of bait types) appear, they will have the maximum bait power, but even so, these are probably better sold than used for fishing.

    Fireflies are one of the most common forms of bait, though not very powerful. Widely varying numbers of them will spawn at night on a full moon, especially near NPC housing. Butterflies will similarly spawn during the day; their bait power varies widely by type, from the least useful Monarch to the top-tier Tree Nymph.

    Worms are common and of moderate power. They spawn commonly during a Rain, and can also be produced when destroying stone or dirt piles, or cutting grass. They can also be crafted into the considerably more powerful Enchanted Nightcrawlers.

    Jungle grass is an excellent and reliable source of bait, as each Jungle plant has a very high chance of spawning 1–3 bait critters in any combination of the following: Grubby (weak), Sluggy (equal to worms), or Buggy (second only to the top tier at 40% bait power). Use of Actuators on Jungle grass blocks will not spawn any Jungle baitVerify; in order for any plant to spawn critters, that plant must be destroyed directly by the player. However, indoor farms are still possible, as Jungle plants will grow in front of walls and fences. Vines will stop plants from growing when long enough; so, in order to make the farm higher efficiency, a row of blocks should be placed under the Jungle grass blocks to prevent vines from growing. The figure above is an example of a well-designed bait farm.

    Once in Hardmode, Lightning Bugs will appear in the Hallow, which are considerably more effective than the Fireflies they resemble. However, these are much less effective than the Jungle bait – both in Fishing Power and attainability (once a farm is attained).

    Flower Boots(Desktop, Console and Mobile versions) no longer produce critters when flowers are destroyed as of 1.4.0.1 (in previous versions you were able to combine the use of a Flare placed at the player's feet and the aforementioned Flower Boots to spawn critters endlessly).

    Fishing items

    See also: Fishing

    Since bait can be easily obtained from common critters and simple farms, fishing is by extension another source of resources. Common resources from fishing include (but are not limited to):

    • Common fish for food items.
    • Special fish which can be used for potions, such as Prismite or Armored Cavefish.
    • Certain weapons, tools and accessories can be caught directly, notably the Crystal Serpent, Reaver Shark, and Frog Leg.
    • Crates contain items such as coins, ores and bars (see below), potions, and even weapons, tools, and accessories.
      • Items found in Locked Gold Chests and Shadow Chests can be obtained from Golden Lock Boxes(Desktop, Console and Mobile versions) or Obsidian Lock Boxes(Desktop, Console and Mobile versions), which is one of the items that you can get from opening crates fished up in the Dungeon or the Underworld. This means that the loot from the aforementioned Chests can be infinitely obtained.
      • Fishing in the Dungeon may also yield the Alchemy Table(Desktop, Console and Mobile versions).

    The items obtained will vary depending on the biome and depth in which the player is fishing.

    Small ponds for fishing can be either found naturally or made artificially by duplicating liquids (see below).

    Liquids

    See also: Liquids

    On the Old-gen console version Old-gen console version and Nintendo 3DSNintendo 3DS version version, liquids can be easily duplicated in large quantities (see images). This process can be easily automated with pumps. By extension, blocks that can be obtained by mixing liquids, are renewable as well: Obsidian, Honey Block, Crispy Honey Block, and Aetherium Block.

    On the Desktop version Desktop version, Console version Console version, and Mobile version Mobile version, it is still possible to create infinite amounts of any liquid by using Bottomless Buckets, liquid bombs, or liquid rockets. However, these are not as fast as previous methods, and require much more resources. The splitting liquid farm will still work, although not efficiently, if the blocks are hammered into half blocks.

    Crystal Shards

    Crystal farm with wiring.

    Crystal Shards have a high sell value for a common material, so farming them can be an easy way of making money throughout Hardmode without direct player action. A stack of 100 is worth 16 GC. Crafting them into Greater Healing Potions yields even higher profits, especially with an Alchemy Table.

    For farming, place single horizontal rows of Pearlstone, separated by three tile-wide gaps for walking and harvesting. The farm must be in the Cavern layer or below. If the farm is not built in the Hallow, it should be sealed in a frame of non-infectable blocks with a three-block gap outside to prevent the Hallow from spreading. Note that there are some limits to how densely crystals can spawn, so farms need to be fairly large to be worthwhile. It will also take up tens of harvests to offset the initial building cost (if using actuators and wires), so they should be built for long-term profits.

    Actuators can be used to switch Pearlstone to an inactive state, causing all Crystal Shards to drop for easy harvesting. For even greater convenience, Conveyor Belts can be used to move all dropped Crystals for easier collection.

    On the Nintendo 3DSNintendo 3DS version version, Crystal Shards are also dropped by Arch Demons, allowing for large-scale collection.

    Money

    Enemy drops

    Other resources

    • Cobwebs automatically regenerate on naturally occurring Spider Walls found in Spider Nests. However, beware that these walls are only created during world generation, and can't be replaced if removed (except on the Desktop version Desktop version, Console version Console version, and Mobile version Mobile version).
    • Some materials can be easily farmed with the use of wired Statues. Examples include Slime Statues and Gel, or Granite Golem Statues and Granite Blocks.
    • The collection of Jungle Grass Seeds can be sped up through the use of Flower Boots.
    • Pumpkins can be grown by planting Pumpkin Seeds sold by the Dryad. Note that they can only be grown on regular and hallowed Grass.
    • Fallen Stars fall from the sky every night, and can be easily collected with a skybridge.
    • Coral spawns spontaneously on submerged sand blocks in the ocean biome, as long as at least 4 blocks of space above it are free. It is possible to create "beds" for growing Coral using sand and water placed atop other blocks or platforms 4 blocks apart. This also has the bonus of spawning Seashells for sale or crafting.
    • Starfish and Seashells (and their rare and more valuable counterparts) also spawn spontaneously on Sand Blocks in the Ocean biome, requiring no water whatsoever. While useful in fewer crafted objects than Coral, they can sell for a considerable amount and can be used as a lucrative pre-Hardmode gold farm.
    • A Sandgun used with ammunition-conserving equipment can place more sand than it uses, thus "farming" sand. However this is a very slow process.
    • (Desktop, Console and Mobile versions) Ale can be bought from the Tavernkeep for 1 SC each, which can then be repeatedly decrafted via Shimmer into a Mug, then one Glass, and ultimately into two Sand Blocks.
    • Hay is produced by cutting tall grass with a Sickle.
    • All the critter types spawn spontaneously in their respective biomes, and can be captured. Gem critters are considerably more valuable than most other critters. They begin to spawn when there are three or more NPCs in an area that is within the Underground or Cavern layers.
    • All the "basic" dyes are either plants that spawn spontaneously, purchased, or enemy drops. Quest-exclusive dyes can be obtained from the Dye Trader if you trade in Strange Plants for them. Most plants that are materials for dyes can be grown, including Strange Plants. See the Dyes page for full details on getting and crafting the various dyes.
    • Snow can be created and dropped by the enemies of the Frost Legion invasion. However, the required summoning item for the Frost Legion appears only during the Christmas season. (Desktop, Console and Mobile versions) Nevertheless, if the Frost Moon reaches wave 15, then for the entire day and night, all special effects of the Christmas season will occur, which makes snow renewable anytime.
    • (Desktop, Console and Mobile versions) Gnomes most commonly spawn beneath Living Trees. Digging out multiple horizontal passages between trees and using platforms to make it easy to lure them to the surface to transform into Garden Gnomes earns over 1 GC each, and having them around for luck increases spawns for other objects.
    • (Desktop, Console and Mobile versions) Dirt bomb can be crafted with 25 dirt and can yield up to 30–40 dirt, making dirt renewable. As the mud can be made of dirt, Chlorophyte is also renewable this way.
    • Ores and bars:
      • As noted above, the "basic" metals for both pre-Hardmode and Hardmode can be obtained from fished crates.
        • While probably slower than actual mining, crates provide not only the metals which could be mined in the world, but their "alternate" metals as well, for example they will contain both Gold and Platinum.
        • On the Old-gen console version Old-gen console version and Nintendo 3DSNintendo 3DS version version, stockpiling crates before Hardmode allows getting a supply of Hardmode metals immediately after killing the Wall of Flesh, and without breaking altars.
      • The "evil ores", Demonite Ore and Crimtane Ore, are dropped by their respective biome bosses (Eater of Worlds for Demonite, Brain of Cthulhu for Crimtane), and by the Eye of Cthulhu (what the Eye drops depends on the world's evil biome).
      • Meteorite ore is provided by the Meteorite crash sites. If desired, timing the crash triggers can maximize the number of crashes.
        • Albeit rarely, Meteorite can also be dropped by Meteor Head. If you leave behind (or stockpile) at least 50 Meteorite ore, you can farm Meteorite from them. Once in Hardmode, this doesn't work anymore as Meteor Heads cease dropping anything.
      • Hallowed Bars are dropped by the three mechanical bosses.
      • Luminite is dropped by the Moon Lord.

    Non-renewable

    A complete list of items that are not renewable can be found at Non-renewable items.