MMoexp: Navigating Grow a Garden’s Latest Event

Grow a Garden has just dropped one of its biggest updates yet, introducing the new seed stages system alongside the launch of the Season 1 pass. For a game that thrives on farming loops, resource management, and progression, this update has already sparked plenty of discussion across Discord and Grow a Garden Items. Some players love the fresh mechanics, while others are frustrated by the confusing execution and a handful of bugs that make the grind feel rough.

If you’ve logged in since the update and felt lost about how to farm efficiently, don’t worry—you’re not alone. This article will break down exactly how the seed stages work, what’s worth grinding, which EVO seeds to focus on, and whether the Season 1 pass is worth your time or money.

First Impressions: A Confusing Start

When the seed stages update was first revealed, most players expected to manage their seeds directly—upgrading them themselves, tweaking stats, and building powerful plants through hands-on progression. Instead, the system turned out to be a little different.

Rather than direct upgrades, the process revolves around buying special EVO seeds, planting them, and then evolving them by returning to Samuel, the new NPC at the center of town. This loop—plant, grow, evolve, collect reward—forms the core of the event.

It sounds simple, but here’s where things get tricky: EVO seeds aren’t always in stock, growth mechanics don’t work as intuitively as expected, and some features like gear boosts seem bugged or unfinished. Let’s break it down.

Step 1: Acquiring EVO Seeds

Samuel, better known as “buff Samuel” among the community, is the key NPC for the event. At his shop, you’ll find four EVO seeds available:

Evo Beetroot

Evo Blueberry

Evo Pumpkin

Evo Mushroom

In theory, you want to collect all of them, since holding more EVO seeds means more rewards as you cycle through planting and evolving. However, there’s a catch—the shop rotates, and only the first two seeds tend to appear regularly. Blueberry and Pumpkin, for example, can be rare, leaving players waiting for restocks.

This slow rotation is one of the reasons many players feel the event drags. You simply can’t buy everything at once, forcing patience and planning if you want to complete all evolutions.

Step 2: Growing EVO Plants

Once you’ve purchased your EVO seeds, the real grind begins—growing them in your garden. The system has some quirks worth knowing:

Watering Cans Are King

From testing, watering cans are the only reliable way to boost growth speed. Sprinklers, often a favorite for passive farming, don’t appear to affect EVO plants at all. Pets like the triceratops occasionally help, but their contribution is inconsistent at best.

Because of this, you’ll burn through watering cans at an alarming rate. Players with large reserves are thriving, while those with fewer cans find the event frustratingly slow. Managing your stockpile carefully is crucial.

Gear Boosts Don’t Work (For Now)

Samuel’s help text claims that submitting gears should accelerate growth, but currently, this mechanic appears broken. Harvesting gear disappears when used without providing a boost, making it essentially a waste of resources.

If fixed, gears could become a valuable alternative to cans. For now, however, consider them off the table.

Tending Plants and EVO 4s

You can also use higher-level EVO plants to tend others, granting small growth multipliers. For example, submitting an EVO 4 beetroot to tend a blueberry might bump the multiplier slightly. Unfortunately, plant size doesn’t matter, and only one mutation ever carries over. That makes tending less rewarding than expected.

Step 3: Evolving for Rewards

Once grown, plants can be evolved by bringing them back to Samuel. Rewards scale as you climb EVO stages, though early rewards are unimpressive. Stage one, for example, offers little more than filler items. The real grind comes from pushing plants into higher evolutions where rare drops like eggs become available.

The cycle is straightforward:

Plant the EVO seed.

Speed growth with watering cans.

Harvest and return to Samuel.

Evolve the seed into its next stage.

Repeat.

At each stage, you’ll get the same seed back, just at the next evolution level, making it a loop designed for persistence.

The Best Seed for Farming

After extensive testing, one clear winner has emerged for farming: Evo Beetroot.

Why?

It grows faster than other seeds.

It’s stocked more consistently at Samuel’s shop.

It requires fewer watering cans overall.

If your goal is grinding rewards like the tiger/jungle egg, beetroot is the most efficient path. The other seeds can still be useful, but their slower growth and rarer availability make them less reliable.

EVO 4 Plants: Pretty but Pointless

While EVO 3 plants remain valuable since they can be submitted for rewards, EVO 4s are largely disappointing. They can’t be evolved further, don’t grant direct rewards, and only serve minor roles in tending.

Unless you’re collecting them for aesthetics in your garden, there’s little reason to push your seeds all the way to EVO 4. Many players expected them to unlock EVO 5 or yield unique rewards, but for now, they’re more of a novelty.

The Shekele Cap Problem

One of the most controversial aspects of the update is the hard sell cap of 1 trillion shekels per plant.

No matter how massive your plant grows, how many hours you invest, or how carefully you breed mutations, you’ll never sell for more than this cap. This has effectively killed the high-value plant market, making massive plants feel less rewarding than before.

For players who enjoyed pushing limits for economic gain, this change is particularly disappointing.

Mutations: Underwhelming and Confusing

Mutations promised to add variety and complexity to the event. Unfortunately, their implementation feels lackluster:

Only one mutation carries over when tending.

Mutations don’t affect the rewards when evolving plants.

Grinding for multiple mutations is essentially wasted effort.

As it stands, mutations don’t justify the time investment, leaving many players frustrated with their limited impact.

The Season 1 Pass

Alongside the seed stages update, Grow a Garden also launched its first season pass. Like in many modern games, it offers both free and premium tracks, each with tiered rewards.

Community Reception

Reception has been mixed. Some players argue the pass feels overpriced given the rewards, while others see it as a fair balance since most rewards aren’t game-breaking.

The Firefly companion is the standout item, and it’s available to both free-to-play and premium players at level 25. This balance has been praised, as it avoids a strict pay-to-win feel.

Other rewards, such as Mizuchi, were hyped as powerful but turned out to be more average in practice.

Is It Worth Buying?

If you’re the type of player who wants every cosmetic, pet, or resource boost, the pass may be worth it. For more casual players, the free track already offers enough to keep things fun without spending.

Ultimately, the value depends on how invested you are in long-term grinding.

Farming Tips for the Event

To recap and optimize your grind, here are the top strategies:

Prioritize Evo Beetroot. It grows faster and appears more often, saving you time and watering cans.

Stockpile watering cans. Sprinklers don’t work, and pets aren’t reliable. Cans are essential.

Ignore EVO 4 plants. They don’t offer much beyond looks. Focus on EVO 3 for rewards.

Don’t bother with size grinding. Bigger plants don’t give better tending bonuses.

Forget mutations (for now). Only one carries over, and they don’t impact rewards.

AFK farming works. Pair beetroot planting with an AFK pet shop grind for jungle egg restocks.

Bugs and Issues

While the system works in theory, several bugs drag down the experience:

Gears disappearing without effect.

Pets ignoring EVO plants.

Tending multipliers not scaling logically with plant size.

Mutations offering little benefit.

These problems make the event feel unfinished, and many players hope part two of the event will address them.

Final Thoughts

The Grow a Garden seed stages update is ambitious but messy. On one hand, it introduces a new progression system, rewards grinding, and keeps players engaged through evolving cycles of cheap Grow a Garden Items. On the other hand, bugs, confusing mechanics, and disappointing caps make it less satisfying than it could be.

Still, there are highlights—like the Firefly companion, the chase for the jungle egg, and the strategy around choosing the right EVO seeds. If the developers iron out the issues, seed stages could become a fun recurring event system.

For now, the best advice is to keep grinding beetroot, save your watering cans, and don’t stress too much over EVO 4s or mutations. With patience, you’ll still be able to snag the event’s biggest rewards.

And who knows? If part two of the event smooths things out, we may look back on this rocky start as just the beginning of something much better.