Tutorial:Tree Basics (Arboriculture)

(Redirected from Tree Breeding)

Wiki.png This article is part of the Feed The Beast Wiki's Tutorials section.

Tree Breeding or Arboriculture is a mechanic introduced by the Forestry mod. It allows the player to obtain new types of trees by cross pollinating trees with forestry Bees. These trees will give the player access to new types of wood and some will provide new fruits. The goal of this tutorial is to provide a step-by-step set of instructions for a player with no previous experience with Arboriculture.

A Note about Spoilers[edit]

This tutorial includes spoilers. Not too many but just enough to give you the basic idea of what to do when Arboriculturing.

Get Some Bees and Some Trees[edit]

To fully get into Tree Breeding, you are going to want to gather the four Vanilla trees: Oak, Birch, Spruce, and Jungle. You will also want some bees; any bees will do but bees of a higher specific trait are more helpful.

Specific bee traits and explanations of those traits are not in this tutorial, this tutorial is for tree breeding.

Ever since the new version of Forestry though you do not need bees if you enclose your trees so that the butterflies they spawn can't get out. The butterflies will act like bees but at a bit of a slower rate. In order to accomplish this you need to have trees with genomes so they will need to be analyzed.

Where to Begin[edit]

Start a tree grove and place some Apiaries. It is a good idea to automate the apiaries, but is not required. Either use a random assortment of trees or, if you know the specific breeding line of the tree you want, just use the two trees you want to crossbreed.

An alternative method for pollinating your trees is to use Bee Houses instead of Apiaries. These blocks are cheaper than Apiaries, and can sometimes be more useful as they give your bees extra buffs to make them last longer and pollinate faster (Note: as there are now Ignoble {% chance of not leaving a princess} and Pristine {will always leave a princess} bees, bee houses are very useful as the ignoble strains will never die out in them). However, they cannot connect to pipes, so they must be operated manually. You may also choose to use these in addition to Apiaries so that you may switch between the two when necessary.

After setting up the trees for crossbreeding, you are going to want to be sure you have a lot of grafters, tons of them. Grafters have five good uses and then one final, dud use before they break. It is a good idea to keep track of how many times you've used them and then just toss them before the sixth time because you could lose an important sapling to the dud use.

Once you have a good amount of grafters it is time to graft some saplings. Assuming your bees have been pollinating around the trees, go back to your grove and look out for discolored leaf blocks. In order to see mutated leaf blocks you must be wearing either Spectacles or an Apiarist's Hat. Use your grafter on any and all that aren't the right color because those leaves have been crossbred and you may be given a new sapling! Once you have a good amount of new sapling breeds, add the new trees to your grove and start all over!

The Treealyzer[edit]

While it is technically not a mandatory piece of equipment, without a Treealyzer there is no way to examine saplings in detail; any mutations will be largely a matter of luck, and selective breeding would be very time consuming. When first acquired, a tree will have the species name matching its appearance and <Unknown> below it, and no other information. By using Honey Drops or Honeydew in the Treealyzer to analyze the tree, its full genetic makeup will be given. The Treealyzer is a Carpenter recipe, and needs both Redstone and a single Diamond.

The initial concern when using the Treealyzer is a steady source of Honey Drops (or Honeydew) to analyze with. Mundane-tier bees don't produce very much, so you will want a lot of them creating honeycombs at once (or, if you dabble in bee breeding, try to use Noble, Majestic, or Imperial Bees). To save resources, it is a good idea to use the same bees for pollinating your trees and producing Honey.

The Grafter[edit]

The Grafter can be crafted in a crafting grid as follows:



Bronze Ingot


Alternatively a Proven Grafter can be obtained by trading with villagers.

Automated Apiary Construction[edit]

Set up any old automated apiary (generally consisting of an Apiary, Wooden Pipe, Autarchic Gate/Redstone Engine, and a pipe to sort the bees and combs). You can make as many apiaries as you want to cover the entirety of your grove, and you can use them as an automated honey producer as well!

Getting Established[edit]

So you have a ton of new trees, but you don't have the kind you want, keep going! Be sure to take out the trees from your grove that have already produced all of the kinds of new trees that they will produce.


  • Balsa
  • Bull Pine
    • the Bull Pine tree is a variant of the Spruce tree commonly found in vanilla Minecraft. It's leaves are much yellower, however. It produces vanilla Spruce planks, which makes it the only forestry tree which does not have it's own unique type of wood.
  • Common Walnut
  • Desert Acacia
  • Grandidier's Baobab
    • Grandidier's Baobab trees are large, fruitless, 3x3 trees with green planks and reddish bark.
  • Hill Cherry
  • Kapok
    • Kapok trees are very tall 1x1 trees which have a cluster of leaves at the top, produce no fruit, and have a tan colored wood.
  • Mundane Larch
  • Myrtle Ebony
  • Sequoia
  • Silver Lime
  • Sipiri
    • Sipiri trees are tall, 1x1 trees. They will not grow in any biome except a jungle or mini-jungle, which makes them the only Forestry tree which currently cannot grow outside it's specified biome. It produces Greenheart wood, and is one of only two trees from forestry, the other being the Yellow Meranti, which have wood that is named differently than the tree which produces it.
  • Sweet Chestnut
    • Sweet Chestnut trees are large 3x3 trees which produce chestnuts, which can be used to make seed oil in a squeezer.
  • Teak
  • Wenge
    • Wenge trees are small, fruitless, 2x2 trees.
  • White Willow
    • White Willow trees are average height, 1x1 trees with a lot of leaves, which form a sort of dome over the trunk of the tree. They can only be crossbred in a swampy biome (but can be grown elsewhere once crossbreed, unlike the Sipiri). They produce no fruit and have a yellowish wood. White Willow trees are useful for creating a small shelter for one night, the same as vanilla giant red mushrooms.
  • Yellow Meranti

Tree Mechanics[edit]



The usual result of a successful mutation is a hybrid of the new species with one of the parent species. A tree which mutated for both species genes will have all the default traits for the new species, and none of the parents, a purebred. A tree that is a partial mutation will have some genes of the new species, and some from the parent species.

Dominant versus Recessive[edit]

Dominant genes are shown in red/pink, recessive genes are blue. If a tree has two dominant or two recessive genes, the Active/Inactive order is determined at random. If a tree has one dominant and one recessive gene for a given trait, the dominant gene will always be Active.

Purebred versus Hybrid[edit]

All trees from the wild are purebred, that is, have both inactive and active Species traits that match. In the Treealayzer, it will list Species: Apple Oak, for example; this is a purebred Apple Oak tree. A Hybrid will have two different species, such as Apple Oak Silver Lime, or Apple Oak Hill Cherry, and have its species shown in blue for the tool tip once analyzed. Hybrids are the result of a tree inheriting two different species genes from its parents. The offspring of two identical hybrids may be hybrids themselves, or pures of the component species. Hybrids are also less effective to use for cross-breeding, making pure strains desirable.

Production and Experimentation[edit]

To cause mutations at least two different Vanilla or Forestry trees have to be planted near an active Apiary or Alveary, since Bees are required to pollinate leaf blocks, this process may take time.

Once a mutation occurred a leaf block will change its texture or color and will drop a mutated Sapling when broken with a Grafter.


Trees have something resembling an actual genome complete with "chromosomes" and "alleles". Most traits of a tree are freely inheritable between species.

# Chromosome Description
0 SPECIES The active Species trait of a tree determines its name and appearance, as well as those traits listed below that are indicated with the "Species-Locked" flag. Species-Locked traits are not transferrable between species: A tree will always have Species-Locked traits that match those of its active Species (e.g. for pre 1.5.1 versions of forestry "Girth" will always be 1x1 for any tree with Apple Oak as its active Species trait; attempting to breed a 2x2 Apple Oak is futile).
1 SAPLINGS Determines the Sapling drop rate from decaying leaves.
2 MATURES Determines how quickly a Sapling will grow into a mature tree by natural processes.
3 HEIGHT Determines the tree height: the quantity of wood blocks spawned when it grows from a sapling, as well as influencing the number of leaf blocks.
4 GIRTH Species-Locked (for pre 1.5.1 versions). Determines the trunk size of the tree and, by extension, the number of Saplings required to grow the tree. This stat ranges from the standard 1x1 (requiring a single Sapling) to 4x4 (requiring 16 Saplings).
5 YIELD Determines the fruit drop rate.
6 SAPPINESS Determines the amount of Biomass created by this tree's saplings when run through a Fermenter.
7 GROWTH Determines the conditions necessary for a tree to grow. Most commonly this trait is simply "Light".
8 NATIVE Determines the natural habitat of the tree.
9 TOLERATES Determines additional habitats that are tolerable to the tree.
10 SUPPORTS Species-Locked. Determines the types, or "Families", of fruit that can grow on the tree (see "Fruits" and "Family", below). Only fruits from families listed under this trait can possibly be produced by the tree, regardless of what appears under the tree's Fruits trait. If the tree's "Fruits" trait includes a fruit that isn't supported, it will appear crossed-out in the Treealyzer, and will not be produced by the tree.
11 FRUITS Determines the fruit produced by the tree, as long as it is from a family that the tree supports (see "Supports", above). If it is not, the fruit will appear crossed-out and will not be produced by the tree.
12 FAMILY Describes the family of the fruit listed under the Fruits trait: Pomes, Prunes, Nuts or Jungle. This family must appear among those listed under the tree's "Supports" trait, or the fruit will appear crossed-out in the Treealyzer, and will not be produced by the tree.

Each of these chromosomes consists of a primary and a secondary trait. Usually the primary trait will be the active one, unless that trait is recessive (blue) and the secondary trait is dominant (red): A dominant trait will always be active when its competition is a recessive trait.

Vanilla Trees[edit]

These are world-generated trees that can be used to cross-breed new trees.

  • Oak Sapling - Apple Oak
  • Spruce Sapling - Red Spruce
  • Birch Sapling - Silver Birch
  • Jungle Sapling

New Trees[edit]

  • Apple Oak
  • Orchard Apple
  • Silver Birch
  • Red Spruce
  • Silver Lime
  • Hill Cherry
  • Wild Cherry
  • Sequoia
  • Balsa
  • Desert Acacia
  • Wenge
  • Grandidier's Baobab
  • Teak
  • Kapok
  • Myrtle Ebony
  • Yellow Meranti
  • White Willow *
  • White Poplar
  • Sipiri **
  • Lemon
  • Plum
  • Sugar Maple
  • Blue Mahoe
  • Papaya
  • Date Palm

Wiki.png Spoiler warning!
Tree Breeding Girth Fruit
Apple Oak 1x1 Apple
Birch 1x1
Spruce 1x1
Jungle 1x1 Cocoa
Silver Lime Oak + Birch (15%) 1x1
Willow * Oak + Birch (10%)

Oak + Silver Lime (10%)
Birch + Silver Lime (10%)

White Poplar Oak + Willow (5%)

Birch + Willow (5%)
Silver Lime + Willow (5%)

Hill Cherry Oak + Silver Lime (10%)

Birch + Silver Lime (10%)

1x1 Cherry
Papaya Jungle + Hill Cherry (5%)
Date Palm Jungle + Papaya (5%)
Common Walnut Cherry + Silver Lime (10%) 2x2 Walnut
Sweet Chestnut Cherry + Walnut (10%)

Walnut + Silver Lime (10%)

2x2 Chestnut
Lemon Silver Lime + Hill Cherry (5%) 1x1 Lemons
Plum Hill Cherry + Lemon (5%) 1x1 Plums
Mundane Larch Oak + Spruce (10%)

Birch + Spruce (10%)

Bull Pine Spruce + Mundane Larch (10%) 1x1
Sequoia Bull Pine + Mundane Larch (5%) 3x3
Sugar Maple Silver Lime + Mundane Larch (5%) 1x1
Teak Jungle + Silver Lime (10%) 1x1
Kapok Jungle + Teak (10%) 1x1+
Myrtle Ebony Teak + Kapok (10%) 3x3-
Yellow Meranti Kapok + Myrtle Ebony (10%) 2x2+
Sipiri ** Kapok + Yellow Meranti (10%) 1x1+
Balsa Teak + Silver Lime (10%) 1x1
Desert Acacia Teak + Balsa (10%) 1x1
Blue Mahoe Birch + Desert Acacia (5%) 1x1
Wenge Balsa + Desert Acacia (10%) 2x2
Grandidier's Baobab Wenge + Balsa (10%) 3x3

* Must be bred in a wet biome (Swampy etc.)

** Must be bred and grown in a tropical biome (Jungle, Mini Jungle, etc.)


When you run a vanilla sapling through a Treealyzer the sapling will change into the Forestry version, which looks and acts slightly different. You can guarantee a sapling drop when using the Grafter with the Forestry version of the tree, or on leaf blocks that have mutated. Also, Forestry Jungle trees do not grow with 2x2 girth. This applies to hybrids also.

The Ebony Myrtle requires 9 (3x3) saplings grow. After growing, the trunk takes on a randomized shape, not a square 3x3 shape. Not to worry though, even without a grafter it drops plenty of saplings to regrow.

The Sipiri tree not only requires a tropical biome to breed, but grow as well. Neither bonemeal nor Hoe of Growth can make a Sipiri sapling mature to adulthood outside of a tropical biome. Oddly, the same is not true of Willow saplings, which will grow just fine outside their marshy homes.

Fruit-bearing trees may cause players with weaker computers to lag or experience a drop in frames per second if used in large quantities, as the process of fruit maturing is governed by redstone ticks. This problem alleviates itself when fruit is done maturing, as the ticks are no longer produced. The maturing process of fruit-bearing trees can be sped up through the use of bone meal or Fertilizer on the leaf blocks themselves. This is extremely useful for your high yeilding trees with slow maturing process times or if you're impatient and really want your fruit to grow.


Further Reading[edit]

Beyond the basics: