Starting your farm on the right foot makes the rest of the year much easier. In this chapter, we’ll cover the essentials for your first days in Stardew Valley: how to clear your land efficiently without wasting energy, pick the most profitable early-game crops, and make some quick cash. Follow these tips, and your farm will be set up for success from day one!
Big thanks to everyone on Reddit for sharing your tips — they were incredibly helpful!
Grow Parsnips or Potatoes
Parsnips and Potatoes — Your Early Game Besties
Start with Parsnips
For your first few days (until around Day 5), focus on Parsnips.
They grow fast and give you quick money to reinvest.
Remember: in Stardew Valley, if you skip watering, your crops don’t grow that day.
So, make watering part of your daily routine — it’s worth it.
Then Move On to Potatoes
One of the best tips I got from Reddit players was: grow Potatoes.
On paper, their selling price doesn’t look amazing, but here’s the trick —
there’s a good chance of getting extra Potatoes when you harvest, and sometimes even two extra per plant!
That means your actual profit is roughly 25% higher than what the numbers suggest.
They also grow in just 6 days, and the seeds are cheap, making them one of the most efficient crops for early-game cash flow.
Take the money you earned from Parsnips, buy Potato seeds, and keep reinvesting your profit.
Thanks to compound growth, your earnings will snowball fast.
I didn’t take screenshots back then, but during my first Spring, I once made around 8,000G in a single day just from Potatoes.
Honestly, most other crops in Year 1 are mainly for collection, bundles, or roleplay rather than profit.
Buy a Training Rod and go fishing
Make the Most of Your Free Time with the Training Rod
Once fishing becomes available, head to Willy’s Fish Shop and buy the Training Rod for just 25G.
Whenever you have leftover energy or a bit of downtime, use it to fish — you’ll thank yourself later.
This tip came straight from Reddit, and honestly, it was a total game-changer.
If you’ve just unlocked fishing, you’ve probably struggled with things like:
“I can’t keep the bar on the fish!”
“The gauge drops instantly!”
“Even when I match the bar with the fish, the progress barely moves!”The Training Rod fixes all of that in seconds and turns fishing into one of the easiest ways to make money early on.
Here’s how it works: the Training Rod can’t catch high-quality fish, but it treats your fishing skill as if you’re already Level 5.
That means your fishing bar becomes much longer, making it way easier to keep up with fish movements.The moment you switch to this rod, fishing goes from frustrating minigame to chill money machine.
And honestly, early on you won’t be catching rare fish anyway, so just rely on the Training Rod until your real fishing skill reaches Level 5. It’s totally worth it.
Is the Training Rod Worth It? Absolutely.
The rod costs 25G, but you’ll make that back instantly — even the cheapest fish sells for 30G.
Catch one fish, and you’ve already broken even. Everything after that is pure profit.
Most fish sell for 30–70G, and even if you just fish casually — say, 3–4 fish a day using leftover energy — that’s about +100G a day on average.
In my own first Spring (around Day 11), I made 365G in a single day from fishing, just as a side activity.
For comparison, growing Parsnips with your starting 500G nets about 75G per day on average.
So yeah — fishing is incredible value for the effort.
It’s especially powerful in the early game, when farming income is still low.
Use your fishing profits to reinvest in crops, and you’ll snowball your way to a strong start.
The Training Rod honestly feels like a completely different game — try it once, and you’ll see what I mean.
Where to Fish 🎣
When it comes to fishing, location matters a lot.
Avoid fishing in the ponds on your farm, the southern pond, or the river east of town — you’ll mostly catch trash (literally worth 0G), and it just drains your Energy for nothing.
Sure, some river fish are unique and only appear there, but honestly, it’s better to wait until you actually want to complete your fish collection or just feel like some peaceful river fishing.
So where should you fish? Here are my top picks:
- The pier near Willy’s Fish Shop
- The lake in the northeast part of the map (near the mountains)
Especially the mountain lake — fish there tend to sell for around 75G or more, and the catch rate is great even for beginners.
Sell whatever forage you find lying around
Foraging is a Solid Early-Game Money Source
Foraging is a Solid Early-Game Money Source
I’ve learned this way from Reddit
too.
Foraging can be a surprisingly good way to make money in the early game, especially when you’re low on funds and need seeds.
Whenever you see the green “+” icon, just right-click to collect the item.
Even selling just one item can earn you 30–60G.
- Parsnip Seeds: 20G
- Potato Seeds: 50G
So basically, selling one foraged item can easily cover the cost of at least one seed.
The Cindersap Forest (south of your farm) is a goldmine for foraging.
Even if you’ve spent all your Energy on farming and fishing, a quick foraging trip here can still bring in a nice little profit.
Plus, foraged items aren’t just for money — they’re also handy for restoring Energy later on.
Keeping a couple of items in your inventory as a backup is always a smart move.
Key Takeaways
- Grow Parsnips or Potatoes
- Buy a training rod and go fishing
- Sell whatever forage you find lying around
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