Most players recommend just making Terra Preta. But if somebody wanted to reliably find high fertile soil . . .

[Shotai]

Then what tactic are you using, and how reliable is it? Share with us the secrets of ye who has found high fertile soil, or forever be skunked by the stench of davey jones locker; yarghhhhhh!

[hstone32]

I look for wetland areas with lots of small ponds. I sometimes find some at the pond-bottoms. If the body of water is too large, it becomes too much of a hassle to search.

[LadyWYT]

I keep an eye out for the really dark dirt...that's about it. I've also noticed that it tends to occur more frequently in areas with frequent rainfall.

[Shotai]

51 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

I keep an eye out for the really dark dirt...that's about it. I've also noticed that it tends to occur more frequently in areas with frequent rainfall.

I went to an area in which it rained pretty much everyday. Dug up so much dirt, couldn't find a singular tile haha

[Krougal]

I seem to find it mostly in rainy grasslands. It can be at any altitude.

I haven't had any luck finding it in swamps or forests.

 

[Michael Gates]

I don't bother with terra preta at all, but I'll dig up hifert if I run into it. It's cosmetic farmland!

[Moltrey]

One area I have found Terra Preta is next to a ruined stone hut that has a stone fenced "garden" area. I discovered it quite by accident while clearing away surface low fertility soil- underneath was a sizeable amount of TP. The garden was about 8x16 and I probably found 20 or so blocks of TP. Caveat, this was with the Better Ruins mod enabled, so, I have to believe it was part of that and not vanilla.

Edited August 8, 2025 by Moltrey

[Zane Mordien]

7 hours ago, Moltrey said:

One area I have found Terra Preta is next to a ruined stone hut that has a stone fenced "garden" area. I discovered it quite by accident while clearing away surface low fertility soil- underneath was a sizeable amount of TP. The garden was about 8x16 and I probably found 20 or so blocks of TP. Caveat, this was with the Better Ruins mod enabled, so, I have to believe it was part of that and not vanilla.

There is one ruin in vanilla that has TP and it is sort of like that. There is a ruined stone building on a raised bit of land with gardens around it with cobble around beds of it. 

Edited August 9, 2025 by Zane Mordien

[Krougal]

Is TP still findable in the vanilla game since it was made craftable?

 

[Thorfinn]

No, not that I know of, @Krougal. Now it's High Fertility Soil. Which you upgrade to TP. There are mods that still have TP, at least last time I played with them enabled.

[Krougal]

21 minutes ago, Thorfinn said:

No, not that I know of, @Krougal. Now it's High Fertility Soil. Which you upgrade to TP. There are mods that still have TP, at least last time I played with them enabled.

Yeah, that's what I thought. I don't recall seeing any naturally occurring TP for a few versions.

[LadyWYT]

4 hours ago, Krougal said:

Is TP still findable in the vanilla game since it was made craftable?

 

I think it might be, but it's very rare. As @Moltrey and @Zane Mordien both already mentioned, there is a certain ruin type that it can spawn in, that looks like a little raised garden bed with a broken path, or something to that effect. That being said, the rare times I saw it spawn in that ruin, it was only a couple of blocks, and the similar ruins I've seen of late have not had any to find. So it may still spawn, but be a very rare occurrence, or it may be something that was patched out of the game in a recent version.

[Zane Mordien]

11 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

I think it might be, but it's very rare. As @Moltrey and @Zane Mordien both already mentioned, there is a certain ruin type that it can spawn in, that looks like a little raised garden bed with a broken path, or something to that effect. That being said, the rare times I saw it spawn in that ruin, it was only a couple of blocks, and the similar ruins I've seen of late have not had any to find. So it may still spawn, but be a very rare occurrence, or it may be something that was patched out of the game in a recent version.

It gave me something stupid like 16 blocks, but I've only seen that ruin a couple times over all of my playtime.

[Krougal]

17 minutes ago, Zane Mordien said:

It gave me something stupid like 16 blocks, but I've only seen that ruin a couple times over all of my playtime.

I know I have gotten some in the past, but it was several versions ago, and I've never seen it since.

It also might have been before it was craftable.

Edited August 9, 2025 by Krougal

[williams_482]

I have seen that ruin and picked up (maybe a dozen?) Tera Preta from it in my vanilla 1.20.11 world. 

[MightBeAPotato]

I found high fert soil once while wandering north of my base but my game crashed before I could save the location, and when I checked where I couldn't find it. I've been checking temperate rainy areas for multiple ingame days and genuinely can't find a single block of it.

[MightBeAPotato]

1 hour ago, MightBeAPotato said:

I found high fert soil once while wandering north of my base but my game crashed before I could save the location, and when I checked where I couldn't find it. I've been checking temperate rainy areas for multiple ingame days and genuinely can't find a single block of it.

Of course as soon as I post this I find some. Turned out to be way closer to my base than I expected (around Z -740 if that helps people determine a good temperate area, unless world gen is too different). The deposits are only 1 block deep so I was only able to spot it by the block ui, since the grass is also identical. I was originally digging holes thinking it'd be the layer under.
 

Edited August 14, 2025 by MightBeAPotato