Breeding

Breeding is a game mechanic that allows certain mobs, including villagers and many animals, to produce offspring.

Some mobs have similar mechanics that are not classified as breeding.

Mechanics
Most animals that can be bred have a food item used to lead and breed it (there are a few special cases, described below). Once an animal notices a player holding its food, it follows the player until either the player is out of range, the player stops holding the item, it begins the breeding process, or it is attacked. Baby animals behave the same way. Most animals are uninterested in food lying on the ground, and those that are do not breed from eating this food; animals breed only when fed by a player. One item per parent is needed to breed a single baby.

Love mode
When an animal is fed its food, it enters "love mode", preparing to breed with another animal of the same species that is also in love mode. Animals that are in love mode emit heart particles constantly. When both animals are fed, they pathfind toward each other, up to eight blocks away. The two animals walk into each other for about two and a half seconds, and then drop and end love mode to produce their offspring, the method of which depends on the animal. Most animals immediately spawn a baby animal at the feet of the parents, usually of the same species as their parents, with the exception of mules, which cannot breed with each other and must be bred via the union of a horse and donkey. Some animals lay eggs, but the method and location they perform this varies from animal to animal. Chickens are the only animals that can both directly produce babies and lay eggs, as well as the only animals that lay eggs without being fed. After breeding, the parents cannot be fed to breed again for five minutes, but they (and their babies) always follow players holding breeding items. An animal exits love mode if it does not breed 30 seconds after being fed, but it immediately becomes able to be fed and enter love mode again.

The number of animals that are produced starting from a single pair of animals, assuming the offspring is fully grown before breeding again, is represented by this sequence:

$$\begin{align} a_1 &= 2 \\ a_2 &= 3 \\ a_3 &= 4 \\ a_4 &= 6 \\ a_5 &= 9 \\ a_6 &= 13 \\ a_7 &= 19 \\ &\;\;\vdots \\ a_{n+1} &= \left\lfloor \frac{3}{2}a_{n} \right\rfloor \\ &\;\; \vdots \end{align}$$

where $$\left\lfloor x \right\rfloor$$ is the floor function.

The $$n$$th term of the sequence can also be computed with this formula: $$a_{n} = \left\lceil K \times (3/2)^{n} \right\rceil$$ where $$K = 1.08151366859...$$ and $$\left\lceil x \right\rceil$$ is the ceiling function. The constant $$K$$ is defined to be $$(2/3) \times K(3)$$ (see OEIS A083286)

Villagers


Villagers do not breed automatically when given food. Villager breeding depends on both the number of valid beds in the area (see the village page for full details), as well as whether the villagers are "willing." A villager may become willing if they have 3 bread, 12 carrots, 12 potatoes, or 12 beetroots in their inventory. They may also become willing as a result of trading with a player. When they breed, they produce a smaller villager. Unlike many baby animals, baby villagers do not have big heads $$. Zombie villagers and wandering traders cannot breed, and baby zombie villagers do not grow up.

Baby mobs


Baby mobs are smaller variations of their adult counterparts, having small bodies, relatively big heads (with some exceptions), and faster walking speeds. Their sounds are the same as their adult variants but 50% faster and are pitched up by 6 semitones. The only exception to this is tadpoles, which are a wholly unique mob from from frogs. Many baby mobs have different interactions or behavior compared to their elders that depends on the mob. For example, lambs cannot be sheared for their wool, calves, mooshroom calves and kids (baby goats) cannot be milked, and baby piglins take gold but do not barter. Most baby mobs do not drop loot or experience when killed, with the exception of items they pick up. Baby mobs that do drop loot or experience consist of the following:


 * Baby zombies, zombie villagers, husks, drowned, zombified piglins and zoglins (both loot and experience)
 * Baby hoglins (only experience)
 * Baby piglins (only experience, but less than adults)

Most baby animals choose and follow an adult within 8 blocks of the same species, regardless of whether it is their parent. Babies can choose new targets to follow whenever they do not have a valid target, such as when the previous target dies or moves further than 16 blocks away. Tamed pups and kittens follow their owner if the parent is absent or sitting. Baby animals that do not follow adults consist of:


 * Tadpoles (which do not follow frogs)
 * Baby sniffers
 * Baby rabbits
 * Baby turtles
 * Ocelot kittens
 * Stray kittens
 * Wild wolf pups

Baby mobs that are not animals never follow adult mobs.

When a baby of a species with different fur/pattern variants is born, they usually inherit the pattern of one of their parents, chosen at random, with some exceptions:


 * In the case of sheep, if the parents have "compatible" colors (meaning that their corresponding dye items could be combined into a third dye), the lamb inherits a mix of the parents' colors.
 * In the case of mooshrooms, breeding two of the same variant has a 1⁄1024 chance to spawn a mooshroom of the opposite variant. Breeding two mooshrooms of differing variants has an equal chance of a baby mooshroom of either type.
 * In the case of horses, there is a 13⁄45 chance of having a random color/markings instead of matching either of its parents.
 * In the case of axolotls, a baby axolotl bred by a player (not found in the world) has a 1⁄1200 chance to be the rare blue variant, with this being the only way to obtain this variant. Otherwise, it inherits the color of one of its parents at random.
 * Frogs do not inherit their variants from their parents. A frog's variant is determined by the biome it matures from a tadpole in.

Baby animals can be manually spawned by spawn eggs on a grown animal. This also works on zombies or variants. Baby animals may also be spawned using the command with a negative Age tag; for example, using  spawns a baby sheep at the player's position, that matures in 100 ticks (5 seconds). For baby mobs that don't grow up like zombies and piglins, the IsBaby:1 tag is used instead. Most baby mobs take 20 minutes to grow up. This can be accelerated by feeding them their breeding item. Green sparkles appear similar to those caused by bone meal. Usually, each feeding reduces the remaining time before the animal grows up by 10%. The less time remains, the less time is saved by each feeding, making it inefficient to feed an animal continuously until it becomes an adult. After the eighth feeding, the time saved by one feeding is less than a minute, as shown in the graph.

Horses, donkeys, and llamas have different mechanics: different breeding items grow babies by different amounts, and each item ages babies by a constant time rather than a percentage of the remaining time.

Baby zombies, zombie villagers, husks, drowned, zombified piglins, piglins and zoglins do not grow up, and none of these mobs can breed.

Polar bears have a baby form that can grow up into an adult, but cannot be bred. This also applies to squid, glow squid and dolphins in Bedrock Edition.

Monsters
These are baby versions of mobs that count toward the "Monster Hunter" and "Monsters Hunted" advancements or are otherwise undead.

Allay duplication
If an allay is given an amethyst shard while it is dancing due to a nearby jukebox playing any music disc, it splits into two allays (itself and a new allay) and the amethyst shard is consumed. After duplication, both allays have a five minute cooldown before being able to duplicate again. Allays do not have a baby form.

Shulker duplication
There is a chance for a new shulker of the same color to spawn when a shulker is hit with a shulker bullet (including one of its own).

The following conditions must be met:


 * When the shulker gets hit and then has less than half its health remaining, there is a 25% chance for it to teleport without spawning a new shulker instead of checking the conditions below.
 * The hit shulker must have its lid open.
 * The hit shulker needs to find somewhere to teleport. For this, it takes a random block in a 17×17×17 cuboid centered on the shulker and then checks if the block has a valid face to teleport to. If not it proceeds to try this up to 4 more times. If no valid face is found, the attempt fails.
 * Each other shulker within 8 blocks of the hit shulker decreases the odds of success by 20%. When five or more other shulkers are nearby, no shulkers can spawn, but the hit shulker still teleports.

If the attempt succeeds a new shulker spawns where the old shulker was before it teleported. Shulkers do not have a baby form, and, other than the above criteria, have no duplication cooldown.

Trivia

 * Any two adult animals of the same species can breed with each other, even if one animal is the parent of the other.