What farms are the best?

[Hydra]

Always yes. "Best" is not a universal term.

I understand what you're saying but in general "best" in this context simply means effort versus reward. And MFR is so far ahead of both Forestry and Steve's Carts (the latter being borderline useless) in that regard that in that definition of 'best', MFR wins hands down.

And from the wording of the OP I think it's obvious what answer the OP is looking for

 

[SonOfABirch]

I made a horribly innefficient treefarm about a week ago (I dug it into a 7x7 pit, so the 2 outside trees have nowhere to grow) and I still have over 4,000 saplings/logs/apples/raw rubber. Minefactory Reloaded is more than you'll ever need.

 

[dtech100]

For what you want a farm ? When you want to farm a forestry tree products like nuts, cherries, plums, lemons you must use Forestry multifarm. When you want simply plant, seeds, vanilla trees, sugar cane, pumpkins you use MFR tree with fertilizer - which are extremely fast. I don't know when you can farm trees from Extra Trees (Binnie's mod) - i think in forestry multifarm. But when you finally mutate the tree you want it will be end-game time.

 

[b0bst3r]

Just a note with Forestry aboretums (tree farms), although you supply them with dirt and the farm turns it into humus, it does not replace the humus after every tree is harvested. The humus naturally decays into sand and it's not until this happens that the farm replaces that sand with another humus consuming 1 dirt in the process. You can make dirt from a peat bog farm, it's entirely possible to make a single self sustaining multiblock forestry farm run itself as the dirt output from the peat farm will go straight back into the farm to be used by the arboretum (I think).

 

[KingTriaxx]

In Ultimate 1.4.7, Steve's Carts still holds the title of farm king for most applications. For no reason other than once you lay down the tracks in the shape you want, it'll run forever. Solar power for normal farms, coal engines run on logs or planks for tree farms. That said, with Railcraft, tracks are a little more work to acquire, but a stack or so will give you enough space to make a farm that will go for ever. I built a two-wide loop track and I have saplings and planks coming out my ears. (Literally I had to switch them into MFR Deep Storage units so they stopped filling my AE network.)

MFR is also incredible at farming anything that gets in it's way. Plop down a harvester and it'll mow through anything around it. It seems to be centered on it, rather than in front of it though. But you can run an entire MFR farm off the input of a single Biogas engine. Even accounting for 25% energy loss from the Tesseract for power transfer. Plus it's got an awesome sound as it shears the leaves off the trees.

 

[SonOfABirch]

Plop down a harvester and it'll mow through anything around it. It seems to be centered on it, rather than in front of it though.

harvesters harvest infront, not around. Don't know why you're seeing those results.

 

[Zarkov]

MFR is also incredible at farming anything that gets in it's way. Plop down a harvester and it'll mow through anything around it. It seems to be centered on it, rather than in front of it though.

The harvester will examine a larger area around a tree that spawns within the actual farm area to get rid of all leaves and logs. So you need a "safety zone" of maybe 5-6 blocks in all directions from the farm limits (not the harvester). Any trees planted in that zone will be messed up eventually.

 

[zorn]

MFR farms seem to be fastest, but not very challenging. You can run multiple solid fueled boilers off of one tree farm, not even a full size MFR one, and thats without fertilizer.

I dont know why trees on an MFR farm will grow directly next to each other, but if you plant saplings too close to each other by hand, the second sapling wont grow. Ive shut off the power to my farm and over a day the trees grew so close to each other it was literally a wall of oak, not even a spot you could walk in.

 

[zilvarwolf]

The harvester will examine a larger area around a tree that spawns within the actual farm area to get rid of all leaves and logs. So you need a "safety zone" of maybe 5-6 blocks in all directions from the farm limits (not the harvester). Any trees planted in that zone will be messed up eventually.

This.

My experience is that a harvester (unmodded) will examine the 3x3 area in front of it for signs of something to harvest. Once it detects that there's something that needs to be harvested, it starts checking a much larger area (and I think that the area searched depends on what is found). So if it finds a tree ready for harvesting, it starts searching an area 17x40x17 (this is the default search area in the 152ngt pack), centered on the harvester, for things to chop down. I made a pretty little underground tree farm with MFR recently and was a bit baffled at first when it started chopping things down (I could hear it chopping) but I didn't see any leaves getting destroyed..and then I went to the surface. heh.

Love me some MFR. Great fun.[DOUBLEPOST=1377873544][/DOUBLEPOST]

MFR farms seem to be fastest, but not very challenging. You can run multiple solid fueled boilers off of one tree farm, not even a full size MFR one, and thats without fertilizer.

I dont know why trees on an MFR farm will grow directly next to each other, but if you plant saplings too close to each other by hand, the second sapling wont grow. Ive shut off the power to my farm and over a day the trees grew so close to each other it was literally a wall of oak, not even a spot you could walk in.

Oaks do that for sure. Not sure about any of the natura or BoP trees. Birch, and spruce won't, and jungle might not since the 2x2 jungle tree is a different beast.

Whenever I setup an mfr tree farm, I make sure to limit sapling placement to the middle block of the planter's area only by filling the outside edges with garbage (cobble or whatever).

 

[Hydra]

MFR farms seem to be fastest, but not very challenging. You can run multiple solid fueled boilers off of one tree farm, not even a full size MFR one, and thats without fertilizer.

I have 20 36HP boilers running off 3 treefarms. And I have a charcoal surplus. It's pretty silly really.[DOUBLEPOST=1377875204][/DOUBLEPOST]

Oaks do that for sure.

I don't know what's up with oaks but they seem bugged compared to birch or spruce trees. They grow right next to each other without any issues so my 7x7 farm keeps ending up with 7x7 solid blocks of oak wood. The output of that farm is also WAY higher than the other 2 farms (1 birch, 1 rubber) because of this.

 

[namiasdf]

For the most systematic factory, MFR would be the best. They accept EU and MJ, as well as the set ups are quite versatile. The blocks themselves are quite versatile as they require no "output" block, they simply will output whatever it is, to the appropriate pipe.

Forestry farms give more of a "farm" feel, especially the old ones. They seem more like an automated chopping system rather than the effect that MFR gives off, where it feels more like a factory.

 

[Golrith]

I believe Oak trees have always been able to grow right next to each other, combined with the random chance of a extra large tree, makes them the best tree for harvesting.

 

[KirinDave]

Steves Carts farms (and mining for that matter) are not as bad as people make it out to be. Forestry farms are actually pretty cheap, power-wise. They're a bit more expensive, but I do confess I really have come to love the multiblock farm. Unlike many multi-block-me-too mods, the Forestry multiblocks actually give you design flexibility.

The MFR farms are tricky to cost, because the upgrades make them very power hungry.

 

[Hydra]

They're a bit more expensive, but I do confess I really have come to love the multiblock farm.

I think they're just way too big for the area they take up. I much prefer the old farms.

Besides, Forestry farming kinda 'died' for me the moment it required a mined resource.

 

[Bigpak]

Ok so here is what I would love to know, how do I get new tree traits? I am utterly confused about that on how to actually get new tree traits. Is it like tree crossbreeding or what? Any ideas?

 

[DREVL]

The thing about multifarms is that they start a little weaker than comparable farms but are meant to be upgraded through tree breeding. If you are using vanilla trees, then MFR is definitely the better farm. But only Forestry lets you pull off something like this: http://imgur.com/a/9c74I

that... is wicked.

 

[KirinDave]

I think they're just way too big for the area they take up. I much prefer the old farms.

Them being "larger" in the sense of surface area is a positive. It makes automation much easier.

Besides, Forestry farming kinda 'died' for me the moment it required a mined resource.

One medium-size Apatite strike will last you months. Months. Not in-game-months. Real months.

 

[Bigpak]

And what I meant by new traits is like how many saplings they produce and how fast they mature etc, how do I breed new traits like that?

 

[TangentialThreat]

How... how can people be seriously using MultiFarms? Did they remove the dirt requirement? Last time I tried it what you got was a machine for converting dirt into sand that harvested a few trees on the side, and while you could farm that much dirt you'd have to quarry constantly or use some other farming method to supply it.

 

[RedBoss]

And what I meant by new traits is like how many saplings they produce and how fast they mature etc, how do I breed new traits like that?

Biofuel Tree Guide + basic Tree Breeding Guide - http://imgur.com/a/yPs94