How To Get Water In Sons of the Forest?

Don't forget to stay hydrated in Sons of the Forest!

Besides the ruthless cannibals running around the forest, you must also be wary of your Thirst and Hunger levels. Like most survival games, Sons of the Forest has you constantly focusing on your resource management, like water, food, and sleep, making sure that you’re rested, fed up, and, most importantly, hydrated.

Key Takeaways
  • There are four main methods of getting water in Sons of the Forest.
  • Most of these methods are centered around the Forest biome, so it’s better to set up your base in that location for convenience’s sake.
  • The most common and efficient way of getting water is by drinking it from rivers and lakes.
  • You can also try specific consumables that rejuvenate your Thirst meter to a certain extent, such as eating Yarrow Flowers and Salmonella berries.
  • Additionally, you can find Energy Drinks from briefcases and abandoned camps that replenish a large chunk of your Thirst and Rest meter.
  • Lastly, you can craft a few personal water-carrying pouches like a Flask or Water Collector to store water.

Sources For Getting Water In Sons Of The Forest

Your Thirst meter drains much faster than your Hunger meter in Sons of the Forest. This means you’ll often find yourself ditching your ongoing expedition to quench your thirst instead. As such, it’s more important to have a steady supply of water than a source of food to maintain your stamina. 

Lakes And Rivers

This is probably the easiest and most abundant way to get water in Sons of the Forest. Lakes and rivers are usually found in the forest biomes towards the edges of the map. Since most of them usually converge to the ocean at the map’s far edge, you’ll find most of them near that area.

River Streams Sons of the Forest
River Stream in the forest (Screenshot Grab: eXputer)

Once you spot a lake or river, simply crouch down while in the stream, and you’ll see a prompt of a droplet that’ll let you drink the clean water. Make sure that you don’t have anything equipped on-hand, or otherwise, the prompt won’t appear. Taking one sip from the stream restores half of your Thirst meter and a decent chunk of your stamina bar.

Drinking water prompt sons of the forest
Use the ‘E’ key to drink water from lakes and rivers (Screenshot by eXputer)

You can find these narrow bodies of water by opening up your GPS and looking for blue lines on the map which indicate the streams. If you can’t immediately find a stream by opening your GPS, you can zoom it out by pressing the middle click on your mouse for a broader field of view.

GPS river locations Sons of the forest
River locations on a GPS (Image Credit Copyright: eXputer)

However, it’s worth mentioning that you might come across frozen lakes and streams if you’re near the mountainous biome at the center of the map or during the winter season when it’s freezing cold. In that case, you need to move down to warmer areas if you want to stay hydrated.

Important: It’s worth noting that you can’t drink saltwater/seawater found on the shorelines.

Plants And Herbs

If you don’t find any streams nearby and want a quick boost in stamina and hydration, you could use Yarrows as a source, too. They’re usually found in groups in dense parts of the forest near river streams, and eating 1 of these white flowers restores 5% of your Thirst and Hunger meter.

Yarrow plants Sons of the Forest
Yarrow Flowers (Image Source: eXputer)

Since you can find them in groups, find and store as many as you can to completely brim your inventory for future-proofing. Additionally, you can also find Yarrow seeds in these groups, which you can use to make more Yarrow Plants with farming tools.

As an alternative, you can also eat Salmonella berries as a source of food and water. You can abundantly find them in the forest and lakeside. However, these berries are much less effective than yarrow flowers and only add a smidgen of nutrition. Therefore, only use them as a last resort for hydration and try to reserve them for crafting purposes.

Salmonella berries Sons of the Forest
Salmonella Berries (Screenshot Captured by eXputer)

Energy Drinks

Energy Drinks are another type of consumable focused on replenishing thirst in Sons of the Forest. These purple-packaged drinks give you a tremendous boost in both your Rest and Thirst meter, even more than both a Yarrow flower and Salmonella berry combined! So, if you have one and are on the edge of your last meters, don’t hesitate to pop open a can.

Energy Drink Sons of the Forest
Drinking an Energy Drink (Image Credits: eXputer)

Unfortunately, these are a lot rarer and more difficult to come by. You can usually hog one or two from either an abandoned camp or tent or from briefcases found next to a corpse. Other than that, there’s also a good chance that you’ll find a few cans in one of the caves highlighted on your GPS.

Collecting Water From Rain

This is a much better long-term method to make sure you have a constant source of water. You can collect water from rain in a Water Collector or from a stream in a Flask and use it right away. You can also store it for later use. This is an extremely convenient approach since you’ll have water in your back pocket rather than going to search for it every now and then.

Water Collector

A Water Collector is an excellent source for water reservation as it directly stores water during rainy occasions. To make one, you first need to collect turtle shells from large Sea Turtles. These Sea Turtles are exclusive to the game’s beaches at the edge of the map.

beach locations forest 2
Beaches in Sons Of The Forest (Image from eXputer)
Important: Sea Turtles are not the same as regular turtles which are smaller, found on the mainland, and only give you meat with no turtle shell.

Once you’ve found your turtle shell as your Water Collector, simply place it wherever you like and watch it fill up when you experience even a mild amount of rain.

Flask

A flask is another similar item that you can use to carry water around. To do this, you first need to find a 3D printer in Sons of the Forest, which you’ll find in a room inside one of the game’s caves. You can find this specific cave’s entrance next to an abandoned vehicle by the river stream. It’s also highlighted with a green pulsing bullseye on the map, so you can find it via GPS.

Cave Entrance location Sons of the Forest
Cave Entrance location on the GPS (Image Credits: eXputer)
  1. Once you’ve entered the cave, go down the hallway and enter a room where you’ll find the printer next to a monitor.
  2. Now, use the monitor to cycle through different craftables until you find and select the Flask by pressing the ‘E’ key.
  3. After you’ve selected the Flask, wait for some time, and it’ll be ready to collect from the printer once it’s fully made.
Making a Flask Sons of the Forest
Making a Flask with the 3D Printer for 100 Resin Ink (Screenshot Grab: eXputer)
Important: You can make several 3D-modeled items from the 3D printer; however, printing them out requires Resin Ink which is extremely rare. Fortunately, the printer will already have enough Resin Ink for your first few prints.

You can fill up the Flask from the river right outside the cave as your initial test. You can access and drink from it anytime via the inventory using the ‘I’ key. The amount of water left in the Flask is indicated by the blue bar beneath it, so you’re always aware of how much supply is left. You can take up to 5 sips from the Flask.

Flask's blue indicator bar in inventory
Flask’s blue bar for remaining water (Screenshot Grab: eXputer)

How Do I Know When I’m Thirsty?

Your Thirst level depletes the most when you’re taking a nap or running. This effectively lowers your overall stamina, causing you to run out of breath much faster. When this level becomes alarmingly low, a notification will pop up telling you you’re thirsty, which is when you should begin searching for water.

To further help with in-game progression, here’s our Sons of the Forest Keycard locations guide for getting crucial key items. If you instead want to know more about making the game more convenient, consider reading our guide on How To Quick Select in Sons of the Forest. Besides that, check out our Sons of the Forest review for a detailed insight into the game’s pros and cons.

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Moiz Banoori is the brains behind eXputer. Having worked at various Video Game sites, with 8 years of Content Writing Experience and a Journalism Degree at hand, he presently monitors teams, creates strategies, and publishes qualified pieces through his aptitude at eXputer. Feel free to get in touch with him through his gaming profile on Steam and PSN.

Experience: 8+ Years || Manages Teams, Creates Strategies, and Publishes Guides on eXputer || Education: Bachelors in Journalism.

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