Graveyard Keeper 2 farming: seeds, beds and harvests
Four seeds per bed, twelve growth steps, and two different skills deciding how it goes. Planting, bed skill, fertilizer, upgrades, the orchard and the vineyard.
The short answer
Unlock Gardening (5 green), dig a bed with Farming 2, and plant exactly four seeds. Your Farming mastery decides how the four planting steps go; after that, the bed’s own skill and upgrades decide growth through the remaining steps of a 12-step crop. Harvesting needs no mastery. There is no watering, no seasons and no weather to worry about.
VIEW IMAGE ↗What to check, in order
- 01
Research Gardening for 5 green points and place beds in the garden.
- 02
Get Farming 2 to dig a bed; a rusty shovel only gives 1, so take a bronze shovel or the first Farming node.
- 03
Plant four seeds with a shovel on the toolbar, ideally with mastery at or above the crop’s requirement.
- 04
Let the bed grow; its skill, not yours, drives growth now.
- 05
Harvest for crops, fresh seeds and 2 Leaves, and turn the Leaves into Peat.
- 06
Fertilize empty beds and build garden upgrades to grow faster.
Planting and growth use different skill
- 01
Prepare bed
Dig a suitable plot
- 02
Plant four seeds
Keeper mastery matters
- 03
Crop growth
Bed skill takes over
- 04
Harvest & reserve
Save seeds for replanting
Field Guide schematic · read alongside the checklist. Not an in-game screen.
Beds and garden capacity
Gardening costs 5 green points and is usually your first green purchase, since Herm’s Planted and Delivered wants 5 Wheat. Digging a bed takes four shovel swings at 2 energy each and needs Farming 2. A Rusty Shovel only gives +1, which is why so many first beds fail; a bronze shovel (+2) or the first Farming talent node fixes it.
The garden holds 10 beds to start, 20 after Garden Upgrade I and 30 after Garden Upgrade II. Each harvest gives crops, fresh seeds and 2 Leaves, which become Peat.
What each crop needs
Every crop has a mastery requirement for planting, and the harvest also pays green technology points. Wheat is the easy starter at Farming 2. The higher crops come in star grades, and the requirement climbs with each grade.
| Crop | Where | Farming to plant | Green points per harvest |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wheat | Bed | 2 | 2 |
| Carrot | Bed | 4 | 4 |
| Flax | Bed | 5 | 5 |
| Beet | Bed | 6 | 6 |
| Cabbage (1/2/3 star) | Bed | 8 / 10 / 12 | 8 |
| Onion (1/2/3 star) | Bed | 10 / 12 / 14 | 10 |
| Pumpkin (1/2/3 star) | Bed | 12 / 14 / 16 | 12 |
| Hops | Trellis | 7 | 7 |
| Grapes (1/2/3 star) | Trellis | 12 / 14 / 16 | 12 |
Planting and growth are different skills
Every crop is 12 steps long, and the first four are the planting steps you do with your shovel. Those are graded like cooking: if your mastery is below the crop’s requirement, some steps fail, and failed steps permanently reduce the harvest. At Farming 0 you cannot plant at all.
The remaining steps happen on their own, one tick at a time, using the bed’s skill rather than yours. A base bed has skill 2 and ticks every 2 minutes. If the bed’s skill meets the crop’s requirement, every tick succeeds, and at double or triple the requirement each tick moves two or three steps. Below the requirement, each tick moves exactly one step and may fail.
Harvesting is the forgiving part: no mastery needed. Odd-numbered successful steps give a seed and even-numbered ones a crop, so a perfect 12-step bed returns 6 crops, 6 seeds and 2 Leaves.
Field note: A low yield has two possible causes. Check your mastery at planting time and the bed’s skill during growth separately; a better shovel after planting cannot repair a step that already failed.
Bed skill and garden upgrades
Upgrades raise every bed’s skill and shorten the tick. Wheat on a base bed takes 8 ticks, 16 minutes. After Upgrade I the bed’s skill of 4 is double Wheat’s requirement, so each tick moves two steps and the same crop takes about 7 minutes.
Garden Improvement II stays hidden on the tree until you have built Garden Upgrade I, so do not go looking for it early.
| Stage | Bed skill | Tick | Cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Base bed | 2 | 2:00 | Gardening (5 green) |
| Garden Upgrade I | 4 | 1:45 | Garden Improvement I (30 green); 10 Peat, 18 Bronze Nails, 9 Wooden Planks |
| Garden Upgrade II | 8 | 1:30 | Garden Improvement II (100 green, 25 blue); 9 Farming Fertilizer II, 8 Iron Details, 4 Oiled Beams |
Fertilizer
Fertilizer goes on empty beds only, a bed takes up to two, and it is permanent: it stays through every future harvest. Peat is the base for everything. The rest are made at the Formulation Bench by combining Peat with Dream Dust or growth elixirs. Applying a duplicate by hand wastes it.
| Fertilizer | Recipe | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Peat | 8 Leaves → 2 at the Compost Pile | Bed skill +1 |
| Crop Boosting I | 2 Peat + Dream Dust | +2 growth steps |
| Farming I | 2 Peat + Weak growth elixir | Bed skill +2 |
| Headstart I | 2 Peat + Weak growth elixir | Starts 1 step ahead |
| Farming II | 4 Peat + Rich growth elixir | Bed skill +3 |
| Headstart II | 4 Peat + Rich growth elixir | Starts 2 steps ahead |
| Farming III | 8 Peat + Miracle growth elixir | Bed skill +5 |
Getting star-grade crops
Cabbage, onion, pumpkin and grapes come in one, two and three stars. A crop planted from one- or two-star seeds yields a crop one star better from the 11th successful growth step onward. Three-star seeds always give three-star crops. Higher grades sell for more, a three-star cabbage fetches nearly twice a one-star, and they make better dishes.
Different grades do not stack, so a Farmer’s bag pays for itself quickly once you start growing graded crops.
Vineyard, orchard and zombie gardeners
The vineyard opens with the Vineyard technology (55 green). Trellises cost 5 Sticks and 3 Peat each and need Farming 6 to dig. You start with room for 12, or 18 after the Vineyard Upgrade. Community testing reports that the Vineyard Upgrade’s speed bonus currently does nothing, so build it for the extra trellises.
The orchard, from Orchardry (20 green) and 10 Peat, holds an Apple Tree and three bushes. Each needs a seedling from Herm at tier III or the Vegetable Stand, and growth ignores mastery, fertilizer and upgrades entirely. Apples regrow every 20 minutes.
Zombie gardeners work from a Gardener Stand with a shovel, and you assign crops to rows with tablets made at the garden blueprint table. Once a zombie claims a bed, you can no longer plant or fertilize it by hand. Harvest the old crop before you change a tablet, or the zombie ignores the new one.
Common questions
Does harvesting require high mastery?+
No. Harvesting has no mastery requirement. Mastery matters when digging and planting.
Do I need to water crops?+
No. There is no watering, no seasons and no weather in farming. The garden well is only for cooking water.
Why did my harvest come out small?+
Failed planting steps from low Farming mastery, or failed growth ticks on a bed whose skill is below the crop’s requirement.
Is the Green Thumb perk worth it?+
Not right now. It claims +2 Farming for planting and harvesting, but the bonus is never applied in the launch build.
How many seeds does a bed take?+
Exactly four per planting.
Can I fertilize a bed that already has a crop?+
No. Only empty beds can be fertilized, and the fertilizer then stays permanently.
Does the God of nature buff help?+
Yes. The sermon buff cuts 20 seconds off each growth tick, but only for crops that start growing while it is active. Plant right after the sermon.
What does my first harvest of a new crop give?+
Besides crops and seeds, the first harvest of carrots, beets, cabbage, onions and pumpkins teaches the cooking technology for that vegetable.
Sources & further reading
Recipes, costs and timings were cross-checked against the references below and the official patch notes. Numbers can shift with updates, so the in-game recipe window always has the final word.
- Community databaseGK2DB: farming
- Community databaseGK2DB: item stars (crops)
- Guidegames.gg: zombie gardeners
- Guidegames.gg: beginner tips (Green Thumb)
