The Best Ars Nouveau Source Farm in ATM9 & ATM10

Looking for the most efficient Ars Nouveau source farm in All the Mods 9 (ATM9) and All the Mods 10 (ATM10)? This guide walks you through building a compact, early-game cactus source farm using an Agronomic Source Link, SNAD, Omni-directional Hoppers, and Item Trash Cans. It’s beginner-friendly, server-safe, and generates source at a phenomenal rate — with minimal overflow when set up correctly.

Materials You Will Need

Before you start building, gather the following items. Everything here is achievable in the early game:

8x Item Trash Cans — simple to craft

8x Omni-directional Hoppers — require a small amount of compressed iron from Pneumatic Craft

1x Agronomic Source Link — this is what generates your Ars Nouveau source

Cactus — enough to place on each piece of SNAD

16x Sand — crafted into SNAD (2 sand together = 1 SNAD)

Dirt or any solid block — used as a temporary ceiling during construction

What is SNAD? SNAD is crafted by combining 2 sand blocks together. Cactus grows significantly faster on SNAD than on regular sand, making it the key ingredient for maximising your source generation speed.

Step-by-Step Build Guide

Step 1 — Place the Agronomic Source Link

Choose your farm location and place the Agronomic Source Link flat on the floor. This block will sit in the centre of your build and is responsible for converting nearby plant growth into Ars Nouveau source.

Step 2 — Lay Down the SNAD

Surround the Agronomic Source Link with SNAD. Place 4 pieces on the corners and 3 pieces along each side, forming a ring pattern around the central source link. This layout gives you the maximum number of cactus growth points while keeping the build compact.

Tip: You can reduce the amount of SNAD you use if you want a smaller, lighter farm. The middle and outer positions are optional — even a reduced setup will generate source very quickly due to how fast SNAD grows cactus.

Step 3 — Build a Temporary Dirt Ceiling

Build a temporary ceiling out of dirt (or any block) at a height of 4 blocks above the SNAD. Make sure the ceiling covers all of your SNAD positions. This ceiling is only temporary — its purpose is to give you a surface to stand on while placing the Omni-directional Hoppers in the correct upward-facing direction.

Step 4 — Place the Omni-directional Hoppers Facing Upward

Stand on top of each piece of SNAD, look upward, and shift-click to place each Omni-directional Hopper so that it faces upward. Repeat this process for every piece of SNAD in your layout. The upward-facing orientation is critical — this is what allows the hoppers to collect cactus as it breaks off above them.

Step 5 — Add the Cactus-Breaking Ceiling Layer

On the second height layer of your ceiling, place dirt blocks in the gaps between your SNAD positions. The goal is to create a staggered ceiling so that when cactus grows upward, it collides with these blocks and breaks off. A minimalist approach only requires 6 dirt blocks placed in the inner gaps to cover all SNAD positions — eyeball the layout to make sure every cactus column has a block above it to trigger the break.

Step 6 — Remove the Temporary Ceiling

Before placing your cactus, remove the temporary dirt ceiling you built in Step 3. This is recommended to give yourself better access and visibility. The cactus-breaking layer from Step 5 remains in place.

Step 7 — Place the Item Trash Cans on Top of the Hoppers

Stand on the dirt blocks from your breaking layer and shift-click an Item Trash Can on top of each Omni-directional Hopper. This creates a direct disposal chain: cactus breaks → falls into the upward-facing hopper → gets sent straight into the trash can above. No pipes required for this setup.

If you want to collect thousands of cactus instead of discarding it, you can use pipes here instead — however, note that pipes without upgrades may not extract fast enough to keep up with the growth rate of this farm.

Step 8 — Place Your Cactus on the SNAD

Finally, place a cactus on top of each piece of SNAD. Thanks to SNAD’s accelerated growth speed, the cactus will shoot up almost immediately, hit the ceiling blocks, break, drop into the upward-facing hopper, and get voided by the trash can — all in a continuous, automatic loop.

You will see the Agronomic Source Link begin filling with source at an extremely fast rate almost immediately.

Handling Overflow — Optional Fix

There is a small amount of cactus that may occasionally drop onto the floor around the edges of the farm rather than landing cleanly in the hoppers. To handle this overflow cleanly, place standard vanilla Minecraft hoppers around the perimeter of the farm on the floor level. Connect these perimeter hoppers to a pipe network that feeds into one or more additional Trash Cans positioned underneath. You do not need a separate trash can under every perimeter hopper — a shared pipe network feeding into a single trash can per side should be sufficient.

Suggested perimeter hopper positions: one on each outer edge and one on each corner — approximately 6 hoppers total should cover the overflow adequately.

Completed Farm — What to Expect

Once the farm is fully running, your Agronomic Source Link will receive a continuous and massive stream of source. The Omni-directional Hoppers will remain nearly empty as cactus is collected and voided almost as fast as it breaks. This is one of the most efficient and resource-light source farms available in both ATM9 (All the Mods 9) and ATM10 (All the Mods 10).

Summary

This Ars Nouveau source farm uses a simple loop: SNAD grows cactus rapidly → cactus breaks on ceiling blocks → Omni-directional Hoppers collect the drops → Item Trash Cans void them. The Agronomic Source Link sits in the centre and converts all that plant activity into a constant flood of Ars Nouveau source. With only 8 Omni-directional Hoppers, 8 Trash Cans, some SNAD, cactus, and an Agronomic Source Link, this is an incredibly powerful farm for how early in the game you can build it. Add a few vanilla hoppers around the perimeter to eliminate any minor overflow and you have a clean, server-friendly, maintenance-free source generator.

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