Deduce #29: The allotment — the solution

The Deduce puzzle from September 12, 2026, worked through clue by clue: 7 clues, 3 rounds of crossing off, and no guessing anywhere.

The puzzle

Four people — Sam, Vic, Eve and Iris — and three things to work out about each: their crop, tool and plot. The clues only ever rule things out.

1. Vic is the one on plot 2.
2. Iris is the one with the trowel.
3. The one with the trowel is on a lower plot than the onions grower.
4. Sam is not the one with the hoe.
5. The carrots grower is exactly 2 plots after the one with the spade.
6. The onions grower is exactly 3 plots after Eve.
7. The squash grower is not the one with the spade.

The walkthrough

A round is one pass over the clues. Each round applies what the last one settled; every step below is an elimination the clues force, in the order a solver would take them.

Round 1

Start with every possibility open, and take the clues in order.

Clue 1, “Vic is the one on plot 2”: plot 2 comes off Sam, Eve and Iris. That settles it: Vic is on plot 2.

Clue 2, “Iris is the one with the trowel”: trowel comes off Sam, Vic and Eve. That settles it: Iris’s tool is trowel.

Clue 3, “The one with the trowel is on a lower plot than the onions grower”: onions comes off Iris; plot 4 comes off Iris.

Clue 4, “Sam is not the one with the hoe”: hoe comes off Sam.

Clue 5, “The carrots grower is exactly 2 plots after the one with the spade”: carrots comes off Vic.

Clue 6, “The onions grower is exactly 3 plots after Eve”: onions comes off Vic and Eve; plot 3 comes off Sam and Eve; plot 1 comes off Sam; plot 4 comes off Eve. That settles it: Sam is on plot 4 and Eve is on plot 1.

Round 2

Go back over the clues with the new facts in hand.

Nobody but Sam can still have onions, so Sam’s crop is onions.

plot 1 is Eve’s, so it comes off Iris. That settles it: Iris is on plot 3.

Clue 5, “The carrots grower is exactly 2 plots after the one with the spade”: spade comes off Sam and Vic; carrots comes off Eve. That settles it: Sam’s tool is rake.

Clue 7, “The squash grower is not the one with the spade”: squash comes off Eve. That settles it: Eve’s crop is rhubarb.

Round 3

Go back over the clues with the new facts in hand.

Rhubarb is Eve’s, so it comes off Vic and Iris. That settles it: Vic’s crop is squash.

Nobody but Iris can still have carrots, so Iris’s crop is carrots.

Rake is Sam’s, so it comes off Vic and Eve. That settles it: Vic’s tool is hoe.

Hoe is Vic’s, so it comes off Eve. That settles it: Eve’s tool is spade.

The answer

Previous: Deduce #28 (Fri, Sep 11) · Next: Deduce #30 (Sun, Sep 13)

About Deduce

Deduce is Noggin’s daily logic grid: four people, three things to work out about each, and clues that never hand you an answer. Every puzzle has exactly one solution and can be finished by crossing off alone. How to play Deduce, or play today’s.