Gardening (The Sims 3)

Gardening is a skill in The Sims 3. The skill is augmented by the Green Thumb trait, and the Super Green Thumb lifetime reward. It involves (as with gardening in real life and the previous Sims games) the planting, growing and harvesting of various plants that Sims can find within the game. Unlike the previous Sims games, The Sims 3 gardening has been much expanded upon, introducing many real-life plants and several fictional species such as the 'Life Fruit', 'Flame Fruit', and 'Plasma Fruit'.

Some expansion packs include more varieties of plant collections. Some of the plants can be used as ingredients for Nectar Making and Mixology, with the key ingredients for Nectar Making being the grapes from Champs Les Sims. With Ambitions, Sims can register as a self-employed gardener. Gardening can be profitable by selling the harvested produce from the inventory, supermarket, or consignment store.

Statistics

 * Number Planted
 * Unique Plants Planted
 * Items Harvested
 * Perfect Items Harvested
 * Unknown Seeds Planted
 * Best Harvestable
 * Money Earned
 * Largest Money Bag Harvested

Challenges
A Master Planter must plant 19 types of plant that can be planted in the game. Once you have mastered the varieties you will be able to reduce weed growth significantly on future plants.
 * Master Planter

Botanical Bosses must harvest at least 75 Perfect fruits and vegetables. After so many Perfect harvastables, the plants of Botanical Bosses almost never die from neglect.
 * Botanical Boss

Master Farmers have harvested at least 650 fruits and vegetables. The plants of Master Farmers remain watered and fertilized longer, meaning their gardens are more efficient.
 * Master Farmer

Plants
Plants and seeds can be planted at home. Seeds can be found on the ground throughout the town or upon reaching level 1, while plants can be found from the supermarket, vegetable stand, or harvesting from wild plants.

Quality & Varieties
Harvested produce has a quality ranging from horrifying, putrid, foul, bad, normal, nice, very nice, great, excellent, outstanding, and perfect. Higher quality produce is worth more for selling and will have increased strength as fertilizer. The quality of the harvested produce roughly corresponds to the quality of the plants. Thus, an excellent apple tree will usually bear excellent apples, however there is a chance of harvesting higher quality produce.

Produce can be used for the following:
 * Cooking ingredients
 * Nectar Making ingredients
 * Mixology ingredients
 * Alchemy ingredients
 * Science samples
 * Fishing baits

Generally, plants are used for ingredients. Some plants also have their own unique variety, which makes them have other usages aside from ingredients.

Mushrooms
Mushrooms are plants that came from Supernatural. The common use of mushroom is for Alchemy ingredients. Some mushrooms are edible and can be used as a food ingredient, i.e. truffles, porcinis, and white caps; while the others are inedible. Collecting wild mushrooms is also part of the Collecting challenges. Collecting 7 of them will increase the quality of mushrooms grown. Harvested mushrooms don't count to the challenge.

Edible mushrooms:
 * Porcinis
 * White Caps
 * Truffles

Inedible mushrooms:
 * Red Toadstool
 * Mycenas
 * Spotlight Mushroom
 * Glow Orbs

Herbs
Herbs are plants that came from University Life. Herbs are related to Rebel social group. Herbs can be used as an addition to meal, herbal drink, burned in bonfire or fireplace, or eaten raw, which will give a moodlet and various certain effects. The moodlet time is based on how the herb is consumed: 8 hours if eaten raw, 5 hours if added to meal, 3 hours from herbal drink, and 2 hours from being burned. There's a 15% chance the herb will cause herb nausea when consumed, which will increase or decrease based on the quality of the herb.

Below is the list of herbs and its effects:
 * Peppermint - +25 Moodlet
 * Chamomile - Increases social group influence gain by 15%
 * Cinnamon - May increase the effect of romantic interactions
 * Greenleaf - Increases weight loss rate by 20%
 * Basil - Increases performance gain and opportunity reward slightly
 * Bumbleleaf - Extends the "On Fire" moodlet to 4 hours
 * Buzzberry - Increases Athletic skill gain by 15%
 * Ginseng - May decrease energy need decay
 * Lavender - Increases energy need gain by 10%
 * Licorice - Decreases hunger need decay by 30%
 * Wonderpetal - Increases academic performance gain by 10%

Coffee Beans
Coffee beans are plants that came from University Life. Coffee beans can be consumed raw or as coffee drink from the barista bar. Coffee beans cannot seem to be used as any ingredients or for the espresso maker. Consuming coffee bean will give various moodlets, which work like "Buzzed" moodlet from drinking coffee, which will temporarily overried "Sleepy", "Tired", and "Exhausted" moodlets, as well as getting "Buzz Crashed" when the effect expires.

Below is the list of coffee beans:
 * Midnight Bean
 * Kona Bean
 * Red Berry Bean
 * Cortado Bean
 * Maui Bean

Fertilizer
Fertilizer can be used to increase the plant speed growth. Fertilizer does not affect the quality of the plant or produce. Most ingredients can be used to fertilize plants, as well as horse fertilizer from the horse stall. Below is the list of fertilizers, the time the effect lasts, and the grade.

Depending on the quality of the fertilizer, the value and length can be modified. The fertilizer value will be multiplied according to the multipliers, and the length will be added with extra days. Furthermore, completing the Master Farmer skill challenge will benefit Sims by giving additional 2 days for any fertilizers.

Tips

 * Sims can use sprinkler to water plants in a 5x5 area. It can be turned on and run indefinitely. Sims can upgrade the sprinkler with Auto-Water so it will run between 4 AM and 7 AM, but it has to be turned off first.
 * The harvester can be used to harvest multiple plants at once.
 * Selling the produce in the supermarket is worth 10% higher than selling from inventory, and even more if sold in consignment store.
 * Sims can plant indoors with the pot planters from Supernatural.
 * Unicorns and fairies can use their abilities to grow up the plants one level higher, up to their harvestable state.
 * The following traits are suggested to help with Gardening:
 * The Green Thumb trait increases the quality of plant produce when they plant a seed or harvest produce.
 * The Loves the Outdoors trait will create a positive moodlet when Sim is outdoors.
 * The Eco-friendly trait will create a positive moodlet when gardening.
 * The Gatherer trait increases the quality of produce harvested from seeds the Sim plants.

External Link

 * Carl's Sims 3 Fertilizer Tests