In the 1.5 update for Stardew Valley, two new types of fruit were added to the game: Mangos and Bananas. The latter is necessary for quite a few things, including retrieving a Golden Walnut and building an important building.
While venturing around Ginger Island, it'll become clear that some Bananas are needed for a few things. Here's how to grow them and everything they can be used for.
How To Get Bananas
There are two different ways to obtain Bananas: grow a Banana Tree, or raise Blue Discus in a Fish Pond.
How To Find Banana Trees
The easiest way to grow Bananas is to plant a Banana Tree. That sounds simple enough, but actually obtaining a sapling for the tree is easier said than done, and the tree takes a while to reach maturity and start producing fruit.
Banana Trees can be obtained in a couple of ways.
- The first way is to trade five Dragon Teeth to the Island Trader on Ginger Island
- The second is by cracking open Golden Coconuts.
> Island Trader
To start trading with the Island Trader, their booth needs to be built. After the parrots build the Island Farmhouse, they'll hang around just north of the entrance beach. Paying them 10 Golden Walnuts will unlock the Island Trader. This vendor will trade five Dragon Teeth for a Banana Sapling.
- Dragon Teeth can be foraged in the Volcano Dungeon, mostly near the giant fossilized skeletons that the floors sometimes contain
- They're also dropped by Lava Lurks, which are those lava monsters that poke their heads up and shoot fireballs
- After the Island Resort has been built, the player can access the Pirate Cove on the east side of the island. Stingrays can be caught here, and if placed into a Fish Pond, they'll sometimes produce Dragon Teeth. They can start producing this item after the Fish Pond population reaches nine or ten, and the daily chance of producing it is only 5%, so this isn't the most reliable way to find Dragon Teeth
Once the player obtains the five Dragon Teeth, the Island Trader will swap them for a Banana Sapling.
> Golden Coconuts
The second method for finding Banana Trees is cracking open Golden Coconuts. These fruit work basically the same way as Geodes. Once the player finds them, they can bring them to Clint and he'll crack them open for 25g. Unfortunately, the Geode Crusher can't be used for Golden Coconuts. Each one isn't guaranteed to drop a Banana Sapling, but the chance isn't incredibly low.
Here's every way to find a Golden Coconut:
- Shake palm trees on Ginger Island
- Dig up artifact spots on Ginger Island
- Cultivate Blue Discus in a Fish Pond until the population reaches nine. At this point, they have a small chance to produce a Golden Coconut each day (about 5%)
- Once the player cracks open their first Golden Coconut, the Island Trader will start selling them in exchange for ten regular Coconuts.
After obtaining a Banana Sapling, plant it and wait for it to grow, which takes 28 days. They only produce fruit in the Greenhouse, on the Island Farm, or on the standard farm in Summer.
Blue Discus Ponds
The other way to obtain Bananas is by raising Blue Discus in a Fish Pond. What is it with Ginger Island's fish and these dang Bananas?
Build a Fish Pond by visiting Robin's Carpenter Shop and paying the materials and gold (5,000 gold, 200 Stone, 5 Seaweed, 5 Green Algae), or empty a currently built Fish Pond if necessary.
A Blue Discus can be caught on Ginger Island North (where the Volcano is) and Ginger Island West (where the Farm is) in any freshwater body, like rivers.
After placing the Blue Discus in the Fish Pond, wait for its population to grow to at least four fish (they'll ask for three Taro Roots at population three before the population can increase anymore). At this point, the fish have about a 1% chance to produce a Banana each day. As the population grows, the chance of them producing a Banana does as well. At population nine or ten, they have about a 15% chance to produce a Banana.
What Bananas Are Used For
Surely, all that work finding a Banana is worth it, right? Never fear, because it's worth the effort. Bananas have a few uses, some of which are pretty great. The two most important are building the Island Obelisk and earning three Golden Walnuts.
> The Island Obelisk
By visiting the Wizard's Tower, the player can access his magic book and build special buildings. Some of them are obelisks that teleport the player to various places. Building the Island Obelisk, which warps the user to Ginger Island, requires a few items:
- 10 Bananas
- 10 Iridium Bars
- 10 Dragon Teeth
- 1,000,000 gold
Building this obelisk will save a ton of time, since the player can warp to the island whenever they want and don't have to wait for Willy to take them.
> The Banana Shrine
Finding enough Golden Walnuts to complete everything on Ginger Island is tough, since there are only 120 of them. There's a pretty easy to way to grab three of them, though, so long as the player has started growing Bananas.
Next to Leo's house on Ginger Island is a strange shrine. By offering a Banana to the shrine, a gorilla will appear and grant the player three Golden Walnuts.
> Other Uses
There are a few other uses for Bananas that aren't as vital as the obelisk and Golden Walnuts.
- They can be eaten to restore health and energy like most other crops
- They can be turned into Jelly or Wine
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A Banana can be combined with one Milk and one Sugar to make Banana Pudding
- This dish restores 125 energy and 56 health and grants +1 each to Mining, Luck, and Defense for five minutes and one second
- The recipe is obtained by trading 30 Bone Fragments to the Island Trader
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A Banana can be combined with a bolt of Cloth in a sewing machine to make the Relaxed Fit Pants
- They also count as a yellow item in the dyeing process
- The following villagers like receiving Bananas as gifts (+45 friendship points): Demetrius, Elliott, Harvey, Jodi, Kent, Leah, Linus, Pam, Robin, Sandy, Shane
- The following villagers have a neutral reaction to receiving Bananas as gifts (+20 friendship points): Alex, Caroline, Clint, the Dwarf, Emily, Evelyn, George, Gus, Krobus, Leo, Lewis, Marnie, Maru, Penny, Pierre, Sam, Sebastian, Willy, the Wizard
- Abigail, Haley, Jas, and Vincent dislike Bananas (-20 friendship points)
Stardew Valley is available on PS4, PS Vita, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PC, Android, and iOS.