Doloc Town Fish Tanks and Breeding

Wild casts feed tonight’s dinner. Breeding is how Doloc Town turns fish into a factory: tanks, feed, oxygen, hatcheries, and variant recipes that fill the Abundant Collection achievement. If Fishing is the rod page, this is the Animal-tree aquaculture page. The Harvest Fusion era added fish farming; 1.0 (August 5, 2026) and patch 1.00.03 tuned drying for new variants. 1.00.04 then sped Sturgeon incubation and growth, slowed Dumbo Octopus, and aligned the rarest fish of each season.

You cannot breed what you never caught. Keep a brood pair in a chest before you sell a “useless” Carp. Doloc Town is single-player — tanks do not sync with anyone else’s save.

Unlock path (Animal tree)

The Animal branch stays locked until Kenenimuu’s tutorial after you build a Small Barn and report back. Then spend Nurturing Animals points in this order of intent, not vanity:

Tech	Why it matters
Animal Basics	Feeding trough — livestock and fish both eat
Aquaculture Basics	Fish Tank
Auto Feeding	Fish food holder — stops daily pellet chores
Premium Feed	Feed press
Oxygen / Hatchery line	Fish Hatchery after workshop + premium feed
Aquaculture Mastery	Electric arrays, Fishy Generator
Self-sufficiency / Fish Power	Late power from fish

Exact point costs live on the Tech tree page and in the node catalog on doloctowndb.wiki. A node with several parents needs one parent, but you pay every listed point type.

Video guide

Tanks, feed, and power

Standard feed: kelp + shrimp loops at a crafting station. Premium feed: wheat loops on the advanced station. Overstocking a tank slows growth the same way overstocking a pond does — match brood count to the UI size (community layouts talk about 3-slot small arrays and 6-slot medium logistics tanks).

Electric aquariums drop manual feeding if your automation grid can carry them. If drones already idle (a 1.00.03 known issue), do not add a hungry hatchery on the same failing circuit. Indoor tanks want power; outdoor ponds want weather protection so acid does not eat pumps.

Patch 1.00.03 added drying support for newly introduced fish variants. If a 1.0 catch sat in a chest unable to dry, update the client and run the Life-tree rack again before you assume the fish is vendor trash.

Variant thinking (verify in your journal)

Community breeding arrays change between patches. Treat the following as planning patterns, then confirm in the tank tooltip:

• Carp schools can climb toward Koi in small arrays; Koi arrays are famous for bus ticket side products in player notes.
• Cod lines can throw Crimson Cod. Catfish + sardine mixes are used for Blackfin style variants.
• Predator mixes (wolf fish / pike) are how players talk about Terrorfish; Terrorfish roe feeds high-tier caviar — but do not caviar a sturgeon if raw sturgeon sells higher.
• “Trash” fish are not jokes: chameleon and grass carp loops can print bottles, fiber, or bags. The doloctowndb.wiki fish catalog keeps garbage on purpose.

Golden Fish still start in the Deep Forest pond with a better rod — you breed from a catch, you do not will a legendary into a starter tank. Smoked Gold Fish → gold ore is a processing trick on the Money page, not a hatchery output.

Abundant Collection and festivals

The Abundant Collection achievement misfired on imported Early Access saves; 1.00.03 repaired the flag. If it still will not pop, finish unique wild catches and tank variants, then reload. Salmon Fest (around month 1 days 25–27 on community calendars) is a wild-catch event, not a substitute for hatcheries — see Festivals.

Cooking still wants dried and smoked fish. Breeding without a drying rack is a chest of rotting value. Tie harvest days to the Daily checklist.

Related pages

• Fishing — rods, Kelp, biomes
• Ranching — barn unlock that opens this tree
• Cooking — caviar, smoked plates
• Achievements — collection trophies
• Community database — 42 fish rows

Put one tank on “food,” one tank on “variant,” and never sell the last parent. The river is RNG. The hatchery is a schedule.