Graveyard Keeper 2 Fertilizer: How to Make Peat and Boosters

Where do you get fertilizer in Graveyard Keeper 2?

Start with Peat. The Compost Pile and Compost Pile II are auto-crafting Farming stations in the Garden: start the Peat recipe and it finishes on its own. Neoseeker’s technology page places the entry point at Fertilizers I (10 green points, Gardening), which grants the Peat recipe, the Crop Boosting Fertilizer I recipe and the Compost Pile build option.

Application is per-plot and pre-growth. Neoseeker’s farming guide states the rule plainly: one application uses one fertilizer item, applied through the plot’s fertilizer slot before growth begins. Plant first and the slot timing is gone for that cycle, so decide the booster before you sow, not after.

Stage	Station	What happens
Peat	Compost Pile / Compost Pile II (Garden, auto-crafter)	Base fertilizer, finishes on its own
Growth elixirs	Laboratory I (Alchemy Lab)	Brewed from exact rune mixes
Booster assembly	Formulation Bench (Alchemy Lab and Writing Basement, 36 recipes)	Headstart, Crop Boosting and Farming Fertilizer lines
Application	Garden plot fertilizer slot, before growth	One item per application

If you are coming from the first game, reset your vocabulary: this game splits the old quality/boost pair into Headstart, Crop Boosting and Farming Fertilizer tiers with different stations. The old names (growth enhancer, quality fertilizer II) describe the previous game’s Church workbench chain, not this one.

Which lab elixirs feed the fertilizer chain?

Four alchemy products feed it, and all four are brewed in Laboratory I from exact rune totals. The mapping below is verified in both the station dataset and the alchemy documentation; the rune column tells you what to mix, the right column tells you what the elixir becomes.

Elixir	Rune mix	Becomes
Weak growth elixir	1 red + 2 green	Headstart Fertilizer I, Farming Fertilizer I
Rich growth elixir	1 red + 3 green	Headstart Fertilizer II, Farming Fertilizer II, Miracle growth elixir
Miracle growth elixir	1 red + 5 green	Farming Fertilizer III
Dream Dust	1 green + 1 blue	Crop Boosting Fertilizer I, Fancy Incense

Two prerequisites gate the whole chain. Every ingredient must be researched once at the Study Table before its runes become visible — the lab refuses unstudied inputs — and every brew consumes Alchemy Flasks plus Fuel. The full rune tables and the 28-formula list live in the alchemy recipes guide, and the research economy is in the tech point farming guide.

Where are the boosters assembled?

At the Formulation Bench, an Anatomy workbench present in both the Alchemy Lab and the Writing Basement with 36 recipes. The dataset confirms it carries Headstart Fertilizer I and II, Crop Boosting Fertilizer I and Farming Fertilizer I; higher Farming Fertilizer tiers follow the elixir ladder above. Exact per-tier inputs vary by build and should be read off the live in-game tooltip rather than copied from a preview — what is stable across sources is the station and the elixir mapping, not the item counts.

That honesty matters because community pages mix the two games freely. A recipe naming the Church workbench, peat plus a named enhancer, or quality fertilizer with roman numerals is the first game’s chain. If the station is not the Formulation Bench, the recipe is not this game’s.

How do you apply fertilizer without wasting it?

One plot, one item, before growth. The fertilizer slot accepts the booster only while the crop has not started growing, and each application consumes exactly one fertilizer item. There is no stacking trick on record for this game: plan which plots earn boosters (seed-multiplication beds first, bulk crops second) rather than spreading Peat everywhere.

The Garden automation layer changes the labour but not the rule. A Gardener Stand with a supplied zombie can tend beds, and the Porter network moves harvests, but the pre-growth slot timing still applies. Staffing and supply are covered in the zombie production line, and the bench catalogue is in the crafting station list.

What does the Bioreactor do?

The Bioreactor is the Factory-side Farming station for zombie labour: the dataset registers it with a single mastery-1 recipe producing Zombie Power, and the technology survey places its unlock at Bioreactor (130 red + 20 blue, Building). It is the breakout search of the launch week with almost no written coverage, which is exactly why this section stays short — the station, the unlock cost and the single output are dataset-verified, and anything beyond that (rates, inputs, power interactions) should be confirmed against the live tooltip before it is written as fact.

Treat it as a factory project, not a garden project: it lives in the Factory branch beside Smithy II and the kitchens, so its materials arrive by conveyor and supplier rather than by hand. The power arithmetic for that branch is in the factory power guide.

FAQ

Where can I get fertilizer early?

Build the Compost Pile and make Peat. It is the only fertilizer with a dedicated auto-crafting station, and it unlocks through the entry-level Fertilizers I technology.

How do I make quality fertilizer?

That name belongs to the first game. In this game, brew Weak or Rich growth elixir in the Laboratory and assemble the matching Headstart or Farming Fertilizer tier at the Formulation Bench.

Where do I use fertilizer?

In the garden plot’s fertilizer slot, before the crop starts growing. One item per application, decided before sowing.

Is the Bioreactor worth rushing?

Only if you run factory zombies: its sole registered output is Zombie Power for the production line. Garden-only players should spend the 130 red + 20 blue elsewhere first.