How to breed animals on minecraft

Had enough of being chased away by creepers? Bring some love to your Minecraft world instead

Breeding animals in Minecraft is essential for farming certain items, or just building that menagerie of cats and dogs you’ve always wanted. So how do you breed Parrots, Mules or even Hoglins in Minecraft, and which mobs are even breedable? We’ll take a look at everything you need to know in this complete guide.

How to breed animals in Minecraft

Most breedable mobs will simply enter love mode by being fed their favorite food. Well, they do say the way to someone’s heart is through their stomach. The following table tells you exactly what food items you’ll need to feed your mobs in order to spawn a cute, teeny version. In most cases – we’ll discuss the exceptions further down – just feed the item to two of the same mob, and you will see hearts appear above them. This shows that they have entered love mode.

There are some mob types, though, with extra requirements, which we’ll discuss now.

Horse

A popular animal to breed in Minecraft are Horses. Horses need to be tamed before they can be bred, we have a full, separate guide on breeding horses specifically.

Panda

In addition to feeding bamboo to two pandas to encourage them to enter love mode, you will also need to ensure that there are at least eight blocks of bamboo within five blocks of the pandas themselves. If you do not meet this requirement before feeding the pandas, they will become aggressive and attack.

Mule

A mule is not a naturally spawning mob in Minecraft, and instead must be bred by the player, by encouraging a horse and a donkey to breed. There are no other requirements to breed a mule, so simply feed a nearby donkey and horse either a golden carrot or golden apple and they will spawn a mule between them.

Hoglin

Not a requirement, but rather a warning. While the Hoglin is breedable, as the only breedable hostile mob they can be quite difficult to breed. Hoglins will enter love mode when players feed two nearby Hoglins a Crimson Fungi, but getting too close to a Hoglin will cause it to attack, so you will need to be careful, perhaps ensuring that the Hoglins are behind a fence.

Ocelot/Cat

Wild ocelots and cats cannot be bred without being entrusted/tamed first.

Players can earn an ocelot’s trust by holding a raw cod or salmon and waiting for the ocelot to approach before feeding it. Any slight movement will cause the ocelot to flee for a few seconds. You will need to continue to feed the ocelot until hearts appear above it, at which point you know it is now trusting, and can be bred with another trusting ocelot.

Cats must be tamed before they can be bred. This is done the same way, by holding raw salmon or cod and waiting for the cat to approach before feeding. Once the player owns the cat, i.e. it has been tamed, you can then breed said cat with another tamed cat of your own, or someone else’s in multiplayer.

Minecraft animal breeding Advancements – Java edition

There are two advancements in Java edition mobs. Firstly, The Parrots and the Bats is an early-game advancement for breeding any two breedable mobs.

You can also get the Two by Two advancement but breeding a pair of every breedable mob in Minecraft, so this one might take a little longer. This includes Nether mobs, and Trader Llamas don’t count towards the Llama requirement.

Minecraft breeding Achievements – Bedrock edition

If you are a Bedrock edition player, then you will have Achievements as opposed to Advancements. There are three breeding-related Achievements to earn in Bedrock edition.Repopulation — Breed two cows with wheatArtificial Selection — Breed a mule from a horse and a donkey

Zoologist — Breed two pandas with bamboo

How do you breed parrots and bats in Minecraft?

Despite the fact that the achievement for breeding your first two animals is titled ‘The Parrots and The Bats’, you can’t actually breed Parrots or Bats in Minecraft. There are a few other mobs that aren’t breedable, as well, but Parrots are by far the most surprising as they are the only tamable mob that cannot be bred.

The reason that Parrots are currently unbreedable in Minecraft is because there is no baby Parrot, but there’s nothing to say this won’t change at some point in the future. After all, there are baby versions of the likes of bees, which are a similarly small mob. You’ll also find that you can’t breed dolphins, as they instead lead you to treasure when you feed them. Squid also cannot be bred and must be farmed using spawn mechanics instead.

More Minecraft mob guides

And head over to our Minecraft hub for even more news, guides and how-tos!

1. 1

   Know which animals you have to tame before breeding. You can skip this part entirely if the animal that you want to breed isn't one of the following animals:

   • Horse
   • Wolf
   • Cat
   • Llama
   • Axolotl

2. 2

   Obtain your animal's taming material. You will need the following items for the following animals:

   • Horse - No material, but your hand must be empty.
   • Wolf - A bone.
   • Ocelot - Raw fish of any kind (must be either raw salmon or raw fish in Minecraft PE).
   • Axolotl - Tropical Fish / Bucket of Tropical Fish
   • Llama - No material, but your hand must be empty.

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3. 3

   Equip the taming material. If you're attempting to tame a horse or a llama, make sure you don't have anything equipped by selecting an empty slot in your equip bar.

4. 4

   Select the animal with the taming material. Right-click, tap or press the left trigger while facing the animal.

   • If you're taming a horse or a llama, selecting the animal will cause you to mount it. You'll need to mount and dismount the animal until hearts appear over its head.
   • If taming an ocelot, walk up to within 10 blocks of the ocelot, then wait for the ocelot to come to you before selecting it.
   • If taming an axolotl, you can attract them by holding a Bucket of Tropical Fish or Tropical Fish.

5. 5

   Wait for hearts to appear over the animal's head. You'll need to continue selecting the animal until this happens; once you see red hearts appear over the animal's head, it is tame.

6. 6

   Repeat this process with another animal of the same kind. Since you need two animals to breed, you'll need to tame another animal of the same persuasion before you can continue to actually breed them.

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1. 1

   Find two of any animal that you want to breed. Skip this step if you tamed animals earlier.

   • You cannot breed two different animals (e.g., a pig and a wolf).

2. 2

   Build an enclosure with one open space. You can use a fence to do this, or you can use a two-block-tall wall. Make sure that you include ample room for your animals to move around.

3. 3

   Equip your animals' favorite food. Depending on the animals that you want to lure, you'll need to equip one of the following foods:[1]

   • Horse - Golden apple or golden carrot. You can make these by placing an apple or a carrot in the middle of a crafting table grid and then placing a gold bar in each of the remaining crafting slots.
   • Sheep - Wheat.
   • Cow or Mooshroom - Wheat.
   • Pig - Carrot, potato, or beetroot.
   • Chicken - Seeds, pumpkin seeds, melon seeds, or beetroot seeds.
   • Wolf (dog) - Any meat that you can find. Wolves must be at full health in order to breed.
   • Ocelot (cat) - Any fish.
   • Rabbit - Dandelion, carrot, or golden carrot.
   • Llama - Hay bale.
   • Axolotl - Tropical Fish / Bucket of Tropical Fish
   • Goat - Wheat.
   • Bee - Flowers

4. 4

   Wait for the animals to start following you. Almost immediately after you equip the animals' favorite food, they should turn to stare at you. At this point, you can proceed with luring them into the enclosure.

5. 5

   Back into the enclosure. The animals will both follow you into the enclosure as long as you have the food equipped.

   • Back all the way into the enclosure to prevent the animals from getting stuck too close to the entrance.

6. 6

   Feed both animals. With the food equipped, select both animals that you want to breed. You should see hearts appear over both of their heads.

   • If you're feeding a wolf and the hearts aren't appearing, the wolf isn't at full HP. Keep feeding the wolf until the hearts appear, then repeat with the other wolf.

7. 7

   Exit and seal the enclosure. Once the animals turn to face each other, quickly leave the enclosure and seal the exit. This will prevent the animals from escaping once the baby is born.

8. 8

   Wait for the baby animal to appear. Around three seconds will pass from the time the animals start breeding to the time the baby appears.

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Add New Question

• Question

  Can I find wolves on Pocket Edition?

  

  Yes, but only in taiga biomes (taiga, cold taiga, mega taiga). You will need bones from skeletons to tame them. They have a one in twelve chance of being tamed by a bone, but once you tame two, you can simply breed them with raw meat to make more. Be careful not to hit them, as they will attack and become untamable. You may need to get a specific seed for a taiga biome, but there's a decent chance you could find one in your current world, as they aren't too rare.

• Question

  I tried to breed a horse with a golden carrot but it didn't work. What did I do wrong?

  

  You need two golden carrots - one for each horse you are breeding.

• Question

  Do the animals need separate pens?

  

  No, they don't need them. The pens are just a strategy. I have a huge free range fenced-off farm, and all my animals roam in there. I can breed them without pens.

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1. ↑ https://minecraft.gamepedia.com/Breeding

JL

Written by:

wikiHow Technology Writer

This article was written by Jack Lloyd. Jack Lloyd is a Technology Writer and Editor for wikiHow. He has over two years of experience writing and editing technology-related articles. He is technology enthusiast and an English teacher. This article has been viewed 345,086 times.

Co-authors: 64

Updated: December 15, 2021

Views: 345,086

Categories: Minecraft Animals | Minecraft

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  "I think that the fence method will work better because I feel you can breed many animals with that method. I'm glad it doesn't show cow sex because that wouldn't be good for those little kids' mindsets."..." more