How to get Sand in Dwarf Fortress
When it’s finally acceptable to tell a citizen to pound sand.
Chris Davenport 
Image via Bay12 Games
Sand is a necessary ingredient in Dwarf Fortress, primarily used for crafting glassworks such as windows and the like. How to find the sand, however, and pick it up for use in extracting, isn’t exactly straightforward. Here’s how to get that sand into stockpiles, so your dwarves can use it for their fortress.
Where to find sand in Dwarf Fortress
Players will be able to identify if their settled area has sand based on the pre-embarkation screen, which lists various snippets of info regarding the selected area, such as the presence of a flux layer or aquifer. On this screen, players will similarly be notified if there is sand in the region — if not, it’s, unfortunately, a matter of attempting trade with the various factions.
Related: How to make a barracks in Dwarf Fortress
How to gather sand in Dwarf Fortress
Players will need the following workshops set up to gather sand, and use it:
- Clothier’s Shop
- Glass Furnace
If you have sand in your settled area, first you’ll need to identify an area where the resource is either in the walls or on the floor. Once done, click the ‘Place Zone’ key, or use ‘Z’ to open the menu, and draw a zone over the sandy areas. Once complete, mark the zone as ‘Sand’ to instruct dwarves to fill bags of sand at the location.
At the Clothier’s Shop, set a task to make cloth bags using fabric. Once this step is complete, select the glass furnace (found in the Furnaces tab of the Workshop sub-menu), and players can then instruct their dwarves to begin collecting bags of sand. Dwarves with item hauling selected in work roles will begin gathering sand, and bringing them to stockpiles for future use in glass blowing and other crafting tasks.
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