The Secret Life of Harvest Sprites

We know quite about about Harvest Sprites, from the Sprites in 'Save the Homeland' and 'A Wonderful Life' to the Legendary Sprites of Mineral Town and the 101 Sprites of Forget-Me-Not Valley in Harvest Moon DS and Cute. We know, for example, that every Sprite is unique in his dreams, ambitions and taste, but ALL Sprites will respond positively to a gift of flour. The 101 Sprites of Forget-Me-Not Valley operate in Teams run by Team Leaders who are larger than they and not quite as cute in appearance. Each Team Leader has a very unique personality of his own. Some are friendlier than others. Some can be rather forbidding until you make friends with them.

We know from HM DS and Cute that Sprites are not created in adult form but begin their lives as babies. In fact, there appears to be an orphan Harvest Sprite baby living in the large jar on the left side of the Sprite Company Tree. Baby Sprites love sweets and many of the same dishes that appeal to human babies, but there is one significant difference: Baby Sprites have magical powers! When you have given 255 gifts to the Baby, he will offer to grant little wishes.

Harvest Sprites are addicted to catalogue shopping evidently and the items that they buy are extravagantly expensive and completely impractical. We know this from watching the Harvest Sprite Outlet on television. Sprites do not use Gold as currency. They have their own currency of Korobos... Human beings never will be able to acquire a single Korobo, no matter how friendly you have become with your local Sprite population.

Catalogue shopping is nothing new for Harvest Sprites. They have been shopping in this fashion for hundreds of years. You could watch the channel in 'A Wonderful Life', wishing sometimes that you could buy one of the preposterous items being offered there. 'Shocking, dismaying catalogue living' appeals to the Sprite mentality...

Harvest Sprites can be extremely lazy or very industrious, depending on their level of training and level of friendship with you. The Legendary Sprites could become adept at every type of farm activity, but the Forget-Me-Not Valley 101 Sprites are very specific in career choice and apart from some situations, will not work outside their area of expertise. There are Sprites outside the official Watering Team who will water your fields, for example, but that is one of the exceptions to the general rule.

What is the Secret Life of Harvest Sprites then? We know where some of them live, but we do not know HOW they live. Do they have wives?

Well, apparently, there are Sprites who marry and even share the human tradition of the Blue Feather in terms of Marriage Proposals.

Show the Blue Feather to Yacht and he will tell you: 'I hope some one special will give one to me someday.'

Sprites do not accept the Blue Feather from humans, however, so it must be another Harvest Sprite that offers it traditionally. If you attempt to show the Blue Feather to Rod, he will exclaim: 'You're giving it to me? Freya, you know I can't marry you. I can't take it. Freya, I understand what you're trying to say. Thank you!'

Perhaps the tradition of the Blue Feather is a fairly recent one for Harvest Sprites, as in 'A Wonderful Life', the three Sprites simply fought over it as a pretty trinket, without ever mentioning any potential use for them in terms of marriage...

Another aspect of Sprite life is television in general. Some Harvest Sprites in the Valley proclaim themselves addicted to regular weekly programmes... So there may be a few 'couch potatoes' among the Harvest Sprite population.