How is the Prairie Grass Challenge Meant to Work?

@JuniperWhimsy 

It is so that prairie grass will spawn for the Horses, goats and sheep to eat. You can also harvest it to come in feeders or to use for nectar making and you may find various items in it. How much will spawn depends on available free space on the lot.

@JuniperWhimsy Maybe over time it becomes a problem but generally in my game it's not. I believe it just means some will spawn over add your own. I know I add a bunch of prairie grass to the lots. Clearing the grass gives you items that are helpful money wise if you are doing rags to riches and you can also refill the hay feeder with it to save money too. Doesn't seem a challenge so much as helpful.

I think you might need someone who was in on the development of the challenge to answer you other wise.

@jpkarlsen LOL we were answering at the sametime. Great answer too! Free space makes sense. ♥

Thanks for the replies everyone.  I know what the grass is there for (as in for horses to eat and to find collectibles etc), I just meant really why is it called a Challenge because at most I've seen others only have 3 patches of grass spawn on a lot over time and not more than that (or in my case none at all) which doesn't seem much of a challenge! 

Thank you @flauschtrud for finding out that the challenge should be spawning 10 patches over time, that answers my question and would definitely make it more of a challenge to control.  As you helpfully pointed out here and in your bug report, it would seem harvesting grass off lot seems to interfere with the challenge working which is a shame.  Next time I start a save with the wild prairie grass challenge I will make sure not to touch the neighbourhood grass AT ALL! 😞

@JuniperWhimsy 

It uses the lot challenge system because otherwise they would have had to come up with another means of getting it to grow randomly on the lot

I don't know what the maximum number is on a lot but it is more than ten as a quick count on my 64x64 lot shows 12.

As I wrote it also depends on how much free space there is on the lot. A small lot with buildings that cover most will not have much room for them to spawn.

You can harvest all the wild grass you want. It will have no influence on how much you get on your own lot. There is not really a challenge in it as such but if you think there is too much or a plot you would like to use for something else you can simply uproot it. If there is free room it will later spawn in another place.

Notice that from you turn on this lot challenge it will take several days for the maximum number of grass to spawn with one or two days before the first spawns.

@jpkarlsen the grass that is system spawned (via the challenge) is limited to 10. But you can have more if it is grass that is placed directly via BB. The lot size doesn't play a role, but yes, it can only spawn on spots that are not built on.

And it's just not true that harvesting has no influence. It shouldn't obviously, but I'm not the only person that has problems with it and the bug report already has a bunch of me toos. In my actual playing saves I never had any grass on my lots.

And it could also be a kind of challenge if the grass uglifies your landscaping and you have to uproot it each day 😉 That's how I suppose it should work.

The spawning happens every night at 5pm and you could get (theoretically) 2-3 grass objects per night (if it wasn't bugged).

@flauschtrud 

I have not planted any myself and so far I have counted 14.

Move your Mods folder to the Desktop and delete localthumbcache.package. Then test the game in a new save.
If it works now check for updates to your Mods and CC. Add it back a little at a time while testing until you have found all that are broken.

As I mentioned in the bug report I did test this in a new and unmodded save. You have no idea how much of my time I already spent investigating prairie grass.

@flauschtrud 

I tested this lot myself. The first morning two grasses spawned on the lot and some in the neighborhood. So since it takes an extra day before you can harvest it was not possible to follow the rest of your directions since the lot already had spawned grass. Did you place a lot from the Gallery (you mention a starter) if so did you check if the lot challenge was enabled on it?

Did you remember to delete localthumbcache.package?