Talk:Tree/Archive 1

It appears that leaves can also break stair blocks, converting them back to cobblestone or planks. --Fett0001 09:13, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

"They will grow with 2 clear blocks between trunks." This information is false. I've had trees grow right next to each other (One space away from the initial trunk) with the help of torches. --DrDude 4:05, 27 July 2010 (EDT)

In reference to the statement that more shrubs create bigger trees, I had done the same and the tree became about 15-20 blocks or so in height.

Someone could add information about those "big" trees with brances what came in the newest update. --Nunuru 13:30, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

Why does "Tree" redirect to log?Toadbert

I suspect the height of a tree's growth may be influenced by how tall nearby structures are, such as walls or other trees. This makes sense from a certain standpoint: the tree is trying to maximize the amount of sunlight that falls on its leaves throughout the day. --Eldoran 22:32, 2 October 2010 (PDT)
 * What I'm curious about is the maximum height trees can get and why they stop growing. I've seen huge trees on the tops of mountains, obviously no good reason to grow that tall. Is there a random height set when they start growing and that is as tall as they get? MrMatthew 23:26, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

Tree growth test results
I created the following grid (left in first image) of saplings which, after only a few (in-game) days of growing grew trees, not just within two blocks of one another, but actually intertwined and creating massive walls.
 * Image

Screenshots:, , , ,

After returning to the site I decided to trim some leaves, but then realized it was pretty stupid because that would ruin the whole natural test. These screenshots were made immediately as I realized this so no trees have grown due to leaf trimming. Well, I hope this clears up some things for curious people and disproves the 'does not grow when adjacent to another tree' theory. - AARST (insert timestamp here, it's 1:20AM on the 6th of October)

I am currently running several tests as well and would like to introduce a system of international units for talking about dimensions and other  measurable(s) for trees. I would also like to talk over a few other things about trees for my studies. Holler back if anyone here is interested, or would at least like to discuss it with  me.--SharpestSpoon 18:38, 13 November 2010 (EST)

Leaves, designated tool and durability
I did some testing. A wooden axe can chop down 33 logs before breaking down. It can also break 33 leaf blocks before breaking. This means they are  not taking double damage, and that axes are  the designated  tool for removing leaves.

Also, a hoe can be used to  remove the leaves, because a hoe only loses  durability when  right-clicking. Saying a hoe can be used to remove leaves without it  breaking is akin to saying flint&steel can be  used (left-click!) for  the same purpose without it losing durability. In my opinion, the part about the hoe should be removed from the  article, because it's  misleading. Noroom 07:54, 13 October 2010 (CDT)


 * I believe I covered the normal rate of degradation for axes with the statement: "Axes lose durability at  the normal rate when removing leaves."  Nice catch on the hoe though; it  didn't occur to me that that was why they didn't degrade.  I've  clarified it in the article, but I feel it's worth leaving in, else  we'll get legions of people thinking "I've discovered that hoes don't  degrade when removing leaves! I'd better add that to the article!" and  doing a poor job of it it. Similarly I don't think most people regard  the flint and steel as a block bashing type of tool, and putting it in  here might just confuse things.  Thanks for the feedback.  --Deathandgravity 13:12, 13 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Whoops. Somehow my changes were lost. Luckily I could pull them back from my laptop's cache. Here's what I wrote: How about this?
 * Logs can be harvested more quickly using an axe. Axes can also be used to  remove leaves, and doing so will cause them to lose durability at the  same rate as with logs. It is worth mentioning there is no speed  increase when using any tool to remove leaves. Additionally, using tools  for purposes other than their intended ones will cause them to lose  durability at double the normal rate. Tools like the hoe are an  exception, since their "use" action is triggered by right-clicking, and  leaves are removed by left-clicking. Thus, they will not take damage  from removing leaves.
 * Let me know what you think and I'll add it in. Noroom 10:43, 14 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Noroom: I actually made some changes along the line of your suggestions already, since your changes were lost. I also added some more information about swords removing leaves more quickly (tested to confirm).  Take a look at what's there at the moment.  I think it covers your comments, although it doesn't explain durability so completely, but I don't think the "trees" article is the place for an explanation of durability. If you think it still needs changing or if it's ok as it is now, let me know. --Deathandgravity 06:57, 15 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Great work. It's great there's a community so committed to ensuring articles are accurate and well-written. Thanks! Noroom 10:46, 15 October 2010 (UTC)

Added note about nighttime tree behavior
I just drained a large basin of water and planted over 130 saplings on the dirt underneath. They had more than sufficient space, and all were exposed to the open air above them. At night, all but 3 died. The three that lived happened to be placed next to torches I had placed earlier.

It appears that trees planted below the water line are checked regularly for sufficient lighting conditions, while those above the water line are only checked during the day. I've added this to the article. I'm just adding this here so people know how I came to this conclusion.

Removed note about night time tree behaviour. I can't tell you why all your saplings died, but I've just run some tests and confirmed that the note that you added to the article was factually incorrect. Trees do not check whether they're above or below the water table, at night or otherwise. I dug holes of varying depths and planted trees at the bottom; all survived and grew.

The only thing that influences whether a sapling pops out of the dirt is whether it has enough light - apce is not an issue. It appears that moonlight is enough light to keep saplings "alive", and from the article on light, this means it has a value of 8. I'm going to make the changes to the light article.

I'm going to hazard a guess that you might be playing SMP; if that's the case then all bets are off regarding tree and sapling behaviour, as it's notoriously buggy in SMP. --Deathandgravity 07:22, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

Removed note about tree growth
The note added by Ikalpo was factually incorrect. The length of time a tree is a sapling does not affect how large a tree it will become. Rather, if a sapling is prevented from growing into a small tree by adjacent features, it will generally take longer to produce a large tree. I believe the way tree growth occurs is that after a random period of time, a sapling gets a chance to grow into a tree, and a random tree height is selected. If the sapling cannot grow into a tree of that height, it must wait another random period of time and "try again". Because small trees seem to grow with higher probability than large trees, more small trees are created, but a sapling can grow into a large tree on its first try, unless something stops it. --Deathandgravity 07:36, 17 October 2010 (CDT)
 * I agree with this I've run a few tests but not enuff to be sure but I think your right it works the other way around as well if you plant a tree with something over it forcing it to grow in to a small tree it will take longer on average. But As you say small trees are more common so forcing a small tree is on average quicker then forcing a large tree.--Tnarg 16:44, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

Light Needed to Grow
The light page says trees need a light level of 13 to grow, while the tree page says they only need 10. Just thought I'd point that out. -Vrox

Stone tree?
My friend found a stone tree, here's some evidence. http://img98.imageshack.us/img98/2207/minecraftwtf2.png --Tials 14:39, 12 December 2010 (CST)
 * fake--Kizzycocoa 14:44, 12 December 2010 (CST)
 * Elaborate. --Tials 20:48, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
 * what is there to elaborate on? someone edited a tree in a map editor or by hand, and tried to trick you for lols.--Kizzycocoa 20:54, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Well, I just wanted to show it, maybe raise some questions, that's how nearly everything starts, right? --Tials 21:12, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
 * not when it's blatant editing.--Kizzycocoa 21:40, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Yeah, fake. '''[[User:Aclectasis| A ]] CLECTASIS ''' 18:19, 12 December 2010 (CST) Or, a really big coincidence. but it is probably fake

New Tree Shapes?
Grew some trees on a personal smp server today and got unusual shapes. Branches that weren't entirely covered with leaves and one that had four leaves right around the trunk and then a huge ball on top. Random luck? Just me? Something with the leaf decay fix? --Raecchi

Removing Soil under a Tree?
I have removed the block of soil under one grown tree. It was still alive after several game days. Can anyone recreate this? If so it maybe should be added.

On an off note, wondering about capitalization of prepositions in title?


 * The wood(trunk) blocks are normal block that won't ever decay. The only thing that does decay are the leaves if they aren't supported by anything but a tree with trunk does support the leaves even though there is no soil under the trunk.DerGraph 14:36, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Post-Beta 1.2 I found a tree that had been created naturally floating above an above-ground lake of water. It was in diagonal proximity to one or more Dirt blocks but wasn't on top of or even merely above any. SteveZombie 22:34, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

Tree biomes section added
It appear that birch trees can't be grown... Can anyone confirm wether this is a bug, or intended? :( --Mr FJ 02:09, 14 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Completely intended iirc --ImNotLikeYou 9:11, 13 January 2011 (EST)

And the point of birch trees in the first place, are? They look VERY ugly to me. Cool12309 02:25, 14 January 2011 (UTC)
 * They are probably just there to have different looking trees every once in a while. --ImNotLikeYou 9:27, 13 January 2011 (EST)
 * According to my tests, in my own personal game, since I grow quite a few trees, it seems to be completely random for trees spawned in, growing from saplings doesn't seem to create the new Birch trees. At least not in my batch of 20. Perhaps a larger sample should be used. -St. Fenix (User•Talk) 22:45, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

I have tried planting seedlings from birch trees in the original location of a birch tree; also, seedlings from conifers, again in the same location. In all cases the resultant tree is the old, "regular" tree. It would appear that the new "species" do not breed true. Zorrothefox 03:13, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Some trees won't grow
I planted a lot of trees and some just won't grow. I waited for some mc-days and then tried bone meal, both doesn't work. For example here a screenshot of one which won't grow: http://t4b.me/not_joomla/mctree.png I can't find any reason why it shouldn't grow in this article. Is this a bug? T4b 21:13, 15 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Alot of it is by random chance, I've had trees that have sprouted only a few minutes after planting them, and just now I had a tree I've been playing days (Real days) with and it only just sprouted. Give it more time, it takes as long as it takes, because the more I've studied this, it seems that trees will happily grow on anything as long as they have enough light and a dirt block on them. Bonemeal has no effect on trees. -St. Fenix (User•Talk) 16:48, 16 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Two or three times a sapling grew instantly when I tried Bone Meal on it. If that was only coincidence then that would be really strange. And on the wiki page of Bone Meal it says it works on Saplings. T4b 18:49, 16 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Bone Meal always 'works' on saplings. The reason that Bone Meal sometimes doesn't work and that some of the reason some trees take longer than others is where the tree is located.  If you are intentionally limiting the height of your tree growth you have to wait for 'grow tree' to randomly trigger, then you may randomly get a tree that doesn't fit and have to wait again.  From my testing the shortest tree is 4 wood and 2 leaves tall, needing 6 spaces total.  The shortest branching tree I've found is 6 wood +2 leaves tall.  Dctrjons 05:56, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Ah, I wasn't limiting the maximum height, but the trees were all next to a high wall, so I was probably limiting their minimum height. So Bone Meal works, but it's random if the trees grow though.

In my opinion Notch should change this, so Bone Meal works always. --T4b 11:23, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I have attempted growing the new birch and redwood saplings in my tree farm; each sapling has been limited to growing 6 blocks by the ceiling, and receives a more than ample light level. Even with the use of bone meal; over the past two days, not a single tree out of my 5 birch and about 15 redwood trees in the farm have grown (the normal trees have been growing though), is there something that I am doing wrong, or is this some sort of bug? Whovian101 12:27, 20 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Agreed, this is a different issue. This is due to the standard tree shape of these trees, which means that they grow differently. No-one has analyzed it yet, but both need >6 space for a trunk height. I tried a 64 stack of bonemeal on both types under standard conditions, neither grew. Darkid 20:37, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

"long trees"
The long trees in the picture section. I think they are an atempt at "red wood" style trees. all of the ones I have seen look like they would be red woods. theallmightybob
 * Highly unlikely, as they wouldn't be Biome specific which would make even less sense, seeing as most people know that giant Redwood trees don't just grow anywhere. If it were an attempt at another giant tree, it would also make little sense because it doesn't adhere to a specific Biome. -St. Fenix (User•Talk) 17:08, 16 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Then what are they? I put a picture of it below as well. Which tree is which? - Asterick6 15:57, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Tree species
The three new types of trees introduced in patch 1.2 is most likely based on the three most common tree-types in Sweden: the silver birch, Norway spruce and Scots pine. I think we should divide the redwood category into Spruce and Pine. Also add better screenshots.


 * I suggest needing to grow redwoods near water or on wet dirt, like real life. They should also be quite large, at least 2x2 and 10+ blocks high. With branches. -FlintTD 16:49, 2 March 2011 (US West Coast)


 * I agree with FlintTD. And what about these trees? Are they both pine trees, or birch trees, or spruce, or fir, or what? I REALLY think we need to specify or ask Notch what he based these trees on. Cause I see two types of trees in this screen. Bunch_of_birch_trees.png - Asterick6 07:15, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Break the glass or not ?
In the article it says that tree branches can break glass when they happen to grow into the glass block. However, in the notes it is contradicted that only until beta trees had done that. Thought, I'd mention. Maybe someone who knows for sure might want to correct it. --Missingpiece 21:17, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Leaf Respawn?
Don't leaves respawn (in Survival) if they are cut down, but the tree trunk remains unchanged? -FlintTD 16:41, 2 March 2011 (US West Coast)
 * Leaves do NOT respawn. Sirhchris 04:43, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Giant Cavetree
Some friends and I were playing SMP when we decided to grow a tree in a cave for fun. After several initial attempts using Bonemeal (which failed), we removed the torches around it, figuring the tunnel straight to the surface above it did the trick. The next attempt caused the tree to grow ridiculously tall. The trunk was 12 blocks straight up the tunnel, and when it hit another cave along the way it grew a few leaves, then stopped growth. It looks absolutely ridiculous. I don't know if this is just an SMP thing or what, but I did take some pics, which I don't seem to be able to upload here for some reason :x I'll see if I can get them later. ZeldaFan 22:59, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

I read that a tree will grow taller if it has a ring of stone around the trunk at 4 spaces above the ground the sapling was planted on. The picture also said that you can repeat the process for every four blocks (4 blocks of unimpeded logs then 1 block of surrounded log) to make them as tall as you want. This seems like an interesting way to get extra wood. -- AzemOcram

That's sometimes called a "tube tree"; you can also just make a long tube and grow a sapling in the middle bottom. People have made 50+ tall trees with this method, and you can grab an axe and power-cut through the entire height for easy wood. It's fairly lucky that you accidentally made one. A trivia note and picture or something about this method might be appropriate if you're so inclined. --Theothersteve7 20:44, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

I added it. But I do not know how to upload pictures nor do I have the time to make a (handmade) copy of what was posted to Notch's page. --AzemOcram 02:38, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Birch tree growing extremely fast
I think it is safe to assume that the 30 minute delay before a sapling grows into a tree is skipped for Birch trees. I have just chopped one down and planted a sapling where it stood and the sapling grew into a tree before the leaves had time to decay completely! It happened in under one minute, did anyone notice similar behaviour with these trees? --Katze 500 18:43, 29 April 2011 (UTC)
 * The 30 minute delay doesn't apply to oak trees anymore, either. With the introduction of different sapling types the counter had to be cut down, because 2 bits were needed to code the type. I have a tree farm with 100 oak saplings which took 1 minute to plant and the first tree grew less than 5 minutes after I planted the first sapling. --Obi-Wahn 11:32, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Happens to me too. I have a Birch tree farm, all the farm took 30 minutes to grow (2 block clerance), some grew in one to five minutes, others took a bit more time. This farm is fairly big and on a SMP server.

So, i've seen a tree in mid air, realy interesting.

I also notice this fast grow. Ferry 13:51, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

sapling drop
It seems that redwood trees give more saplings (around 5) inside snow biomess than redwood trees inside no snow biomess (mosly 0 saplings). can somebody confirm this? Ferry 13:49, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

NETHER TREES
After the 1.6.5 update, I noticed that planting trees in the nether in SMP (haven't tested SSP yet) using bone-meal and dirt will cause trees to grow without leaves. Only the small type trees do so, if you get a large tree/oak than it will have leaves. I have not tested with other sapling types. Basically, it results in a 4-7 block column of logs, which actually looks very good with the Nether atmosphere. Anyone mind testing this? It might just be an issue with my server. Firewolf34 07:00, 30 May 2011 (UTC)


 * That happened to me in SSP and SMP. --R ocĸetor talk  07:20, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Great trees
For some reason, I get the idea that great trees were called super trees once by Notch. I might be mistaken. In fact, I may have seen this because it's possible that he has described them as 'super trees'. Can someone look into this? Learner4 16:08, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

Tree Spacial Growth conditions.
I've done some experimenting with Birch and Pine trees and have concluded that the spacial requirements as mentioned currently on the wiki aren't completely correct. The spacial requirement for birches is variable for the height of the birch. There are only 3 heights: 5, 6, and 7 logs. The bottom log (the location of the sapling) needs just the 1x1 area that it's in. Al the logs above that (except the top one) need a 3x3 square of space. The top log, and the two blocks above it need a 5x5 space. This means a birch with height 5 can grow just next to a birch with height 7, with only one block in between, which is how I discovered this.

For pines, it's harder to say because there are more heights possible. For heights 4, 5, and 6, at least, it seems the spacial requirement is just a 1x1 block for the bottom two logs, and an empty 5x5 square around the 6 blocks above that. That means, even for a pine tree of height 4, you need a room that's 8 blocks high. I haven't tested any pines larger than that. Some people feel like experimenting to confirm my findings?

Pine, Spruce or Redwood
These terms have been used fairly interchangeably, but it seems that they all refer to a single tree type. Has anyone asked Notch what the internal name is so that we can get some consistency? Lots of confusion with people thinking there are four tree types, not three. --Snicker 04:33, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

What if...?
The other day my friend mentioned that seasons in Minecraft would be awesome. I was thinking that to make this possible, trees would also include a branch block that would grow leaves in the "spring" and drop them in the "fall". The measurement of time will be made possible with the new moon phases. Also, breaking a branch block will yield sticks. Any opinions? --Captain_Clam 11:48, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Tree/Sapling help
I'm trying out a survival map at the moment and theres this tiny tree that has one log and 2 leaves on top. Is there a way to confirm a sapling drop or more leaves growing or is it up to chance?