Farmland

Farmland is a block on which seeds can be planted and grown. To make farmland, you can use a hoe on dirt. If you destroy a farmland block, which can be without tool, it will drop dirt

Farming
To begin farming you need to craft a hoe. Like all tools, hoes have variable durability depending on the material they are made of. The hoe can be used to till dirt or grass into farmland by right-clicking. A farmland block will be created dry. If it is near water the block will become hydrated, causing crops to grow faster (this is explained further in the next section). Seeds can be planted in any farmland block where they will eventually grow. Seeds planted on hydrated farmland will grow faster than those on non-hydrated blocks. Crops can also be grown at night by placing torches next to them, which will also prevent aggressive Mobs from spawning near them. Nonetheless, if there is grass near the torches, this could also allow passive mobs to spawn, and they could destroy the crop by walking on it.

Not every seed grows the same, look at the See Also section for information about specific crops.

Hydrated Farmland Tiles
A hydrated Farmland block is the preferred block for farming. Hydrated farmland will yield a fully developed wheat crop in a little over a single day/night cycle.

For a Farmland Block to become hydrated, the following conditions must be met:


 * 1) Water up to four blocks away, including diagonals.
 * 2) The water must be on the same horizontal level (water beneath a farmland block will not hydrate it).

The blocks between the farmland block and the water make no difference.

For example: in a nine by nine grid of Farmland blocks, in which the center block is water, all will hydrate.

Farmland Block Decay
Under certain condition a farmland block will "decay", becoming a dirt block regardless of what it was initially. This will happen if any of the following occur:


 * If the player or any animal walks on the block too much. (In the September 18th, 2010 patch, "sneaking" was added, among other things this allows you to walk on farmland blocks without destroying them. This did not work in SMP until Beta 1.3_01, when it was fixed).
 * If the farmland block is dehydrated for too long.

In Infdev a farmland block will not decay if something is planted on it unless it is walked on or the farmland block is in complete darkness (Light level 0). The best way to change a farmland block into a grass block is to wait for it to turn back into dirt. Grass will then grow on it as it normally does.

Trivia

 * You cannot place torches on the top of farmland blocks.
 * In versions prior to Beta 1.3, there was a bug which would allow you to destroy any block (even bedrock) by tilling and planting seeds under it.
 * Dirt can be hoed into farmland from any side of the block.
 * Rain will hydrate farmland though not quickly and apparently randomly.
 * You cannot light farmland blocks on fire.