Sunfish

Sunfish is a fish that can be caught in the river in Pelican Town or Cindersap Forest during Spring and Summer when the weather is sunny. It can also be caught on Riverlands Farm, Forest Farm, and Hill-top Farm, and it is available with Magic Bait regardless of season, weather, or time. A pet cat with max friendship may also gift one, and it can sometimes appear in the Traveling Cart or in Garbage Cans during Spring and Summer.

Sunfish is also used as the tutorial catch replacement, meaning it can stand in for ineligible fish or non-fish items when the tutorial catch is generated. One Sunfish is placed in the Community Center Fish Tank after the room is repaired.

Beyond basic fishing, Sunfish has a few useful applications:

• It can be placed in a Fish Pond, where it reproduces daily.
• A Fish Pond starts with a capacity of 3 and can be expanded to 10 by completing two quests.
• The pond’s main product is orange Sunfish Roe.
• At population 10, the pond can also produce Solar Essence.

The Fish Pond quest chain requires relatively simple items:

• Expanding from 3 to 5 fish requires either 2 Acorns or 2 Geodes.
• Expanding from 5 to 10 fish requires either 1 Amethyst or 3 Mixed Seeds.

Fish Pond production is straightforward: at populations below 10, the pond mainly produces roe, with a small chance of nothing each day. At population 10, the pond still mostly produces roe, but it also gains a chance to produce Solar Essence.

Sunfish also has a few other uses outside the pond. It can be used in the Sewing Machine spool to create the dyeable Fish Shirt, and it can serve as an orange dye in the dye pots at Emily’s and Haley’s house. In quests, Sunfish may be requested through the Help Wanted board in Spring or Summer. One Sunfish can be requested for an Item Delivery job, while Demetrius or Willy may request 1 to 5 Sunfish for a Fishing job. Demetrius can also request 10 Sunfish for the Aquatic Overpopulation Special Order during Spring, which rewards gold equal to selling the fish and the Farm Computer recipe.

Because Sunfish is relatively easy to obtain in sunny Spring and Summer weather, it is a convenient early-game fish for filling bundle slots, completing requests, or starting a Fish Pond with a low-effort species.