So, with the recent food drop nerf, I’m a little nervous about being able to maintain my wolves’ stamina, especially when I send them on hunts and mining/fishing. Or the usual campaign grinding. It could be irrational anxiety, maybe it’s not as bad as I think it’ll be, but right now I just don’t know.

But what’s the best way to keep food stores full? Is it farming? Buying food off the mole market? Or is there a new specific area in campaign thats the best for food grinding? I’m leaning on farming for now, but I’d like to hear what everyone else thinks :)

For me it was Fishing and Farming pulling in the most, both of which I do relatively casually. I have hundreds of fish and various crops.

The Campaign is still giving a good amount of food IMO - so far I'm still sticking to feeding from Campaign food first and I have plenty.

After the update I sticked around in exploring and after maybe 30 minutes grinding my food supplies i normally would have used dropped to zero. only 1 wolf and a companion. yes I still have the cooked meat and other stuff I use for cooking but i didn’t want to use it as ”food” it’s my only income for pebbles since I’m not breeding my Wolfs…

so know I’m really curios how this will work to be honest. I don’t Farm as much since it’s too much babysitting and I still have a RL job and responses so for casual players this site of the game is ruined pretty much… fishing is the same problem you have to stare on it for 1 minute to catch around 7-9 fishes. when I farmed corn I get around 5 if im not taking care of it 10 is the max I got I think? Wheat is I think around 5-7 and the max I saw was 17… still not a high supply for a 1h cooldown. For hunting you lose more than you gain especially for the big ones. Cooking only works if you can grind in explore so you need more food to do that and after the drops I encounter I think this is not very profitable to earn food at all anymore…

my conclusion is we have to prioritize what we use our food on. since now it’s limited to us.

I've just been doing campaign grinding and farming (and fishing every once in a while). Despite the nerf, Darkspine's first sword area, The Neck, still provides a good amount of food dropping from the monsters! Mostly food that needs to be cooked, but yes, it's sustainable while farming with one wolf.

Echoing what @Stellori says, “The Neck” is a godsend for fish and meat drops because the Grimalkins drop all kinds of fish very regularly (I assume because they're kitties!) and the Bugs drop cookable…bug bits. Self explanatory there. Add in the fact that they'll drop the opposite type of loot once and a while, and you'll be able to sustain for much longer in between fetching your cooking orders.

I've been explore and hunt grinding. Even with the drop nerfing, I've found that cooked fish and farmed vegetables is a good way to stay afloat. As long as you're only using one wolf and not tabbing through the food discovery events in the campaign, you should be ok.

Then again I only ever WW grind on the second campaign map, which is still pretty bountiful in terms of food drops.

TL;DR: Use one wolf for mining, a different one for fishing, and a different one for campaign (and only one). Rodill are good on mining & fishing wolves for stamina regen. Give Biggs & Tiny their payment so you don't have to babysit your crops, and always have your plots going as much as you can. Fish whenever the activity shows up in the activities bar. Cook everything & always have your cooking pot full. Manual feed will allow you better control over which of your foods your wolves will eat and help you maintain a good balance.

Give Biggs & Tiny their payment, and you don't have to maintain your crops. Once you max Rice seed familiarity, you can average 30+ Rice per plot, every thirty minutes. You can get more if you maintain your crops yourself, I think, but I feel the trade-off is more than worth it. Plus, you can clear that task from your activities bar.

Fishing is also helpful. It takes up 25 energy for each trip, but you only need 2 trips to clear that from your activities bar, even with the first area. I usually only fish if it's on my activities bar anyway, or if I need to replenish my cooking stock. That way, my wolf has a chance to regain their stamina. Giving them a Rodill companion helps, as they will replenish stamina when played with (up to 50 at level 10).

Cooking is probably one of the better things to do. Cooking fish takes them from replenishing 5 stamina to 20 stamina, and fish cook fairly quickly. The higher your cooking level, the faster you can cook and the less likely it is that you'll burn anything. After a certain point, you won't burn anything at all, no matter how complex the recipe. If my cooking stock is low (no fish or even cooked meat), I'll stock up on Pumpkin Pies & Crunchy Rainbow Bug Soup for Biggs & Tiny. That way, I always have some on hand for when I need to pay them to maintain my crops.

My favorite areas to grind are the second area in Darkspine, the third area in Icerun, and the fourth area in Goldsea.

The second area in Darkspine is fairly easy to tackle with even a single level 1 wolf and their level 1 companion, and is a great place to start levelling both. It's also one of the better places to get ingredients for cooking Crunchy Rainbow Bug Soup for Biggs & Tiny. The Folium drop two of the ingredients needed for the soup. And (as has been mentioned) the Grimalkin drop fish. You can also pick up plenty of snails from those scenarios.

The third area in Icerun is great once your wolf and companion are ready to take on the Lapistrix. I find the Lapistrix easier to tackle than other third area mobs, and they drop fish as well. They're also good for getting trinkets, which you can then sell to the vendor to make additional pebbles. Isopod encounters seem to have been moved to third areas in the campaign, which also help you maintain stamina - especially as isopods come in 5, 10, and even 15 stamina regen flavors.

The fourth area in Goldsea is my favorite to grind in, once my wolf and companion can take on the Broch. The boss encounter doesn't happen with enough frequency to deter me, so I don't worry about not being able to solo it. The fish I get from the Broch & fishing that I cook as well as the moths are able to keep me going. I get plenty of trinkets I can sell to the vendor, and wild wolf encounters aren't terrible.

I use one wolf for mining, one for fishing, and one for campaigning. If you equip a Rodill on the mining and fishing wolf, you can decrease the amount of food you need to feed them, as once per hour you can play with the Rodill to replenish stamina. Feeding these three wolves individually can also help you maintain your food stores. I personally like to do 2-3 stamina regen foods of different types (ex - 1 cooked Koi, 1 cooked Salmon, 1 cooked Meat), and the rest in Corn or Rice. My Goldsea grinding wolf will get 4-5 moths and 1 each of a cooked food, and a single Corn or Rice if I still need something.

I have level 30 farming so I can get 600+ stamina worth of food if I only check it every 4 hours (checking more often can get you a lot more since I can't plant multiple high-yield 4 hour crops at once due to compost and water restrictions) so once you've leveled up your farming, it's smooth sailing.

Edit: Just levelled up my walnut familiarity to lv 3 so now I get 800+ stamina worth of food.

It would be kinda rough for newer players though. I'd say they'll have to not worry about speedrunning campaign and just farm the first sword of Darkspine with one wolf and companion until they have their professions levelled up and buy all the food from the Mole Market.