Sheep

Sheep are passive mobs that first appeared in Survival Test mode. The main purpose of sheep is to supply wool; a building material. Sheep are 1.25 blocks tall, 0.625 blocks wide and 1.4375 blocks long.

Behavior
Sheep wander around aimlessly. When they come to an obstacle they will often try to breach it by jumping, which makes for some odd behavior when at obstacles they cannot overcome. They will make no attempt to stay out of water, and a common sight is several sheep bouncing up and down in the water. Sheep often spawn in groups of 2-8. Like other passive mobs, they are attracted to light, and can sometimes be seen jumping up and down on a Torch or other light source. Differently colored sheep act exactly the same as their white counterparts.

Information & History

 * In Survival Test sheep would "eat" grass, or rather, turn it into a dirt block. After "eating" three grass blocks, sheep would regrow their wool.

Appearance

 * Sheep are the only mob to spawn with both a separate body and armor file.

As of the Beta 1.2 update, sheep can now have black, gray, and light gray wool along with the traditional white. However, the majority of sheep still spawn with white wool, and darker colors tend to be rarer. Dyes can also be applied directly to sheep and shearing colored sheep produces dyed wool blocks of the corresponding color.

Drops
Survival Test
 * 0-2 Brown Mushrooms (on death)

Alpha Beta
 * 1-3 White Wool (on hit)
 * 1-3 Wool the same color as the sheep (on hit)

Sheep do not drop wool if they are damaged by cacti, lava, drowning or falling; only by being hit, with the exception of the being hit with a non-damaging snowball. This means that it is not possible to collect wool blocks using a mob grinder trap. (However, wool can be crafted from string dropped by spiders.)

Trivia

 * The only naturally spawning sheep (in order of rarity) are light gray, black, gray, or white.
 * No matter what color sheep it is, it has the same white wool color on its head and shaved body.
 * Applying dye to sheep and then hitting them gives a high chance of yielding more dyed wool than just manufacturing the blocks, making a more resourceful but harder way to make color blocks.