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Ever play a game not knowing what you are doing and as you progress you realize how many mistakes you made? So many in fact, that you even think about restarting the game? Trust me, I have been there.
I will share things I wish I knew about Stardew Valley before starting the game. Hopefully, you will learn something new and apply it to your game. Or at least get a laugh from me wasting 2 years of my life. (No it is not #2.)
I have a video down below if you would rather watch instead of read it. If you rather read, skip the video. (If you are a beginner, make sure to check out the “Ultimate Stardew Valley Farm Guide” to know which farm layout is the best for you, before you start.
1. Sell Wild Seeds In the Beginning Except for Winter
Usually, you would want to sell the crops when harvested because they are worth more than the seeds right? Well, it is different for the spring, summer, and fall wild seeds. It is more profitable to sell them until you get the botanist profession perk.
Let’s take the spring seeds for example. Selling one leek, dandelion, daffodil, and wild horseradish is worth 180 gold for the regular non-ranked varieties. Turning those into wild seeds will sell for 350 g.
Plant 20 wild seeds. Harvest the items when they grow and turn them back into seeds. Plant 20 wild seeds again and sell the rest. Just rinse and repeat.
2. Fiddlehead Fern Only Grows in the Summer at the Secret Woods, One of the Things I Wish I Knew About Stardew Valley
I went through 2 game years before I found one. Why is fiddlehead fern important? It is needed in the Fiddlehead Risotto recipe, to be shipped for an achievement, and the community center chef’s bundle. That’s a lot of importance for a plant.
However, with the new updates, you can now have a possibility to find the Fiddlehead Fern in the Prehistoric levels in the Skull Cavern.
3. Hardwood Everyday
Hardwood stumps respawn every day in the secret woods. So if you need hardwood, you can get 10 a day. I thought it was once a week.
4. Keep Track of Your Stardrops. No Seriously
I thought my last Stardrop to earn was the one my spouse was supposed to give me at 13 hearts. I tried getting this for 2 years in real life.
I tried the bouquet gift glitch until it was patched. I gave Sebastian sashimi every day, which is one of his favorite gifts. In the month of October during 2019, I found a screenshot dating May 2017 that shows Sebastian giving my player the Stardrop. I don’t remember taking this.
So what was I missing? Well, I grew 2 sweet gem berries. One for the Full Shipment Achievement and one for the Stardrop at the secret woods. Guess what? According to my records, I shipped both of them. I wanted to bang my head on a table. 2 years!!! This is definitely one of the things I wish I knew about Stardew Valley or rather took more seriously.
5. You Can place Treasure Chests Anywhere, One of the Things I Wish I Knew about Stardew Valley
Ever got a full inventory in the mine and went all the way home to dump your treasures into your chests? I did until I learned that you can put treasure chests outside the mine. It’s very convenient. Trust me.
It’s not just the mine either. Put treasure chests on the docks or in the forest. Also, you can put furnaces at the mine entrance to smelt bars. Put tappers on the trees in the forest so you don’t have to have trees on your farm and still be able to harvest pine tar, maple syrup, etc.
6. Keep at Least 1 of Everything
That’s right. Keep at least 1 of everything or more, especially the gold-ranked or the iridium-ranked items. You will need tons of different items for community bundles, quests, cooking, and achievements. Also with gold items, it is easier to win at the Stardew Valley Fair in Autumn.
7. Do Not Donate the First Dinosaur Egg, One of the Things I Wish I Knew About Stardew Valley
I made this mistake and it took forever to find another one. Now mind you, this was before the update that added dinos in prehistoric levels in the Skull Cavern.
What you should do is put that egg into the incubator, to hatch your own dinosaur. Then, when that dino lays an egg, take that egg to the museum. That way, you now can have dinosaurs on your farm and have a steady stream of dino eggs. Sell them eggs or turn them into dinosaur mayonnaise.
8. Worms
Those wiggling pixels in the ground are worms. Worms show you where buried items are. It can be clay, lost books, artifacts, and forage. So don’t step on them, dig them up instead.
9. Trashcans
So trashcans are gross right? Well besides trash, there can be items in the trash. For instance, the trashcan by Sam’s house tends to have Jojo cola. The trashcan by Emily’s and Haley’s house can have bread. However, do not go dumpster driving around the NPCs because like I said trash cans are gross and the NPCs judge you for it.
10. Do not Fish on Farm, One of the Things I Wish I Knew About Stardew Valley
Yes, there are water sources on your farm. However, do not fish on your farm unless you like trash. There is a very low chance to catch a fish on your farm. I guess people just decided to trash the farm when it was abandoned, huh?
11. Minecarts Have Coal
I didn’t even know this until I watched a video from WickedCandy. If you are in the cave and the level you are on has a track, follow it. It will lead to a minecart and as long as you not been on this level before, there will be coal in the minecart. Also, there is coal in unopened backpacks as well.
12. Crows Do Not Attack Wild Seeds
Since wild seeds grow into the foraged items, the crows do not attack them. They are not considered crops. So do not waste Scarecrows on wild seeds.
Also, crows do not attack seeds on your farm if there are only 15 seeds or less.
13. Harvest the Mushrooms after 7 pm From Your Mushroom Cave, One of the Things I Wish I Knew About Stardew Valley
If the headline wasn’t a good enough hint, make sure you choose the mushroom cave over fruit bat cave when Demetrius asks you what you want to do with your cave on the farm.
With the mushroom cave, you can actually harvest mushrooms of different varieties every day if you go in the cave at 7 pm or later. I kept making the mistake of looking in the mornings and only harvested them once a week. What a way to lose easy gold.
That’s the List of Things I Wish I Knew about Stardew Valley Before Starting the Game
Did you learn anything new? I hope so. A couple of the items on the list, I actually just found out recently and I have been playing the game for years.
Pin me!!!!
Just for a recap, the tips were:
- Hardwood respawns every day in secret woods
- Fiddlehead ferns only grow in the summer in the secret woods
- You can place treasure chests, among other things, anywhere
- Keep track of your Stardrops so you do not waste two years of your real life
- Minecarts hold coal
- Crows do not attack planted wild seeds
- Trashcans can have items for the taking
- Do not fish on the farm
- Sell your wild seeds
- Keep at least one of everything
- Dig up the worms
- Do not donate the first dino egg you find
- Harvest your mushrooms every day after 7 pm
Knowing these tips is a real time saver for me. If I kept track of my Stardrops better, I would have saved 2 years of my real life.
Also, if you are interested in secret notes, check out the Ultimate Stardew Valley Secret Notes Guide! (Psst… I have other Stardew Valley posts. Just check out my Resources Page where I organize my posts by games!)
If this was useful, please share this post, 13 things I Wish I Knew About Stardew Valley, with your friends, subscribe for updates, and I’ll see you next time.
Amber Borden
Amber is an avid gamer. The first game she ever played was Super Mario Bros on the NES. She has seen many genres of videos games due to her 30 years of gaming. However, Amber typically sticks to RPGs, Sandbox and Simulation.
Since she loves gaming, her first job was at a Gamestop. Also, she has written guides for Gamefaqs. Amber was a full time worker in the retail world, but now she is working on this site from home. No matter what, however, she still plays her video games.
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