Stardew Valley’s new fish ponds will send you around the world to appease your new fishy overlords. Update 1.4 brought a ton of new content to Stardew Valley when it landed last month. There were new outfits, hats, and hairstyles. There were six new breeds of dogs and cats. There was a new multiplayer map with new multiplayer options to play with your friends like never before. And also a brand new building: the Fish Pond.

On the surface, the fish pond just seems like a way of having fresh seafood on the regular. For 5,000 gold, 200 stone, five seaweed, and five green algae, you can put a big pond in the middle of your farm and fill it with whatever aquatic life you want. Fish will eventually spawn to a certain maximum before being ready for harvest.

You'd think that's where the story would end, but you'd be wrong. After you reach that cap, your fishies will start handing out missives that ask you to go pick up a few things in order to increase their population cap. After reaching three Herrings, for example, they'll ask you to go get three driftwood. That seems fair, but then once you get to five Sandfish Scorpion Carp, they'll task with you finding a Golden Relic.

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Fish Pond
via SegmentNext

Other fish will ask for diamonds, amethyst, or even iridium ore. These fish have some refined tastes. Once you toss the requested item into the pond, the population cap will go up once again to a maximum of 10. What quests you receive from your fishy friends depends on the type of fish you're farming.

On top of that, certain fish will also produce items that randomly appear in the chum bucket. Lava Eels will make Magma Geodes, Slimejacks will produce…well, slime, and pretty much all fish will produce roe of some kind. Because it's Stardew Valley, someone has already done the math on what fish is the most efficient to farm based on what items they produce and how quickly they spawn. Turns out it's the Blobfish for their ability to produce a ton of roe and the occasional pearl.

Strictly speaking, fish ponds aren't the most efficient use of farmland, but they are a fun and welcome addition to Stardew Valley.

Source: Reddit, Stardew Wiki

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