Breeding



Breeding is a game mechanic that allows fed animals of the same species to breed with each other to make new animals. Animals (except Wolves, Cats, Chickens and Pigs) will follow a player holding Wheat if the player looks at the mob, and will continue following the player until it is out of range, fed wheat, or until the player stops holding the wheat. They may only breed once per wheat given, as long as they are not following their offspring.

Mechanics
Sheep, Cows and Mooshrooms enter "love mode" if fed one wheat (as of Snapshot 12w36a, Pigs are responsive to Carrots and wheat, Chickens to wheat seeds or nether wart). Wolves enter love mode when they are fed any type of meat. Cats enter love mode when they are fed a raw fish. Tamed wolves and cats must be at full health before being fed to enter "love mode". Animals in "love mode" emit hearts constantly and will path towards nearby animals of the same species that are also in love mode. The two animals will "kiss" for about two and a half seconds, and then a baby animal of the same species spawns either in between the parents or on the same blocks as the parent that was spawned first, which ends love mode for the parents. They will not be able to enter love mode again for 5 minutes. However, they can be herded with the appropriate material, regardless of age. After the baby animal has spawned, it will follow its parents for 20 minutes before growing to full size. Once the parents breed they also drop a small amount of experience, but in a farm of 100+ animals, it begins to add up a lot, making a very nice exp farm bonus.

One item per parent is needed to breed a single baby. When sheep are born, they will usually be the color of one of their parents, chosen at random. If the parents have 'compatible' colors (meaning that their corresponding dye items could be combined into a third dye), the lamb will be a mix of the parents' colors (see Wool Dyes). Sheared sheep will continue to produce babies of their original color.

Animals are uninterested in wheat lying on the ground. Using wheat or other items (carrots, and seeds) to breed animals that give food (cows, mooshrooms, pigs, chickens) is a way of getting more efficient food than bread.

Villagers will breed of their own accord depending on the available houses, or at least "registered doors". (See the NPC Village page for full details.) When they breed, they will produce a smaller villager but unlike other baby animals (excluding kittens,) they don't have big heads. Baby villagers will run around the village and will "play" tag. This is also when baby animals started following their parents (although their parents followed them long before then.) To get Villagers to breed, you don't give them wheat. You just leave the alone and they will breed randomly, though it may take up to 5 hours. Also, it is important to know that Villagers mate to get their population to half of the number of houses in the village.

Ranching
Animals in an open setting may be difficult to breed. It may be easier to construct fences for animals to stay. Even a medium size pasture can result in animals neglecting to notice one another in love mode. Animals will spawn in the same square as their parent. It should be noted, however, that if they are in the same square as a fence, glass pane, or other item that takes up only part of a square, offspring may spawn in or on the other side of the block.

Pigs, Chickens, Cows, and Mooshrooms can all provide food when killed. This food will be cooked if they are killed by fire. (But if so, they may not drop experience orbs. Additionally, the player gains no experience for cooking the meat in this manner, as he or she normally does when cooking in a furnace.)


 * Cows additionally drop leather. Both Cows and Mooshrooms can be milked with a bucket, and Mooshrooms can be 'milked' for Mushroom Stew using a bowl. Mooshrooms can also be sheared for 3-5 Red Mushrooms, although this will turn them into normal Cows.
 * Chickens additionally drop feathers. Chicken Eggs can be harvested from Chicken farms, and can be used in addition to chicken breeding to speed population growth, as they have a 1/8th chance of producing (at least one) baby chicken when thrown.
 * Sheep drop one wool when killed, but it is more productive to shear them as they drop 1-3 wool. One dye can be used to color their wool before shearing or breeding, which is more efficient than dying the single wool after shearing. Dyed sheep produce offspring of their current color; if the two sheep are different colors, the color of the baby sheep will match one of the parents, chosen at random.



Sometimes when farming animals, it may be difficult to keep all animals in the farm, yet still allow you to get in and out of the farm. There are several ways to handle this:
 * Dig holes. Dig a hole outside of the farm, at least 3 blocks deep (two for the tunnel, one for the ceiling).  Place ladders as needed.  Tunnel under the fence, and dig up under the farm. Place more ladders.  Since Pigs, Cows, and Sheep are more than one block wide, they will not fit in the hole resulting in them running in circles trying to get in the hole. However, baby animals and Chickens can fit in a one block hole, so you may want to place a trapdoor at the top.  In version 12w34a and later, the trapdoor can be placed in the top block of the hole; in older versions, making it level with the farm requires putting an extra block inside the farm to attach it to (don't put it within two blocks of the fence).  Of course, the tunnel can also lead to somewhere more distant....
 * You can also extend your fence to form a "mob-lock" -- a small area with two fence gates, one leading into the pen, one outside. This area should be large enough for at least two of the animals in question.  For cows and sheep, making both sides a double gate will make moving animals in and out much easier.  Animals that escape into the lock can be pushed or led back into the pen, or simply considered volunteers for slaughter.
 * A flashier version of this is to use two Fence Gates with a Pressure Plate between them. You open one gate and as you pass over the pressure plate, it opens the other gate. The "off" signal made by the pressure plate returning up will close both gates. The whole event is quick enough to thwart any possible pathing out by the animals. Be warned though, keeping the animals away from the entrance is a good practice, otherwise just one getting onto the pressure plate could trigger a "stampede".
 * Another method is to place two blocks in place of a fence and put a trap door on the bottom part of the higher block. Animal AIs cannot make paths that use trapdoors and they cannot open them. This is easier than most other methods and takes up little space (2X2X1).
 * By far the simplest and least space consuming method is to use a single post of Nether Brick Fence between regular posts, this will create a single pillar that you can walk around but larger animals cannot pass as Nether Brick Fence does not connect up with regular wooden fence. (1x1x1). Of course, unlike a gate this isn't easily switchable, which may be an issue when bringing animals into your farm.

Automated animal farms and mass breeding


Small scale automated breeding systems can be built by herding passive mobs into moving minecarts and summoning them to a central breeding location - this has the disadvantage of still breeding new mobs relatively slowly (one every five minutes.) Also, when saving and loading the game the mobs will "escape" from the minecarts - this can be dealt with by "storing" them inside of glass blocks.

Mass animal breeding farms can be built by "compressing" mobs into a very small number of squares using a mob compression system. Mobs are crushed into a small area (Generally a three high 3x3 chamber) - these animals can be used to produce new animals that will remain trapped inside the enclosure and can be bred themselves - meaning that extreme amounts of animals will eventually be stored in the same square and can be fed simply by "spamming" stacks of wheat into the enclosure. If starting with two mobs and feeding them for an hour while using this system (assuming no missed feedings or killed mobs) 17 adults and 24 baby mobs will be held inside the 3x3 cell. After two hours this would increase to 247 adults and 361 offspring.

Chickens can be fed through a slab in the side of the enclosure or from above through a hole in the top center, other mobs can also be fed through a 1 wide hole in the side of the enclosure without any risk that they will escape. Feeding the twice as many mobs as slain while harvesting is enough to keep mobs at roughly their current level. Collecting and throwing eggs will increase the number you can harvest.

When breeding chickens or other animals in a fenced-in pen (with a fence gate) and you get a large amount of them, it can be difficult to leave the pen without animals escaping before you close the fence gate. A way to deal with this is to go to the opposite side of the pen as the door / gate, pull out some the appropriate food (wheat, seeds, carrots) wait until the animals crowd around you, then putting the food away by switching items and quickly running to the gate. Since they're no longer following you, the animals will not be fast enough to get to the other side of the pen when you do.

Baby animals
Baby animals are smaller variations of their parents, having small bodies, relatively big heads, higher pitched sounds, and faster walking speeds. They do not drop resources or experience, primarily to balance the breeding. While baby cows and mooshroom calves can be milked, only adult animals will drop food resources. Baby animals grow into full sized animals after twenty minutes, which is one day in Minecraft (Except sheep - they can grow faster if they eat grass). Dogs (tame wolves) have another variation: the puppy does not gain its full health automatically (even when it grows to full size), but must be fed to increase its HP.

Baby animals, when born, will follow their parents until it has grown in to an adult. Tame dogs and cats will follow their owner if the parent is absent or sitting.

Bugs

 * Animals in love mode need to be able to see each other to breed, but they don't have to be close to each other: for example, sheep in two different pens separated by multiple fences can breed if they are both in love mode and have seen each other.
 * Animals occasionally disappear in multiplayer even if they are enclosed.

Trivia

 * Before the full release, Snow Golems also had the ability to enter "love mode" when fed wheat. If two Snow Golems were in love mode, they would fire snowballs at each other, causing them to step out of love mode and flee from each other.
 * Animals of the same species are able to breed with each other regardless of whether or not they are a parent to the animal they are bred with.
 * A baby animal will follow you if you are holding wheat, but the wheat cannot be fed to it.
 * Baby wolves seem to be naturally attracted to the player.
 * Baby Wolves will attack mobs just like adults.
 * Baby Cats and Villager children do not have big heads like other baby mobs.
 * Using the spawn egg of a mob which has baby variants on that mob will spawn the baby variant.