Berries were first introduced in the Gold/Silver/Crystal games. You could not farm them as they grew on bushes in set areas of the world. When the Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald games came out berry farming became all the rage. Leaf Green/Fire Red did use berries but there was no way to farm them, you had to trade them over one-by-one. Yeah, most folks didn't care for that option.
With the new Pokemon games, Diamond and Pearl, Nintendo has upped the bar on berry farming. They have added in some new berries and made berry farming better and easier.
Why farm berries?
Some players like to explore every aspect of a game while others do not. Berry farming does take time, a lot of time! Some bushes will not produce berries until 96 real hours have passed. That's four days for those of you who are math challenged.
Generally, the lower the number of the berry the faster it will grow into a berry producing plant. The number of berries you can get off of a plant does vary by berry.
Berries have three main uses:
- Hold item in battle
- Cook into poffins
- Plant to grow more berries
Those are the three most common uses you will encounter for berries. There is one other use that I will cover later on in this article.
Hold Items
Using a berry as a hold item during battle is a very good use of a berry. Beware though, in single player mode a held berry that is used by your Pokemon is gone. When battling over Wi-Fi or in the Battle Tower those berries magically reappear after battle. I don't want to think about where that berry came from but in game terms they are not used up.
The first berries you will encounter in the game are useful for healing and removing status conditions. You can use them from your bag on a Pokemon but, if a Pokemon holds the berry they can use it themselves at the end of the round. This saves you a lost turn during battle.
Not all berries are useful as a held item which leads us to:
Cook into poffins
There is a house in Hearthome City, The Poffin House, where you can turn your berries into poffins, a tasty treat for your Pokemon.
Poffins are the Diamond and Pearl version of Pokeblock. Depending on the characteristics of the berry (and your cooking skills) these treats can be used to up your chances of winning a Pokemon contest. Like the Pokeblocks that came before them, a Pokemon can only eat so many of these treats before they can no longer benefit from them.
This is not the place to go into the fine art of Poffin making, I'll save that for a later piece.
Plant to grow more berries
Berries grow in soft loamy soil. When you pick a berry it is a good practice to plant one in the same spot. Unless you have not completed the game.
Berry farming is a task best left until after you beat the Elite Four, or at least after you acquire the HM Fly. Berry farming is hard work and you need to be able to get to all of your berry patches several times a day. I suggest you just clear cut the berries in the early part of the game and keep one on hand (at least) to use when you start your farming career.
The first item you will need to begin your farming career is the Sprayduck. It is a watering can shaped like a Psyduck. With this item you can water the berry patches to avoid having them dry out. You can acquire this item from the flower shop in Floaroma Town. This same shop will also trade you stuff for your berries. Once you have the Sprayduck you can begin your farming career.
Depending on the climate in which the berry patch is located you may need to water the patch more (or less) often than other patches. The Sprayduck is what allows you to water those patches.
Each patch goes through three stages of wetness:
- Dark brown - Fresh soil ready for planting
- Medium brown - Still good soil but it is starting to dry out
- Light brown - Dry soil, get that plant some water!
I have found, through extensive research, that you will get the biggest berry harvest if you can keep your berry patches dark brown. I have managed to pull 15 berries off of a single bush by keeping the soil dark brown through the entire growing proccess. This is hard to do for berries that take 96 hours to mature.
Berry Watering Tip: Soil dries out faster in the daytime than at night. Always water your patches right before you go to bed at night and every few hours during the day.
There are some places in the world where you can plant four berries side-by-side. These are the best patches but they are not always in the best places. I have found that if a patch is too far out of the way I just leave it empty. If I'm planting 30 berries and watering them every few hours I can burn 20 minutes just getting all of the easy to reach patches!
Have any Pokemon Berry Farming questions? Ask them in the comments.