Minecraft Tips No. 2: The Mob Farming Controversy

by Nicolas and Finn, Grade 6

Ok, so this article is a collaboration with Finn! The reason for this articles existence is simple, to fix the controversy between farmers everywhere in the cube shaped world of Minceraft. While cows drop leather and steak, chickens drop feathers and chicken and sheep drop wool and mutton. So, which is the most useful of the mob farms? Let’s find out.

First up, chickens. Chickens drop feathers, which can be used for arrows and a book and quill. The book and quill allows you to write a journal about your friendless life in the Minecraft life, while arrows allow you to shoot mobs far range using a bow or crossbow. Although useful, chicken isn't the best food source. When it's raw, it has a 30 percent chance to poison you and gives you ½ a hunger bar, which is really bad. In addition, cooked chicken is one of the worst meats, only above mutton and the raws in the meat, and baked potatoes are the only root vegetables that give you more hunger bars/saturation than chicken.

Next up, sheep. Sheep drop wool and mutton. Raw mutton has a 0% chance to poison and wool is very useful too. If you have 3 of the same color, with 3 wood of the same type as well, you can make a bed to make it through the night quickly. Wool can also be dyed with colored dye and is pretty in builds. Mutton is one of the worst food sources in the game, with it’s cooked version being the same as a carrot and its raw giving the same hunger as raw chicken.

Finally, the one you’ve all been waiting for, cows. Cows drop leather and raw beef, and can be milked with a bucket to get a bucket of milk. Milk buckets give the ability to clear all status effects from your character when drunk, and will create a cake when you put 3 milk buckets, 2 sugars, 1 egg and 3 wheat in a crafting table. When raw, raw beef gives as much hunger as a cooked mutton, which already puts it above mutton, and when cooked, gives as much as cooked pork chops, giving 4 hunger bars, about 1 half of your overall hunger. Leather can be used to craft the 2nd weakest of armor, item frames, and the weakest horse armor.

Nicolas’ Opinion

Overall, in my opinion, I think cows are the most useful, as they have the most uses. You can milk them, you can kill them for leather to use for multiple crafting recipes, or you can use the meat to get a lot of hunger.

Finn’s Opinion

In my opinion, a Chicken farm is the most useful. The best farm for this is you put a hopper on the floor leading to a chest and then throw in eggs. Once you’re out of eggs, pour in lava so the chickens only have a half a block of space, therefore when the chicken grows, it will burn and the drops will go into the hopper and you take the eggs and do it all over again. This is useful since the cooked chicken can provide a good food source in my opinion, giving you 6 full bars of hunger/saturation per cooked chicken. The feathers can also be used for key things, such as a book and quill as well as arrows.

So overall, if you just want to have your own opinion (*cough cough* Finn) you can choose chickens or sheep as your best personally. But for overall uses, cows are the most efficient.