Papaya Farming

[Severous]

I’ve been watching the Papaya farmers in Tropico2.  Don’t recall Tropico1 well enough to know if this is also relevant to the earlier game. Perhaps someone who does know both could expand this thread with similarities/differences.

A Farmer will start by going into the farmhouse. Once there he/she decides if going farming or needs a slop/sleep/religion break.  Assuming its farming then choice is:
a) Harvest crop if ready and no one else already assigned to do it or
b) Go plant some more crops

The area that is planted first is the most fertile one within a 5 square range.  If more than one area has the same fertility then its the closest.

There is no maintenance of a plant/tree just planting stage and harvesting stage.

Both Planting (between 7 and 8 days) and harvesting (1 day) appears to take the same time irrespective of the skill of the farmer.

The amount harvested does vary per the skill of the farmer and I think the productivity of the land. I also suspect the skill of the farmer who initially planted the crop is important.  I haven’t been able to prove this yet but it could be important for Papaya and Banana farms as those crops don’t die unlike corn etc that are replanted after each crop. Using a skilled farmer to set up a Papaya farm could be an important tactic.

I’m still gathering information on the varying skills/overseer/productivity of the land and will post in due course.

Here is the growing cycle of the Papaya tree as far as I have observed over several cycles.

[baccus17]

What I've observed, is that with the "tree based" crops, such as papayas and bananas in T2, and coffee in Trop, you get large, productive farms due to the slow crop development time.  

The farmers plant, and plant, and plant some more while the crops are growing.  Once they start producing as full grown trees, then you get the BIG payoff of the farms being super productive.  Usually, there are more crops than can be harvested quickly.  Later in the game, the farmers don't seem to plant new trees, as they can barely keep up with the existing ones.  That may be why Frog City cut the number of farmers to 2 for the papaya and banana crops.

One thing interesting about banana crops, and I'm not sure if this is accurately relfected in the game, is that a banana tree only produces one crop of bananas.  Then the tree is cut down.  I visited a banana plantation in Jamaica, and the mature trees, aside from the bunches of bananas, had a single HUGE, stinky flower, that spawned a new plant.  I'm not sure how multiple new plants are grown from a single plant.    Anyhow, our guide told us about the mortality of the banana tree after it had produced its bunches.

And for your useless trivia of the day:
single banana = finger
clump of bananas (like in the grocery store) = hand
many hands of bananas (many feet long) = bunch

So goes the Harry Belafonte song "six foot, seven foot, eight foot bunch!"  

-baccus

[Severous]

Thanks for the Trop1 and Bananna lessons guys.

No such thing as weather and moisture to worry about in Trop2 so makes understanding easier.

Further observation from the continued tracking of the Trop2 Papaya farmers:

- Its possible to harvest 0 Papaya.  When skills are low etc.  Theres no fractions..its a fat zero on some occasions despite the apparent crop carried back to the building.

- A fallen/spoilt crop can be gathered.  Thought at one stage this meant a zero crop collected..but now seen other values. So assuming its normal yield.
 
- Its the average skill of all the farmers that influences the crop gathered.  When 2xSkill 3 farmers were working they regulary gathered 2 Papaya each. When one was sacked and a novice with 0 skill joined - the harvests dropped to 1 and sometime 0.  Importantly not just the 0 skill farmer - but also the skill 3 farmer harvested less each time.  For a while a skill 3+skill 0 farmer were producing less than just the skill3 farmer alone.

Starting to think that high skill farmers are very much more productive on Papaya farms. Tracking continues...

[Severous]

My current conclusion on Papaya farming is that expert skill 5 farmers are not much better than skill 3 farmers.

They work faster...their little hoes move faster...but they take more hoeing motions to complete the job than an unskilled farmer.  They both take the same amount of game time to plant a tree/harvest.  This observation coupled with no significant increase in harvests makes me think something is wrong in the code/maths.

The amount harvested on each trip to the trees by a skilled farmer will not exceed the number of trees in that square.  The average skill of farmers on the farm does appear to affect the harvest..if its lower than 3 then I often saw crop yields drop below 1 per tree resulting in 1 or 0 harvests.

I also used a road to wipe out trees previously planted by unskilled farmers, then removed the road and replanted with skilled farmers and an overseer.  Only in one square out of 20 did the yield increase. The original planting had only one tree...on replanting it had two...and subsequently cropped two each time.

Maximum crop was one per tree in the square (max of two trees per square)

Most annoying observation - the square with the highest Papaya fertility was planted first but no matter how many times I replanted it - I could not get it to become as productive as all the less fertile squares.  I even demolished the farm completely and rebuilt it and started farming all over again with most skilled farmers and an overseer.  Made no difference    

Now why would the best square produce less than others?

Im currently planting a farm in a much poorer fertility area with two skill 5 farmers and an overseer.  Will report findings in due course.  

[Coconut Kid]

Bump for farming information.

Still there is no definition of the size of the farm?