Pet Helpers: Horses, Cats, and Dogs

Besides livestock and poultry, you can care for pet dogs, cats, and a horse on your farm. The horse will live in your livestock barn, but it does not take up any animal spaces. Your pets will need to be fed and interacted with to increase their friendship hearts. They won't become sick or die of old age. You can sell unwanted pets to any of the vendors at the Trade Depot.

Obtaining a Horse

Your first pet will typically be the horse. Exit your Highland Farm area on Spring 15 or later in your first year to bump into Elise riding her white horse, Schneizel. You admit that you don't have a horse, so Elise has a deal for you: bring her 5 Milk and in exchange she'll give you a horse. Luckily you have Hanako the cow that you recently received from your neighbor, Eda.

Starting on the 16th, since Elise specifically tells you not to visit her house on Sundays (which happens to be the 15th), walk into her mansion between 6:00 and 22:00 with the 5 Milk in your bag. The Milk can be any Star Rank. After giving your new pet a name, Sam will deliver the horse to your barn.

If you don't bring the 5 Milk to Elise before Fall 1, she won't have the horse for you anymore. You can still get a horse by buying it directly from Ashe at Silk Country for 10,000 G. You can select a different color of horse once you reach Fall of year 3, but since you can only own one horse, you'll have to sell your existing one before you can buy a new one.

There are four horses available in Story of Seasons:

While you can ride the horse to get around faster than walking, its true benefit is to act as a fast transport. In various spots of the game you'll find Horseback Riding Areas. If you have a horse and you have a Carrot in your bag, you can call the horse and teleport yourself to the area you select from the menu options: your farm, the Trade Depot, in front of the Oak Tree Town guild hall, or the Safari.

Carrots can be purchased in-mass from Otmar at his General Store for 200 G each once you obtain a horse or by Fall 1, whichever occurs first. Using a Carrot is not required if you want to go to the Safari (in case you have zero Carrots for the trip back), but you'll use one for going to any of the other locations.

Obtaining Cats and Dogs

Before you can buy dogs and cats you'll want to build a Pet House. The blueprint for the Pet House is for sale at Silk Country for 3000 G. To build the Pet House you'll need to combine 10 Small Lumber, 15 Lumber, 15 Stone, and 20 Pet Food; you can buy Pet Food from Otmar's General Store for 50 G each.

You can place a Pet House in each area of your farm, so there's a maximum of two Pet Houses on your farm. Each Pet House can hold three dogs/cats each for a maximum of six pets. You CAN place one of your dogs or cats inside of your farm house as a house pet, but the space it occupies continues to exist in the Pet House.

The blueprint for the Pet House is available from the beginning of the game, but you can't purchase your first pet until Summer of year 1. The types of dogs and cats available will unlock as you progress through the years in the game, with 16 total cats and dogs available.

If you plan on keeping one of your cats or dogs inside your farm house, build the Pet Food Dispenser and place it inside your house. This indoor decoration blueprint is for sale at Mistel's Antique Shop once you buy a dog or a cat. It requires 5 Pet Food, 3 Copper, and 2 Ruby to construct. If you don't build and place the Pet Food Dispenser, then your house pet will become stressed and fat.

Cats

The purpose of cats is to collect items for you.

Your cat will have an item for you to collect when you see music notes float above its head. Then just stand next to your cat and press the A Button on your Nintendo 3DS to receive the item. The types of items your cat can retrieve for you are foraged items, fish, building materials, and ore.

As you increase your friendship with your cat, the number of items you can receive will also increase. When your cat has fewer than 3 hearts, it will only find a maximum of one item. When you are between 3 hearts and 6 hearts you might occasionally receive two items. Once your friendship reaches 7 hearts or more, you can receive up to three items per fetch.

You can't really control the items that you receive from a cat. You do need to have at least 4 hearts before your cat will find ore, but even when you have a great relationship with your cat, you can't tell it, "Hey, stop bringing me fish." The quality of items you receive will get better as its friendship increases; for example, once your cat reaches 7 hearts you'll stop receiving Weeds from it.

Dogs

The purpose of dogs is to herd animals for you.

Until you own a dog, you have to manually place your farm animals outside the barns if you want them to spend a day outside in the sunshine. The dogs will do all that work for you! Starting at 6:00, the dogs will run to their assigned barns to herd the animals outside. You can control whether the dogs herds the livestock or the chickens and rabbits by using the Animal Notebook. Find your dog in the list of animals and then press the X Button on your 3DS to select which barn (displayed as "Help") the dog will be responsible for.

When you first get your dog it won't appear to do much at all. You may need to use an Animal Whistle to entice it to do its assigned job. The Animal Whistle is a tool blueprint you can buy from Cabin Country for 1500 G and requires 2 Small Lumber and 1 Iron to craft. Your dog will earn Training Points each time your dog is told to work by using the whistle, either herding or retrieving. The dog will earn +5 herd training points, with a maximum of 1000 training points. You can see the status of the dog's herd training by checking the Training statistic on its Animal Notebook profile. As you raise your dog's Training Points, it will have a greater chance of working on its own without you telling it what to do.

The second factor that determines herding is the dog's friendship hearts. The more hearts your dog has, the greater the number of animals it will herd. Any animals that the dog can't handle will remain inside the animal barns. Each dog can herd a maximum of 16 animals. The larger dogs will herd more animals at lower friendship levels than the smaller puppy dogs; for example, a larger dog can herd 16 animals at 8 friendship hearts while the smaller puppy can herd its maximum 16 animals at 9 friendship hearts.

Fat Cats and Fat Dogs

Pets that are neglected won't become sick, but they will become overweight. Each pet will have a Stress bar on its profile page within the Animal Notebook. As you do things that are negative to your pet (e.g., hitting it with your hammer, ignore it for 3 days, forget to feed it, or put it outside on a stormy day), this orange Stress bar will increase in length. The next day after this orange bar is 80% filled, your pet will become plumper in size.

For dogs, being unhealthy means that it won't herd as many animals. The maximum limit that a fat dog or fat puppy can handle is 12 animals. Cats don't appear to be able to retrieve any items when they are not healthy. For both animals, they cannot run after you while you are leading them with a Leash. Also, being overweight will impact your chances of winning the Pet Promenade on Fall 8.

To restore a cat or dog to a healthy weight, reduce its stress level by taking out for a leash walk, even if it can't keep up with your running pace. Each step the pet takes reduces its stress by 1 point.

The horse cannot become unhealthy or overweight, as it doesn't have a Stress bar.

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