Naturalist

Naturalist is a Minecraft Java mod that fills the overworld with 47 wild animals, each tied to the biomes it belongs in and given behaviour worth stopping to watch. Bears raid beehives and berry bushes, lion prides trail a maneless leader, moles burrow the moment you sprint at them, and clams snap shut over the treasure they are guarding. The current 2.0 release runs on Fabric and NeoForge for 1.21.1, installs on both the client and the server, and no longer needs Geckolib.

What Naturalist adds in-game

Most Minecraft animal mods stop at new spawn eggs. Naturalist writes a food chain instead, which is what separates it from the wider pile of mob mods. Predators hunt named prey and then sit on a two minute cooldown rather than clearing the map, herds and prides travel together, birds and snakes pick their variant from the biome they spawn in, and a long list of animals can be tamed, bred, bucketed, or caught in a net. If you play on 1.20.1, Alex's Mobs is the other big roster mod worth comparing against, and Naturalist ships predator and prey compatibility for it.

• Biome-driven spawns. Every animal carries its own biome tag, so savanna, jungle, ocean, cave, and snowy biomes each get a different cast.
• Real predators and prey. Bears hunt deer and salmon, lions hunt zebras, boars, and rhinos, tigers hunt at night, and every kill starts a two minute cooldown.
• Taming and pets. Baby lions, hippos, elephants, mammoths, and bears grow into pets, while hedgehogs, crabs, rats, capybaras, birds, snakes, lizards, and tortoises tame from food.
• Mounts and storage. A tamed elephant or mammoth takes a saddle and a chest with a 25 slot inventory once it is grown, ostriches can be saddled and made to jump, and a fed giraffe carries a rider for a short while.
• Variants everywhere. One bird entity covers eight songbirds chosen by biome, snakes split into green, coral, and rattlesnake, and crabs, jellyfish, rays, tigers, hedgehogs, and rats each roll a colour or species on spawn.
• New drops and blocks. Venison, bushmeat, fur, fat, teeth, hides, glow goop, snail shells and shellstone, coloured froglass, and duck eggs all come off the roster.

Every animal in Naturalist

This is the roster in the 2.0 release for 1.21.1, grouped by where the animals live. Builds for 1.18.2 through 1.20.1 carry roughly half of it and none of the 2.0 additions, so check the group you care about against your version before you commit to a world.

Forests, plains, and snowy biomes

• Bear. Brown and shaggy, in forests and taigas. Neutral by day and hostile in darkness, raids beehives and berry bushes, shears for fur, and cubs tame from salmon, honeycomb, sweet berries, or venison.
• Black bear. A darker bear in forests, taigas, and groves, currently sharing the brown bear's behaviour.
• Deer. Forests and cherry groves. Bolts the moment it sees you unless you sneak, flees bears, and drops venison and leather.
• Boar. Savanna edges and forests. Keeps its distance unless you hold carrots, potatoes, or beetroot, and charges once you anger it.
• Hedgehog. Forests, plains, meadows, and taigas. Rolls into a spiked ball inside six blocks and hurts whatever touches it. Tames on sweet berries, and a tamed one can be netted and thrown as a weapon.
• Mole. Forests, plains, and meadows. Burrows when you sprint at it, leaves a trail of dirt mounds, and stays invulnerable underground until a wolf digs it out.
• Rat. Forests and plains. Tames on bread, and a tamed rat released onto a chest harvests and replants crops within seven blocks.
• Turkey. Forests, taigas, and groves. Runs from you inside six blocks unless you crouch, hunts ants, and falls slowly like a chicken.
• Bird. A single entity with eight songbird variants picked by biome, from blue jay and northern cardinal to Steller's jay. Eats dropped seeds, tames from them, and perches on your head to slow your fall.
• Mammoth. Snowy plains, ice spikes, snowy slopes, and frozen peaks, in herds of two or three. Babies tame on five cakes, and a grown tamed mammoth takes a saddle, a chest, and a banner.

Savannas, deserts, and badlands

• Lion. Savanna, in prides of three to five that follow the one maneless lion. Sleeps through the day and hunts zebras, boars, rhinos, and horses.
• Tiger. Jungles, mountains, badlands, deserts, cherry groves, and mangrove swamps, appearing as white tigers, leopards, or black panthers depending on the biome. Hunts at night. Cubs tame on meat, grown tigers never do.
• Elephant. Savanna. Neutral, gives bees a wide berth, and a baby fed five cakes grows up able to wear a saddle and carry a chest.
• Giraffe. Savanna. Feed it an apple or a hay block and it lets you ride for a short stretch.
• Zebra. Savanna. Handled like a horse, so it can be tamed, saddled, and given a chest.
• Rhino. Savanna. Winds up, charges, and smashes through blocks on the way.
• Ostrich. Savanna. Buries its head when you walk up, defends its eggs hard, and a chick you raise yourself can be saddled, ridden, and made to jump once it is grown.
• Vulture. Savanna, badlands, and desert. Circles high overhead, perches on cactus, scavenges rotten flesh, and picks on zombies and badly wounded players.
• Komodo dragon. Badlands, savannas, deserts, and jungles. Basks in the sun, watches you for twenty seconds if you linger, then turns hostile. Its bite poisons.
• Desert scorpion. Deserts and badlands. Hostile in the dark, poisons for six seconds, and can be caught with a capture net.

Jungles, swamps, and rivers

• Alligator. Swamps, mangrove swamps, and rivers. Attacks players in the water, at night, and anywhere near its eggs, and hunts deer, snakes, and frogs.
• Hippo. Savanna and jungle water. Attacks players who swim near it and rams boats. Babies tame on melon.
• Capybara. Jungles and swamps in groups of two to four. Completely passive, sleeps through the day, swims well, tames on melon slices, and wears a dyed collar.
• Tortoise. Swamps, deserts, and jungles. Pulls into its shell, lays eggs, tames on bamboo or dandelions, and gains health once tamed.
• Lizard. Swamps, deserts, jungles, forests, and savannas. Tames on spider eyes and drops its tail when hurt, leaving it twitching on the ground.
• Snake. One entity with three variants. Coral snakes in jungles, rivers, and beaches, rattlesnakes in deserts, badlands, and savannas, green snakes elsewhere. The first two poison, and rattlesnakes rattle at anything inside four blocks.
• Jungle scorpion. Jungles. Bigger than the desert kind, hostile in darkness, poisons on hit, and cannot be netted.
• Duck. Swamps and rivers. Lays throwable duck eggs, tames on fish, and ducklings can be scooped into a bucket.
• Bass. Swamps, mangrove swamps, and rivers, in schools that share one size. Larger bass swallow smaller ones whole, and a medium bass that feeds can grow into a large one.
• Catfish. Swamps and mangrove swamps. Hunts cod, tropical fish, tadpoles, and bass, swallowing bass whole.
• Piranha. Jungle water and lush caves, in schools of up to twenty-four. The school leader picks the target and the rest follow, so hitting one turns all of them on you.

Oceans

• Whale. Ocean biomes. Fed and bred with cod, salmon, or crab meat, immune to jellyfish and pufferfish stings, and drops fat.
• Great white shark. Warm and lukewarm oceans. Charges head-on, pulls back, and circles for another pass, and goes after players in low light. Cannot be tamed or bred.
• Anglerfish. Oceans, with a glowing variant the deeper it spawns. Neutral until provoked, hunts cod and tropical fish, and can be bucketed.
• Blobfish. Deep ocean floors. Five seconds at the surface turns it into a pink blob, and it reforms once it sinks back down.
• Jellyfish. Oceans, in about five colours. Drifts on the current and stings anything that touches it, whales excepted.
• Ray. Oceans, as a stingray, eagle ray, or mobula ray. Passive, but poisons anyone who attacks it.
• Giant isopod. Ocean floors, brown or blue. Walks the seabed and curls up when you come within three blocks.
• Crab. Beaches and stony shores in five colours. Picks up dropped swords and tools and fights with them, and tamed crabs dance near a playing jukebox.
• Clam. Ocean floors. One in twenty holds treasure, and it snaps shut and launches you upward in a burst of bubbles when you get close.
• Starfish. Ocean floors. Can be bucketed, and drops a placeable block form.

Bugs and small wildlife

• Ant. Ant hills that generate in jungles and savannas. Carries dropped food home, alerts the whole colony when hurt, and a planted queen starts a colony tamed to you.
• Butterfly. Forests, plains, and swamps, as named species such as monarch, red admiral, and purple emperor. Pollinates and speeds up nearby crops.
• Caterpillar. Climbs walls and cocoons itself into a chrysalis. Catch it with a capture net.
• Dragonfly. Swamps and mangrove swamps. Drops froglass, a coloured glass block in azure, verdant, and crimson.
• Firefly. Forests, plains, swamps, and mushroom fields. Glows after dark, hides in tall grass, and drops glow goop.
• Snail. Most temperate biomes plus lush and dripstone caves. Hides in its shell inside five blocks, can be dyed any colour, and leaves slime balls the way a chicken leaves eggs.

How to install Naturalist

1. 1.Pick the loader your version supports. Fabric covers 1.18.2 through 1.21.1, NeoForge covers 1.21.1 only, and Forge stops at 1.20.1. Our guide to installing Minecraft mods on Java walks through that step.
2. 2.On Fabric, download Fabric API as well. Every Fabric build of Naturalist lists it as a required dependency.
3. 3.Download Naturalist from the Modrinth project page, matching the file to your loader and Minecraft version.
4. 4.Drop the jar into your mods folder, alongside Fabric API if you are on Fabric.
5. 5.Launch the game. For multiplayer, install the same files on the server as well as on every client.

Compatibility and dependencies

• Loaders and versions. Fabric on 1.18.2, 1.19.x, 1.20.1, and 1.21.1. NeoForge on 1.21.1 only. Forge on 1.18.2 through 1.20.1.
• Current release. Naturalist 2.0.3, published in August 2026 for Fabric and NeoForge on 1.21.1.
• Required dependency. Fabric API on every Fabric build. The NeoForge build needs nothing beyond NeoForge itself.
• Geckolib. Dropped in 2.0, so the 1.21.1 files run without it. Builds for 1.20.1 and earlier still list it as required.
• Side. Install on both the client and the server for multiplayer.
• Config. Animals can be switched off one at a time or as whole groups of land animals, aquatic animals, and bugs, which matters because 47 spawning species is a lot of extra entities in a world.
• Integrations. LambDynamicLights, Field Guide, BucketLib, Terralith spawns, and breeding info in JEI and EMI through Just Enough Breeding.