Bucket

Buckets are tools used for carrying water, lava or milk. Water and lava buckets can only be obtained by using the bucket on a source block; shallow, running fluids cannot be collected. Milk buckets are collected by using the bucket on a cow.

If one is under water and moving forward, filling an empty bucket will create a momentary air pocket. This is enough to refill the player's air meter, allowing them to stay under water indefinitely. To reuse the bucket just dump out the water.

Buckets can be crafted from iron, or found in dungeons. There is, approximately, a 53% chance of finding one bucket in a dungeon chest.

Usage
Water buckets can be used to extinguish fires in an emergency, and to drain and fill lakes. Buckets can also be used as a diving tool. By pointing directly down and filling the bucket the player will be surrounded by air for a short time, thus filling the player's air meter.

Water that is used in a bucket can clear out tall grass on small fields. It is useful for collecting seeds and clearing the area for building. The water can be picked back up when the water has been used. This bucket could also be used to make farms where you could grow wheat, and other items. Another usage is filling a cauldron with a water filled bucket. This allows the filling of glass bottles for making potions.

Types of buckets

 * Water bucket - holds one water source block
 * Lava bucket - holds one lava source block
 * Milk bucket - used to make cake. Milk can be used to cure poison and immediately stop potion effects.

History
The bucket was added in Infdev (June 15, 2010).

The bucket has been able to pick up water and lava as of its release, but was not given the milking function until Alpha 1.0.11 (July 23, 2010)

The bucket is renewable as of weekly snapshot 12w06a.

As of 1.2.5 in Creative mode, a bucket used to remove water or lava will remain empty.

In snapshot 12w21a and later buckets are stackable to 16. In snapshot 12w21a & 12w21b, when used on a cow, Buckets that are stacked all disappear leaving only one bucket filled with milk - similar to the old bug with mushroom soup/bowls in which the player used to receive only 1 empty bowl when consuming a stack of soup.