Description
Cattle farming can be used to obtain milk, a constant food source, although cattle can later be slaughtered for meat if necessary. As of the 1.26 update, having bulls around your house can also reduce the amount of aggressive animals you awake to.
The video below is Kaalus's view on cattle farming:
Cowboy Life Part 2
Kaalus cattle driving
How to Farm Cattle?
First build a fenced area to contain the cattle. Use open gates or blocks placed next to the fence to allow cattle into the fenced area. To herd cattle, you can blow whistles, which they will run away from into the other direction. An alternative to move cattle is to use tall grass as bait. Hitting cattle isn't very effective since cows will run away from you whilst bulls will attack you. Use a bucket to collect milk from a cow by tapping the cow with the bucket while keeping yourself safe from bulls (e.g. milk cows from the other side of the fence). After a cow has been milked once you will need to wait for it to regenerate milk before you can milk it again. Black cows will regenerate milk faster than brown cows.
Keep Your Bulls
As of the 1.26 update it is important to keep bulls with your cows and make sure that they are all the same color. Although bulls will try to attack you if you milk or accidentally hit one of their cows they are necessary to protect cows from animal attacks. Having several bulls of the same color is best since bulls of the same color will gang up on anyone messing with a cow of the same color. Fences will not always provide sufficient protection for cows since many aggressive animals, especially werewolves and tigers, can at times find ways to jump fences. Also aggressive animals may spawn inside the fenced area. Not having a few bulls around will almost inevitably lead to a dead herd.
Notes
- Cattle run away from the sound of a whistle, as do ostriches and birds.
- Cattle will come after tall grass and flowers to eat them when dropped as items.
- You can gather milk from cows using a Bucket.
- Cattle also run away from the sound of an explosion creating an effect on the entire herd of cows.
- Bulls will attack you if you hit a cow.
- Bulls will only guard their own cows; Black Bulls only protect Black Cows and Brown Bulls only protect Brown Cows. There are no completely white cows and as such the rare white bull is less useful than its counterparts, although can be kept with other cows for alternative carnivore bait.
Related Pages
- Herding
- Rideable Animals
- Farming
- Egg Farms
- Brown Cow
- Black Cow
- Brown Bull
- Black Bull
- White Bull
- 8 things for the perfect survival house!- this page provides some other useful tips for cattle herding.