plants Are Berry cuttings affected by the soil type they are planted on?

[SapphireX]

From what I have understood, in VS version 1.22+ the new planted berry cuttings/bushes need to be fertilized directly rather than have their soil fertilized like other crops in the game
However, does the type of soil the berry cuttings are planted on have an effect on the plant in the first place?
To rephrase my question just in case, Is there any difference whether I plant my cuttings on Low fertility soil or high fertility soil? 

[williams_482]

The berry bushes will use the nutrients in the soil they are planted on. The better that soil, the less fertilizer they will need to reach the same yields. 

I recommend medium fertility soil: it's plentiful and easy to find but clearly better than low fertility soil. High fertility soil is probably better used for crops, or converted into terra preta (again for use with crops). 

[LadyWYT]

Tagging on to what @williams_482 said, soil fertility doesn't affect how fast the cutting will grow, but will affect its health and care requirements once it matures. Low fertility soil will produce a bush that is struggling; better soils will produce a healthy bush. Getting a bush to the bountiful state, I think, requires terra preta, or high fertility soil treated with potash. As for the nutrient use, bushes will use up the nutrients as they produce crops; the nutrient demand does decrease slowly over time, but those nutrients won't be replenished unless you fertilize the tile.

9 minutes ago, williams_482 said:

High fertility soil is probably better used for crops, or converted into terra preta (again for use with crops). 

Actually, I'm more inclined to say that terra preta is better suited to berry bushes, and high/medium fertility soil better suited for crops. Terra preta is hard to get, but it makes for a very productive bush that won't need quite as much attention. That means you don't need to worry about planting and taking care of as many bushes. In contrast, crop fields are always going to be rather large, so it's going to be difficult to get that much terra preta to cover them all. High/medium fertility soil is much easier to fill a large area with, and crop fields will also replenish their nutrients over time if you let them fallow or rotate crops properly.

The one exception I can think of is a greenhouse--you might want to invest terra preta there if you're trying to grow an exotic crop like pineapple outside of its natural climate.

[MKMoose]

43 minutes ago, SapphireX said:

However, does the type of soil the berry cuttings are planted on have an effect on the plant in the first place?

The soil quality affects the initial nutrient levels of the fruiting bushes, meaning that the plant will start off healthier and will not need fertilizer as quickly to keep it producing. Planting in better soil is essentially equivalent to applying a bit of fertilizer after planting in lower-quality soil. There is no long-term difference besides the visual appearance of the soil.

 

11 minutes ago, LadyWYT said:

Actually, I'm more inclined to say that terra preta is better suited to berry bushes, and high/medium fertility soil better suited for crops.

Using terra preta for berry bushes is a waste of terra preta (or a purely cosmetic choice). The reason is simple: for crops, higher soil fertility has long-term effects, as the nutrient levels passively recover back up to the baseline for the soil tier - for berry bushes, however, the effect is only relevant for the initial nutrient levels, which are much cheaper to boost with a few pieces of fertilizer.

The difference is so large that I've been actually considering opening a bug report - assuming one terra preta costs 8x compost and 4x bone meal (ignoring the HFS and charcoal), it ends up equivalent to a 188% average nutrient level increase. With low fertility soil having 25% starting nutrient levels and needing 60% to bring it up to terra preta's 85%, it turns out that it costs more to plant one bush on terra preta than it costs to plant three bushes on low fertility soil and fertilize them to terra preta's levels, in the optimal scenario. The ratio is even worse for medium fertility soil, which needs 35% to be brought up to terra preta's levels.

Granted, technically the cost is different due to a nutrient imbalance, so normally you'd likely prefer to use more bone meal and some saltpeter or potash (unless you want to cheese the system), but I think it the difference is so large (especially when you don't have HFS and the cost of terra preta becomes effectively doubled) that there is virtually no scenario where terra preta can be considered more cost-effective.