How to breed animals in Minecraft

Breeding in Minecraft is an important asset to the game; it allows the player to create more animals when there might not be more in the surrounding area.

This could be used for creating a food supply, farming materials, trading, or just to create an army of pets.

With so many new mobs in the game, and changes to the old methods of breeding, it gets confusing as to how exactly players are supposed to attract certain animals and breed them.

Without further ado, here's how to breed every single breedable mob in the game, including the upcoming Minecraft Axolotl and Goat mobs.

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Breeding Foods in Minecraft

Two foxes about to be bred using sweet berries (Image via Emma Witman)

There are a variety of foods that players can use to breed animals in Minecraft. Many of the same food items are used to breed different animals, but there are definitely some that fall outside the standards.

The most standard method of breeding in Minecraft is using wheat. Cows, mooshrooms, and sheep will follow the player if they're holding wheat. Those same Minecraft mobs can be bred by right clicking two of the same animals with wheat in-hand.

Pigs, though they used to be breedable with wheat in previous versions of Minecraft, now require either carrots, beetroot, or potatoes to breed.

Horses and donkeys can only be bred while tamed. They can breed using golden apples, enchanted golden apples, or golden carrots.

Chickens can be bred using any type of seed, including: wheat, pumpkin, melon and beetroot seeds.

Wolves, once they've been tamed, can breed using almost every type of raw, or cooked, meat. This includes: rotten flesh, raw or cooked steak, raw or cooked porkchops, raw or cooked mutton, raw or cooked chicken, and raw or cooked rabbit. Wolves cannot be bred using any type of fish meat, or rabbit stew.

Ocelots must trust the player before breeding. Cats must be tamed and at full health before being bred. Both Minecraft mobs work similarly to wolves, but in an opposite fashion. They can be bred using any form of raw fish, including: raw cod, and raw salmon. They cannot be bred using cooked fish.

Rabbits can be bred using yellow dandelions, carrots, and golden carrots.

Llamas must be tamed before breeding, and can be bred using hay bales.

Turtles are slightly different than the other Minecraft mobs. They do not have babies on the spot after breeding, instead they lay eggs that take a few in-game days to hatch. Turtles must be bred using seagrass on, or near, a sandy area so they can lay their eggs immediately after breeding.

Pandas are the only Minecraft mob to have extra breeding conditions. There must be at least eight bamboo blocks within a five block radius of the two mobs. Don't push the pandas too close though! If the two are too close together when fed they won't breed, and instead will attack the player.

Foxes can be bred using sweet berries, which will allow the player to create a baby fox that trusts the player instead of running away.

Bees can be bred using any type of one or two block tall flower.

Striders can be bred using only warped fungus.

Hoglins are similar, but can only be bred using crimson fungus.

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Axolotls and Goats

(Image via Minuthu on YouTube)

Out of the mobs being released in the Minecraft 1.17 Caves & Cliffs Update, only the axolotl and goat can breed.

Goats work in the exact same fashion as sheep, cows and mooshrooms. Meaning they'll follow the player with wheat in hand, and breed with only wheat.

Axolotls are somewhat similar to cats and ocelots. They breed using only a tropical fish, or a bucket of tropical fish. While ocelots and cats can't use tropical fish to breed, axolotls can.