Jax’s Guide to Farming for Normal People Part 1 and 2

If you have tons of money to throw at farming here's my guide:

Buy the best tree/fruit tree seeds you can and plant them.
Ok….now that the rich people are out of the way here's the guide for the rest of us.

To start with, what do I mean by "Normal People"? I mean people who don't have tons of money, or time and who aren't really going for 99. They want to get to 60 for questing purposes or 62 to grow their own snapdragon seeds. And you don't want to spend all day staring at your crops.
Here are the goals of this guide:

1. Help you get the level you want.
   
2. Provide you a few "I didn't know that! Cool!" moments.
   
3. Keep you farming at 15 minutes a day or LESS! While still making GOOD progress toward your goal. (You can farm more to go faster obviously).

The first part of this guide is general advice to do with farming along with some hints and tips. The second part of this guide will be data on how to get from one set of levels to another etc. I also have an updated table to add later with more useful information.

Section 1 Hints and Advice

1. Super compost is your best friend.
   
   
   1. What can go into super compost? All fruits over pineapple, all tree roots, used coconut shells, some high level berries and herbs.
      
   2. What SHOULD go into super compost? Pineapples, coconut shells (never NEVER coconuts whole) and oak/willow/maple roots.
      
   3. Why not yew or magic roots? Why only shells and not whole coconuts? Yew and magic roots are useful in herb lore. They are worth enough to either save for when you have the herb lore level that you can use them or sell on GE. Plus, you can make Amulets of Nature with mage roots. Coconuts are needed to pay for magic trees. In addition, you can use a coconut with a hammer and empty vial. You can use that coconut milk to make a potion or sell it on the GE AND then use the shell to make compost. (See how that works? Get a little cash plus your compost).
      
   4. You'll be in Catherby everyday checking on your fruit tree and planting your allotment. Talk to Arhein by the docks and buy 80 pineapples. You need them for farmer payments, you need them for super compost, heck you can even sell them on the GE for about 100x what you pay Arhein for them. And don't forget, pineapples are free for the picking in Brimhaven.
      
   5. If you are just starting out regular compost is fine.
      
2. There are other ways to get farming xp.
   
   
   1. Sorceress Garden. Depending which garden you use you get xp for each squirk you pick or herb you steal. (summer=60, spring=40). I don't especially like this mingame. However, if you wanted to work thieving with farming this isn't a bad choice. Regular farming, however, is better.
      
   2. Vinesweeper. This has just been released. Any leprechaun can teleport you into the mini-game. It's a lot like minesweeper, I'd suggest reading the KB if you are really interested. It looks to be about 1xp=6pts. Not a fast way to obtain seeds or xp. I suppose if I were hard core farming I could do this between runs but it's really not that great. (I think it could be great if you got a big team together but that's a different guide.)
      
   3. Jade Vine. As a reward for the Back to My Roots quest you can play this mini-game (mini-mini game?) You get 1500 farming xp for checking the health of the Jade Vine and 2500 Slayer xp. Personally, I do this every day. It takes about 4 hours from the time the vine is checked for it to go wild. This is very fast. You can check it as you go through Ardy on your way to Brimhaven. The xp is between a willow seed and banana seed BUT it's free! I always use super compost and only lose one seed a month. And it's good slayer xp for the amount of time it takes.
      
3. What to wear.
   
   
   1. Boots of Lightness. You will be running. Don't ask for an explanation. Not required but nice to have.
      
   2. Ava's Accumulator. No no no…not a spotted/spottier/polkie dottie cap thing. It's not worth it to me. The boots put me below weight anyways. I would rather have the free arrows. And other metal stuff. If you can't wear an accumulator yet then sure, go ahead with a spotted cape or whatever.
      
   3. Anything else you want. The idea is to travel light. So put away the armor and put on a "fun" outfit. I would wear a teleport device of some sort (glory, dueling ring etc) in case you get mixed up and need to hit a bank fast.
      
4. How to get seeds. If you are starting out I'd say B, C, A are your best bets. And never ever throw away seeds! Ever. Hear me?!
   
   
   1. Steal them from Marty (or any other master farmer). Marty is in Draynor. Another master farmer can be found near the farmhouse north of Ardougne. And one is N of Lumbridge. If you don't have the thieving levels you can probably still get seeds on a busy server. Lots of people steal from them and drop the lower level seeds. If you are just starting out this is a good way to get your starting bunch. I see it more in Ardy then anywhere but it's up to you. If you are going to thieve and only want certain seed there's a trick. Put one of each kind of seed you want in your inventory. Fill up the rest of your inventory with other junk. When you pickpocket the farmer the seeds that aren't in your pack will fall on the ground automatically. The seeds that you want will stack in your inventory.
      
   2. Kill things. Highly effective. Mainly for allotment and herb seeds. I'll go out on a limb and say I don't think anything drops seeds other then allotment and herb seeds. Leave me a comment if I'm wrong.
      
   3. Woodcutting. Chop down trees. Get bird's nests. Check nest for tree seeds. Sell nest, keep seed. Or keep nest. Point is this is a way to get seeds. Not really fast. But something to keep in mind.
      
   4. Kingdom of Misc. If you have your people set to collect maples, teaks, mahogany, flax or herbs you will get seeds. I do maples and flax. I collect 1x a week. This yields me 34 tree seeds and 7 herb seeds (on average). You can sell the flax and maples to fund your kingdom (currently I'm running a 15% profit from this) and plant the seeds.
      
   5. Buy them. Don't think this takes much explanation. I try not to buy seeds as I have better uses for my money. You probably do too. I'll touch on this more later.
      
   6. Vinesweeper mini game. Not worth the time. Unless you're on a really good team. Maybe then. Doubt it.
      
   7. White Tree in Varrock. You have to do the Garden of Tranquility quest. You can pick fruit off the white tree in Varrock. The fruit recharges your energy. Is it really worth doing? Depends. It's near but not convenient to the tree patch in Varrock (try it you'll see what I mean). I've picked a bunch to help when I do agility.
      
5. Buckets are your friend too.
   
   
   1. Spawns. Al Kharid in one of the tents. Just south of Ardy Zoo near the well. Various other locations.
      
   2. Buy them from any farming store.
      
   3. Bert. Get sand (80) a day from Bert. As you make more and more glass you will have more and more buckets.
      
6. Pick up everything you can at a farming patch. Why? Because you never know when they will be useful. Because almost everything can be used to pay for something else. Because you'll be banking regularly anyways.
   
7. An organized bank is key. I keep my farming "gear" (pots, watering can, baskets sacks) together with seeds organized by type right next to them. You can do whatever you want. I also keep one of every herb seed in my bank so I don't have to go looking for them.
   
8. Paying the farmer. I try to pay the farmer for anything I plant that's within 10 levels of my current level. After that if I have the payment I use it. Otherwise I super compost it.
   
9. Patience is a virtue. For trees and fruit trees (and things you have payments for) plant them as soon as you get the level. For bushes, herbs, allotments etc I'd wait to be the appropriate level +1 (Ignore this if you are less then level 10). You'll get more crops and more xp.
   
10. Only talk to the Leprechaun 1x per trip. You can waste a lot of time trading stuff with the leprechaun. At the beginning of each farming round withdraw everything you need. Unless you are making compost or need to stash buckets leave the leprechaun alone until the end.
    
11. Quests. I've put quests that require farming xp in the appropriate sections. Three other quests that will help you are listed below. I encourage everyone to do these regardless of their goal as they have benefits to skills other then farming.
    
    
    1. Ghosts Ahoy-Ectophial puts you close to a patch.
       
    2. Tree Gnome Village-Spirit Trees are great especially after level 30 Farming.
       
    3. Kingdom of Miscellanea and Royal Trouble. Best source of seeds. Do Royal Trouble to lower your costs.
       
12. Summoning. Compost mound adds 2 to your total skill at 50+. I'll add more as I learn more later.
    
13. Payments to farmers. Yes. Do it.
    
    
    1. You can also pay farmers 200gp to cut down your trees. I'm not a fan of this but there you have it.
       
    2. You can note your payments. Very helpful when you start doing tree runs.
       
14. Amulet of Nature. I rarely use mine. Choice is yours. I am a farm it and forget it type.
    
    

Section 2 Getting Started
First stop off at any farming store (near the allotments) and purchase the following:
1 Rake
1 Secateurs
1 Spade
1 Seed Dibber
1 Trowel
1 Watering Can
31 Buckets
Sacks
Baskets
Starting out: (Levels 1-14) Put 15 items in a compost bin. Leave it alone for 2 hours. Come back with 15 buckets and 15 more compost and make more compost. Go ahead and rake the allotments/herb/flower patches. If you feel like it go ahead and plant all the patches. Woodcut or fish nearby if you didn't use compost. If you did, well, wander off.
What to farm:
Always Plant: Go from potato to onions to cabbage. Each takes 40 minutes to grow. These seeds are easy to get from either master farmers, GE or monsters.
(I'd skip Marigolds as the prices for those seeds are ridiculous now.)
Hops are good at this level. Barley, Hammerstone, Asgarnian seeds.
Add in guam and redberry bushes at level 10. These are cheap, fast xp.
Where to farm:
If you are just starting out (RS I mean, not farming) I suggest the farm just south of Falador.
Use the hops patch across from Lumbridge.
Just north of the hops patch is a bush patch.
If you have access to Catherby then I'd suggest using both Catherby and Ardougne North. Just run between them.
Hops patch just north of Seer's village
Bush patch just south of Ardougne.
15 Minutes: Take one trip a day and hit your allotment/hops/bush patches.
Speedy: Set your timer and every 70 minutes go hit your patches again.
Quests to do at this level: None.

Ranarr: Level 15-32
What to Farm: Keep doing what you were doing to get to 15. Allotments, herb, bushes, hops, flowers. If all you have are potato seeds and guam I'd still plant them. By now you should be getting close to 100 xp per guam/potato planting. That's still worth it. And very cheap. Oaks are your friends in this range. In fact, if you are training some other skill near a tree patch set your timer. After 2.5 hours or so you can check health and plant another oak to add a little training boost.
Where to farm: Start in Taverly(tree), tele to Falador (tree and allotment), home tele to Lumbridge(tree). Run across the river and hit the hops and bush patches on the way to Varrock (oak). Then go do something else. (This could take you more then 15 minutes, my apologies. You could bypass the bushes and hops if you wanted and tele from Lumbridge to Varrock. But at this level the bushes and hops would be useful).

15 Minutes: Taverly, Falador, Lumbridge, tele to Varrock.
Speedy: (see the where to farm section). Every 70 minutes check your hops and allotment. Every 2.5 hours rerun the whole route.
Quests to do at this level:
Any level-RFD Dwarf-1,000 Farming (requires a lot of other skills however)
Any level-Fairy Tale Pt 1-Magic Sectauers-3,500 Farming
17 Farming-Forgettable Tale-5,000 Farming
25 Farming-Garden of Tranquility-Seeds-5,000 Farming
29 Farming-My Arm's Big Adventure-Disease free herb patch-5,000 Farming (a MUST if you are going to be any kind of serious herb farmer)
30 Farming-Enlightened Journey-Hot Air Balloons-3,000 Farming
Spirit Tree: Level 32-81
What to Farm: Herbs, bushes, trees, fruit trees, specials.

1) Calquats are GREAT once you get to level 72. Cheap and easy.
2) I'd say you must grow a cactus too for the spines.
3)Taper off on the allotments. I planted them until the high 60's because I had the seeds and was already at the herb patch. Otherwise I'd leave them be.
4) I'm at 80 and still doing bushes. The xp isn't the greatest but I want the jangerberries/poison ivy/whiteberries for herblore down the road. And they sell well.
5) I only plant 2 trees a day. I get most of my seeds from miscellania so there's no rush to plant more. Once a week I plant Lumbridge since I'm there anyways to do Tears of Guthix.
6) I planted a papaya in Lleyta and a palm tree in Catherby. I only dig these up when I have another papaya/palm to replace it with. I do harvest them everyday. You will need the papayas and coconuts as you go along. Stockpile them early.
Where to farm: I'm going to assume that once you reach this level you can travel pretty well in RS. That you can afford a glory and skills necklace etc. After much trial and error I've discovered that you the best way to do a farming run is to focus on one thing. Fruit and Regular Tree Route: Tag your Jade Vine in Ardougne and visit the bush patch to the south. Jog back up to the Ardougne south bank. Grab your Ring of Charos or 30 gp, an axe, 1 fruit tree (and Calquat if you can) and a Teleport to Varrock. Catch the boat to Brimhaven and plant your Fruit Tree. Run to Tai Bwo Wannai and plant the Calquat. Tele to Varrock. (Optional buy battlestaffs). Grab a tree and payments and plant in Varrock. Now hit the bank and grab 2 fruit trees, 1 regular tree and payments. Spirit Tree to Tree Gnome Village, then to Tree Gnome Stronghold. Run to the regular tree patch. Bank is right next to it. Now, if you can do so, grab an elf crystal and a teleport to Catherby. Hit the Lleyta patch and then Catherby Fruit tree. If you skip the Calquat you can do this run in less then 8 minutes.
In Catherby: Buy out Ahrein. Make super compost. Buy bananas if needed from charter ships. Buy baskets/sacks.
Herb run: Withdraw from your bank all of the following: skills necklace, glory, ectophial, 2 laws, firestaff, 5 seeds. Tele to Trollheim. Ectophial to Port Phamatys, skills necklace to fishing guild (Ardy allotment), glory to Draynor (bank) run to Falador patch (you can swing through Draynor Manor if you have turnip or belladonna seeds. My best time is 4 minutes flat.
15 Minutes: Trees then herbs.
Speedy: Herb run, fruit tree run. Tele to Yanille (have your house there). Talk to Bert for sand (you need the buckets remember?), plant hops. Go to house and use portal to Falador. Plant tree. Tele to Lumbridge. Plant tree. Games necklace to Burthorpe. Recharge glories and plant trees. Do the herb run every 70 minutes.
Quests to do:
53 Farming-Back to My Roots-Jade Vine-24,000 Farming (Another MUST quest)
45 Farming-Grim Tales-4,000 Farming
40 Farming-Rum Deal-7,000 Farming