Last update: 06/05/2020 6am EST.
Contact me if you see any mistakes or if you have suggestions.
Wondering what's the best way to plant your flowers to optimize production? Welcome to my super long layouts guide!
Follow the flowchart below to figure out what is the best garden set-up for your needs!
(Remember that these are our recommendations, and the layouts are totally flexible to your own preferences).
You can start by reading "Understanding the Flowchart" and "Understanding Layouts" if you are new to gardening.
★ Understanding the Flowchart
What is your goal?
- All Flowers layouts are for trying to breed all flower phenotypes (colors).
- Breeding layouts are for crossing genes of two flowers (usually in an attempt to make a new flower).
- Cloning layouts are for when you already have the desired flower, and want to make exact copies (same genes).
- Testing layouts are for checking a flower's genotype. It is mainly used for Folklore/Paleh blue rose methods.
What is your situation?
- # Species: how many different species of flowers (e.g. tulips, roses, pansies) are you working with?
- Parents: are the two flowers you are breeding identical (same color) or different colors?
- Space: how much available space do you have for your garden?
- Visitors: how many visitors are you planning to have water your flowers every day? (Visitor Watering Guide)
Are you willing to use cliffs? (advanced gardening)
- Cliff meta is an interesting garden layout that enhances efficient use of space.
- Flowers cannot breed across cliff levels or produce offspring onto a different cliff level.
- This means cliffs can be used as a "divider" or blocker that does not take up space.
- Disadvantages: cliff layouts are inconvenient, annoying to water, and looks funky.
contents
Understanding Flower Production & Layouts
- Breeding vs. Cloning
- Reproduction Algorithm
- What makes a bad layout?
- Bad Layout: X
- Bad Layout: Checkerboard
All Flowers Layouts
- 12x12
- 39x21
Breeding Layouts [single-species, same parents]
- 2x2
- turtle (super-turtle)
- hexahole
- tetris-t
- ladder
Breeding Layouts [single-species, different parents]
- isolated pairs
- diamond
- cliff isolated pairs
Breeding Layouts [multi-species]
- dense isolated pairs
- offset dense isolated pairs
- dense diamonds
Cloning Layouts [single-species]
- isolated clones
- cliff cloning
Cloning Layouts [multi-species]
- clone rows
- clone rows (double-spaced)
- offset clone rows
- offset clone rows (double-spaced)
- cliff cloning (multi-species)
Testing Layouts
- 2+1 testing
- 2+1 cliff testing
Super Advanced Testing Layouts
Understanding Flower Production & Layouts
Breeding vs. Cloning
- AGAIN: it is very important that you understand the difference.
- Breeding is 2 flowers mixing genes to make 1 offspring. Cloning is 1 flower making 1 exact copy of itself.
- If you are struggling with understanding this concept, please read Gardening 101.
- We usually don't want a layout that can do both!
Reproduction Algorithm 101
- Flowers have a chance to reproduce once per day (when you first start your game, or at 5AM).
- If a flower rolls "successful" at reproduction, it will then look a valid partner (same species) in the 3x3 space around itself to breed with, and then produce an offspring. If it does not find a valid partner, it will make a cloned offspring.
- i.e. breeding takes precedence over cloning whenever possible.
- When a flower is successful, it (and its partner) are marked as invalid or "locked". They cannot produce until the next day.
- For advanced readings, see: Flower Production Algorithm, Flower Production Guide.
Why are Checkerboard and X breeding layouts bad?
- A big problem with many ACNH flower guides on the internet is that they recommend checkerboard and X layouts.
- They are presented as breeding layouts (to make new colors). However, they are highly susceptible to cloning.
- Let's first take a look at the X layout.
- Now let's look at how the Checkerboard layout is impacted.
Why is X a bad layout? 
Why is Checkerboard a bad layout?
The layouts in this guide are systematically tested and simulated to focus on a specific goal while maximizing efficiency!
"All Flowers" Layouts
J_MASTER's 12x12 Breed Everything Layout
This all flowers layout uses a 12x12 space to get at least one of each flower. It utilizes the fastest direct paths for every color (see paths and folklore blue rose method). It takes approximately 63 days to get all flowers using this method with 0 visitors, or 13 days at 5 visitors. You can further speed the process up by doubling the layout.
BackwardsN's 39x21 Layout
BackN's optimized 39x21 layout uses a different method. Instead of relying on the fastest direct paths to any single flower, BackN's method relies on combinations of flower parents that can create as many different other colors as possible (example: hyacinths). The layout works well at 0 or 1 visitors watering.
Breeding Layouts [same parents]
2x2
| Uses: | Breeding 1 species where parents are the same color. |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | Simple and easy. 100% clone-resistant. Ideal single-species same-parent breeding layout. |
| Weaknesses: | Not space efficient. |
| How to tile: | Make sure there is space inbetween each set of 2x2. Leave empty spaces on opposite sides of the 2x2 square as shown. |
 |
Turtle (tiled: "Super-Turtle")
| Uses: | Breeding 1 species where parents are the same color. |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | Dense and space efficient. Also the name is cute. |
| Weaknesses: | Not 100% clone resistant. tetris-T and ladder are better with more visitors. |
| How to tile: | Tile right next to each other, leave empty space around entire layout if possible. (also known as super-turtle) |
 |
Hexahole ("Hexhole")
| Uses: | Breeding 1 species where parents are the same color. |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | Dense and space efficient, more offsprings than turtle at 0 visitors, more clone-resistant than turtle. |
| Weaknesses: | Not 100% clone resistant. tetris-T and ladder are better with more visitors. |
| How to tile: | Tile the "hexahole component" below as needed depending on the size of your field. (no need to copy exact size, just understand the "piece" and follow the pattern). |
 |
Tetris-T ("5x5 Tetris-T", tiled: "10x10 Tetris-T")
| Uses: | Breeding 1 species where parents are the same color. |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | Dense and space efficient. Better than turtle and hexahole with more visitors. 13% more flower efficient at 3v-5V. |
| Weaknesses: | Not 100% clone resistant. |
| How to tile: | You can put them right next to each other. Put 4 copies of the layout together for "10x10 Tetris-T". |
 |
Ladder ("dense diamonds but without the multi-species part", "formerly 'intertwined diamond-like' but not called that anymore because Yue didn't like it")
| Uses: | Breeding 1 species where parents are the same color. |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | Dense and space efficient. Better than turtle and hexahole with more visitors. 11% more flower efficient and 3% more space efficient at 3V-5V. |
| Weaknesses: | Not 100% clone resistant. |
| How to tile: | You can put them right next to each other~ |
Breeding Layouts [different parents]
Isolated Pairs ("Independent Pairs", "IP")
| Uses: | Breeding 1 species (parents can be same or different colors). |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | Everything-- 100% clone resistant, focus on individual gene combinations. |
| Weaknesses: | Space inefficient. You can adjust it to be more space efficient with cliff-assisted IPs or multi-species dense IPs. If you have 0 visitors, diamond is 4.5% more space efficient (otherwise use IP at 1 or more visitors). |
| How to tile: | Just make sure there is space inbetween each set of IP. |
 |
Diamond
| Uses: | Breeding 1 species (parents can be same or different colors). |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | 100% clone resistant. 4.5% more efficient than IP at 0 visitors. |
| Weaknesses: | Less space-efficient compared to isolated pairs. If you have visitors, IP is better. |
| How to tile: | Ensure that each set of diamond is not touching. It is slightly more space-efficient if you stagger each diamond. DO NOT tile diamond into checkerboard. |
 |
Isolated Pairs (cliff-assisted)
| Uses: | Breeding 1 species (parents can be same or different colors). |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | All the strengths of how good IP is with bonus space-efficiency. |
| Weaknesses: | You have to deal with cliffs bro. |
| How to tile: | Like always, ensure each IP is not touching another. |
 |
Breeding Layouts [multi-species]
Dense Isolated Pairs
| Uses: | 2+ species breeding (parents can be same or different colors). |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | All the strengths of how good IP but more space efficient! Easy to maintain and water. |
| Weaknesses: | Prone to failure (20-30%), which means when a flower fails to breed simply because there is no more empty space for it to make an offspring. You need to solve this problem by using offset dense IPs or by ensuring there is an extra free column at at each end of the full layout. |
| How to tile: | Make sure there is empty space between each column. Leave a column of space at each end, especially if lots of visitors. |
 |
Offset Dense Isolated Pairs
| Uses: | 2+ species breeding (parents can be same or different colors). |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | SO GOOD. Ideal breeding layout. All the strengths and space efficiency of dense IP + slightly lower failure rate. |
| Weaknesses: | Not much. (Can look messy, some people chose standard dense IP for "organized" aesthetics). |
| How to tile: | Like below. Leave a column of space at each end, especially if lots of visitors. |
 |
Dense Diamonds ("Double Diamonds")
| Uses: | 2+ species breeding (parents can be same or different colors). |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | Two overlapping diamonds for more space efficiency. 4.5% more efficient than IP at 0 visitors. |
| Weaknesses: | Visually much more disorganized than offset dense IPs. Less space efficient because tiling dense diamonds is super awkward. |
| How to tile: | ... You do your best. Stagger each "set" of double diamonds. |
 |
Cloning Layouts [single-species]
Isolated Clones
| Uses: | Standard cloning layout for just one species of flower. |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | Easy & simple! Make sure it is not touching another flower of the same species. 0% failure rate. |
| Weaknesses: | Bad space efficiency. |
| How to tile: | Again, just ensure they are not touching |
 |
Cliff Cloning (single-species)
| Uses: | Cloning a single species of flower. |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | Good space efficiency, exactly 1:1 empty space for each flower to clone onto. 0% failure rate. |
| Weaknesses: | You have to deal with cliffs bro. |
| How to tile: | You can tile it horizontally like picture A. To tile the layout vertically, put one extra space inbetween like picture B (to minimize failure rate), or put down a row of stone path between the vertically tiled sections. |
| A |  |
| B |  |
Cloning Layouts [multi-species]
Clone Rows
| Uses: | Cloning 4+ species of flowers. |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | Super space efficient, easy to maintain, easy to water. |
| Weaknesses: | None, really. It does require 4 species though. Small chance of failure. |
| How to tile: | Just make sure there is space between two each row. |
| Notes: | Higher chance of failure with visitor waring, use double-spaced clone rows if 2+ waterers. |
 |
Clone Rows (double-spaced)
Same as clone rows above, but with 2 empty spaces between each row.
| Strengths: | Provides allowance for higher production rates (from visitor bonus) to reduce failures. |
|---|---|
| How to tile: | Self-explanatory. 2 empty spaces in between. |
 |
Offset Clone Rows
| Uses: | Cloning 3+ species of flowers |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | Same as regular clone rows, except the minimum # of species is 3. |
| Weaknesses: | Requires a little more planning, less efficient than regular clone rows. |
| How to tile: | Carefully plan where each of the 3 flowers are going to go such that it won't touch another flower of the same species. |
| Notes: | Higher chance of failure with visitor waring, use double-spaced offset clone rows if 2+ waterers. |
 |
Offset Clone Rows (double-spaced)
Same as offset clone rows, but with 2 empty spaces between each row.
| Strengths: | Provides allowance for higher production rates (from visitor bonus) to reduce failures. |
|---|---|
| How to tile: | Planning, planning, planning. Same thing as offset clone rows with more spacing inbetween each "pair" of clones. |
 |
Cliff Cloning (multi-species)
| Uses: | Cloning 2 or more species of flowers. |
|---|---|
| Strengths: | 0% failure rate. Good with 5v bonus! |
| Weaknesses: | You have to deal with cliffs bro. |
| How to tile: | Ensure there's 2 empty spaces between each "pair" of clones. |
 |
Testing Layouts
Testing layouts are used for Folklore/Paleh blue rose methods.
In the aforementioned blue rose methods, we will need to tell whether an unknown purple rose 𝑥 [0?20] is a purple rose α [0020] or purple rose β [0120]. We do this by breeding purple rose 𝑥 with a seed yellow rose [0200]. If purple rose 𝑥 successfully produces a yellow rose [0210] with seed yellow rose [0200], we can deduce that it is purple rose β [0120].
I can't actually think of another scenario where testing layouts are necessary, as typically it is faster to use more direct flower paths (testing can be a big bottleneck). If there is a genotype you want to test, you can play around with flower simulator to see if there's an appropriate pairing.
1+1 Testing
| How to use: | A simple isolated pairs testing layout. Read explanation on testing layouts first. |
|---|---|
| How to tile: (IMPORTANT!) | With regular isolated pairs, we can put the pairs next to each other with 1 empty space in between. However, if we do this with testing pairs, you will be unable to tell which purple rose 𝑥 pair the offspring is from. Make sure you double space each 1+1 testing pair so you will be able to know the parents of the offspring! |
 |
2+1 testing
| How to use: | 2 seed yellows surrounding 1 purple rose 𝑥. There is only one available spot for an offspring to spawn. All other surrounding tiles are blocked (e.g. with hard paths, fencing, etc.). |
|---|---|
| Explanation: | 2+1 layouts are great testing layouts because there is only 1 tile for an offspring to spawn on. All other tiles are blocked off. Following the reproduction algorithm, ideally one purple/yellow pair will breed. The third would clone, but have no space to clone onto and therefore fail. But why do we need a third flower (2 yellow) roses anyways? Following the reproduction algorithm, each flower has one opportunity to "roll" for breeding every day. Adding a 3rd flower improves likelihood to make an offspring if the first 2 flowers fail! Thus, this is our most recommended testing layout. We want to speed up the testing process as much as possible so we can get a blue rose faster! |
2+1 cliff testing
| How to use: | Read 2+1 testing above, but involves cliffs for more space efficiency. Leave the middle tile lowered but blocked so you can walk between the upper and lower section easier (for watering). You can hop across the top section~ |
|---|
Super Advanced Testing Layouts
Extra testing layouts for super nerdy garden scientists!
Credits:
- Guide: @yuecrossing
- Dataminers: @aiterusawato, Paleh#2526, @_Ninji
- Layouts research & analysis: Chomp#2418, Catobat#4610, PCVXD#1272, J_MASTER (@GigaRoboid), BackwardsN#7201, @AeonSake, @nubleh, Rataime#2586, HannahK#6377, Landers#9431, @yuecrossing.
- Flowchart: Ragzilla (ragzilla#0001), @yuecrossing
References:
- J_MASTER's Space-Efficient Layouts Guide (@GigaRoboid)
- J_MASTER's turtle/super-turtle/hexhole research (@GigaRoboid)
- Peach's Flower Layouts and Placements Guide (@PeachNKey)
Tools:
- Aeon's Flower Simulator (@AeonSake)
- Nubleh's Flower Planner (@nubleh)
