"My quest to hunt down Farfetch'd: Results and information for travelers"

#PokemonGO: Earlier this week I returned from a 15-day trip to Japan and Hong Kong, and my main PoGo goal (other than leveling up during the Eggstravanza event) was capturing two regionals: Corsola and Farfetch'd. I captured about 15 Corsola which was only available at HK. These were readily available and I had no problem running into them. I did anticipate however problems encountering Farfetch'd. It has a reputation of having a very low spawn rate to begin with, but frequency of Gen 1 regionals has been particularly depressed after the launch of Gen 2 (supposedly including Farfetch'd). I have seen only one or two Tauros since then in my own biome. I visited UK and Germany in March and collected four Mr. Mime, but this happens to be a regional with a rather high spawn rate. Meanwhile a number of travelers to Asia have reported their lack of success in obtaining the leek duck (see here and here and here). With a trip to HK and Japan planned, I decided to go all out in searching for Farfetch'd. I stockpiled Incense and lures and researched recommended spawn locations. I had access to at least two networks in both HK and Japan (DoCoMo and Softbank, in the case of the latter). My itinerary was a little convoluted: first I would arrive in Haneda Airport in Tokyo, then commute to Narita Airport in Chiba where I would fly to HK, all on the first day. Then after several days down there I would fly back to Haneda and then spend several days in Tokyo. Then I would take the train to Matsumoto, stay the night, and then spend the next day crossing the Tatayama alpine pass, and then journey to Toyama and Kanazawa. Then I would spend a few days exploring the country, after which I would take the train to Nara where I would stay a few days. Then I would fly back home from Kansai Airport in Osaka. This trip would include visits to urban centers, rural areas, and a total of four different airports. I knew that HK and Japan have local trackers and I considered possibly consulting them if I got desperate, but having the good fortune of catching a Farfetch'd just two minutes after walking off the plane in Haneda on my first day, I never felt the pressure to do so. So my results here represent my success without the use of any third party trackers. These are the results of someone simply running into Farfetch'd by chance. In short, I ended up sighting Farfetch'd 15 times, and was successful in capturing it 10 times. Since my trip was 15 days in length, this was in effect 1 Farfech'd sighting per day, far better than I could have ever anticipated. The table below presents the raw data, documented with screenshots. NumberDateTimeLocationCPIV %Captured?Screenshots14/5/201712:56PMHaneda Airport, Tokyo, Japan40258Yessightings pokedex journal24/5/20173:52PMNarita Airport, Chiba, JapanUnknownUnknownNomap34/5/20174:25PMNarita Airport, Chiba, Japan69338-47Yessightings encounter44/6/20175:39PMHong Kong, HK79538Yesmap encounter54/7/20177:59PMHong Kong, HK15631-38Yesmap encounter64/8/20172:03PMCheung Chau, HK41551Yesmap journal74/9/201712:57PMHong Kong Airport, HKUnknownUnknownNomap84/10/20174:20PMMusashino, Tokyo, Japan20938-40Yesmap94/12/20175:08PMShinjuku train station, Tokyo, Japan70651-62Yesmap encounter104/16/20179:23AMKanazawa, Ishikawa, Japan40616-42Yesmap journal114/16/201711:13AMTsubata, Ishikawa, JapanUnknownUnknownNosightings124/16/20174:20PMTsubata, Ishikawa, JapanUnknownUnknownNosightings134/17/201711:49AMKaga, Ishikawa, JapanUnknownUnknownNomap sightings144/18/20175:31PMNara train station, Nara, Japan10453-58Yesencounter journal154/19/20172:42PMKansai Airport, Osaka, Japan24251Yesmap journal (If the table does not display correctly, please click here) Here are my notes about each sighting and encounter:  1. My first sighting occurred just minutes after landing while I was walking from the airplane to immigration/customs. I caught the shadow of the bird in Sightings and then had the good luck of having Farfetch'd spawn in front of me while I was walking. As mentioned above, this greatly took off of the pressure for the rest of the trip, having already filled the Pokedex entry.2. My second encounter occurred a few hours later at my second airport. This encounter occurred right as I was passing through immigration/customs. I unintentionally pressed the button on my Plus before I saw what it was and I screenshotted the image right as it was buzzing. The Plus buzzed red and the sprite disappared from my screen. However, a "fled" message did not appear in my Journal. This may mean that the Pokemon did not really flee and may still be encountered again.3. I saw a Farfetch'd on Sightings about 15 minutes later. I then scrambled and searched all over for that Farfetch'd (Sightings being less informative than Nearby), though I was no longer able to explore the area on the other side of Immigration, which is where I had the prior encounter. I am a little uncertain whether this was the same spawn that I failed to catch in #2, as I did not screenshot where it lay on the map (I was anxious to just capture it). However, #2 was encountered at 3:52pm and I finally went into the encounter with #3 at 4:25PM, as the screenshots show. This exceeds the usual 30 minutes alloted for spawns, so I consider #3 to be a different Farfetch'd that spawned nearby.4. This encounter was at the Hong Kong Convention Center which I passed on the way to the Hyatt hotel from the TST ferry launch. With the Nearby tracker, I knew at least where to go to find it. This was the highest CP Farfetch'd I found on my trip.5. This spawn popped up on Nearby when I was on the bus returning to my hotel from Happy Valley. Now, if I was by myself, I certainly could have hopped off and went to capture it, but since I was with other people, I felt like I could not do this, so I prayed for a little GPS wander so the Farfetch'd sprite would appear on my screen. At the last moment, right before the bus pulled away with the green light, the Farfetch'd appeared and I promptly captured it.6. This encounter occurred at Cheung Chau while I was walking to the ferry launch from the beach on the other side of the island. Again the Nearby tracker was helpful in telling me where to go.7. I did not see Farfetch'd at HK airport when I arrived, but while I was checking in to my departure flight, I saw one appear on Nearby. I could not go over to get it while I was getting my luggage checked, so I waited patiently until the process was done. But when I finally was able to go over there, it had despawned. Nonetheless, this confirms a third airport where I have seen the regional.8. After a visit to Sublo in Musashino, Tokyo, I went to Inokashira Park to view the sakura (and find a wild Forretress that proved elusive), and that is where I ran into a Farfetch'd when I wasn't even looking at the Nearby; I was hurrying along to a gym at some distance away. I later went to Shibuya that night which was a supposed Farfetch'd hotspot, but I did not encounter one while there.9 A Farfetch'd spawned outside Shinjuku-eki (west exit) as I was hurrying along to go catch a train; it was caught successfully.10 This encounter breaks a dry spell about 4 days in length. I had spent a day with bad signal in the mountains and then had no sightings for my first whole day in Kanazawa. Finally in the morning I saw a Farfetch'd on Sightings when I was in the hotel room. I went out and a block away the leek duck appeared on my screen.11-13. These are sightings of Farfetch'd while I was on the train in Ishikawa prefecture, mostly in rural areas. There was no way I could have captured these but they do count as legitimate sightings.14. I was staying at the hotel at the train station in Nara and a Farfetch'd appeared on Sightings. I was worried I would not catch it since the night before a Snorlax appeared and I searched everywhere for it and could not pinpoint its actual location. I was about to leave the hotel room when a little GPS wander made the Farfetch'd sprite appear, and I promptly caught it. What a relief!15. I was wondering if I would see a Farfetch'd at Kansai airport in Osaka, and sure enough, when I was about to check in, a Farfetch'd spawned next to a PokeStop. I went into the encounter screen, threw a berry, and the network signal degraded. The white ball in the upper left spun and spun until I received a red "ERROR" message. I knew it could pop up again, but I really needed to check in for my flight. After checking in, I walked back to that location to get the bird to spawn again, but my avatar would not budge, no matter how far I walked. I restarted the app and it would not place me in the correct location. By this time I had to leave, so I walked over to where the security line was, and miraculously, the Farfetch'd reappeared, and I was able to finally capture it, completing my collection of ten Farfetch'd. Here are my takeaways from my experience: 1) Without the use of an unauthorized tracker, it is certainly feasible to track down Farfetch'd, but it will help to have app open at all times and scan Sightings and Nearby constantly. I burned about 45+ Incense and about 20 lures on the trip (often using the Incense in the most efficient way possible), hoping to get a Farfetch'd spawn of my own, but I should note that of all the many spawns I received (including Mareep, Dratini, and Phanpy as Incense spawns and a wild Ampharos as a lure spawn), not a single spawn was a Farfetch'd. Zilch. I know regionals do spawn via Incense, as back in November I received a Mr. Mime as an Incense spawn. But the spawn rate for Farfetch'd must be so low, that it is exceedingly unlikely to receive one. Of course, luck also plays a role. It was extremely unlikely I would receive an Ampharos either. I know that others have had success spawning Farfetch'd from Incense on trains in Tokyo. 2) I wish I had screenshotted my Collector badge when I started the trip. That would have allowed me to get an exact number of Pokemon captures in order to derive a ratio of Farfetch'd. All I can do is estimate. I know I captured 689 Pokemon over two days at the end of my trip. Multiplying that over 14 days (subtracting the one day I had bad signal), I would have caught approximately 4,800 Pokemon over the trip. Ten Farfetch'd translates into a very rough ratio of 1:480 captures. There may be better data out there on this. (The Global Pokedex previously gave the rarity as 1:2130, the rarest of the Gen 1 regionals). 3) Airports stand out as a prime Farfetch'd scouting location. I sighted one at every single airport I visited on this trip. I have wondered if airports have higher spawn rates to help travellers nab a regional during rather short layovers, but my experience is only anecdotal. Airports are problematic in that they contain discrete partitions. I sighted Farfetch'd in the unsecured area in Hong Kong and KIX and in the secured area in Haneda and Narita. So a spawn may occur in the wrong part of the airport while you are there. 4) Two other of my Farfetch'd were at rail stations. Others have mentioned train stations as possible Farfetch'd hot spots. Another Farfetch'd was fetch'd at a park and another at a convention center. All others were found randomly on the street. 5) None of my Farfetch'd had good IVs. Not that this means much practically, other than trading value. 6) Japan now has a Nearby tracker. Will this make it easier or harder to find Farfetch'd? I certainly wouldn't be wandering around as much as I did in Narita airport but would this make it more likely to miss Farfetch'd that are actually near you but not near PokeStops? TL;DR: Farfetch'd is not impossible to find on a trip without the use of local trackers; with some luck I was able to spot an average of one per day. Your chances are best with frequent monitoring of spawns, and visits to known hot spots. Airports may be good places to find Farfetch'd. Lures and Incense may slightly increase odds but the expense may not be worth it. via /r/TheSilphRoad http://ift.tt/2pbnEh9