Zombies Eat Animals

Zombies can now hunt animals for food, eat dropped meat to recover health, and gain additional maximum health. Unprotected livestock and animals in the wilderness may therefore become part of a zombie's food chain.

The mod also automatically supports many modded animals by checking their loot tables, while datapack tags and configs give modpack authors direct control over the system.

Zombie Growth and Rewards

Depending on configuration, zombies can:

• Gain additional maximum health from repeated feeding
• Become persistent after eating and stop naturally despawning
• Drop additional loot based on the maximum health they gained
• Receive temporary Resistance effect after eating rotten flesh

The maximum amount of health growth is configurable, including an additional cap for Hard difficulty. This means a zombie that survives and feeds for a long time can become both more dangerous and more rewarding to kill.

Configuration

Most aspects of the system can be adjusted.

Hunting

• alwaysHunting — Zombies continue looking for prey whenever normal hunting conditions allow it
• berserkerHunting — Enables a more aggressive hunting mode that bypasses normal hunting limits
• huntCooldownTicks — Cooldown between successful hunts
• huntCapForADay — Maximum hunts per zombie during one Minecraft day
• huntCapForADayTotal — Maximum total hunts by zombies in the same level during one day
• huntFollowDistanceFactor — Multiplier applied to zombie follow range while searching for prey
• doNotAttackZombieHorses — Prevents zombies from targeting zombie horses

Eating and Growth

• enableEatFoodItems — Enables eating dropped food
• recoveryPerNutrition — Controls health restored from food nutrition
• maxHealthBoostCap — Maximum additional health zombies can gain from feeding
• maxHealthBoostCapHardModeAddition — Additional health-growth cap in Hard difficulty
• eatCooldownTicks — Cooldown between eating actions
• rottenFleshGiveResistance — Allows rotten flesh to grant temporary Resistance

Persistence and Loot

• zombiesBecomePersistentAfterEating — Zombies that have eaten will no longer naturally despawn
• zombiesDropMoreLoot — Adds bonus loot based on health gained through feeding
• hpLootRatio — Controls how much gained maximum health is required for additional loot rolls

Datapack Support

The mod uses tags to control zombie food and hunting targets.

Zombie Food

zombieseatanimals:zombie_food

Any item in this tag can be eaten by zombies.

data/zombieseatanimals/tags/items/zombie_food.json

Force Hunting Targets

zombieseatanimals:zombie_target_animal

Entities in this tag are always considered valid hunting targets.

Prevent Hunting

zombieseatanimals:not_zombie_target_animal

Entities in this tag are never hunted.

Target selection follows this priority:

1. Entities in not_zombie_target_animal are never hunted.
2. Entities in zombie_target_animal are always valid targets.
3. Otherwise, the mod checks whether the entity's loot table can drop an item in zombie_food.

For most modpacks, adding compatible food items to zombie_food should be enough. The entity tags are mainly intended for cases where explicit overrides are needed.

Zombies Eat Animals

Zombies hunt animals for food. Eating meat restores their health and helps them grow stronger over time.

This mod turns zombies into scavengers and predators that interact with the world instead of wandering aimlessly.

Features

Zombies Hunt Animals

Zombies will search for nearby animals and attempt to hunt them.

Typical targets include creatures that drop edible meat, such as:

• Cow
• Pig
• Sheep
• Chicken
• Rabbit

Animals in the wilderness are no longer completely safe at night.

Zombies that survive long enough will repeatedly hunt for food.

Automatic Target Detection

The mod automatically detects valid prey.

If a creature's loot table can drop food items that zombies can eat, zombies will treat that creature as a hunting target.

This means many modded animals will work automatically without additional configuration.

Zombies Eat Meat

When animals die and drop food items, zombies can walk toward the dropped items and eat them.

Supported foods include:

• Raw meat
• Cooked meat
• Rotten flesh

Eating food restores zombie health and contributes to long-term growth.

Zombies Can Grow Stronger

Zombies that keep feeding may gradually increase their maximum health.

Over time, well-fed zombies that survive in the wild may become significantly tougher than normal zombies.

The growth cap is configurable.

Rotten Flesh Bonus

Eating rotten flesh may grant a temporary Resistance effect, allowing zombies to become harder to kill for a short time.

Gameplay Impact

This behavior creates a more dynamic world:

• Animals may be hunted by zombies at night
• Zombies roaming the wilderness may grow stronger over time
• Unprotected farms may lose livestock
• The death of a zombie may strengthen a nearby zombie
• Monsters interact more naturally with the environment

Configuration

Several aspects of zombie behavior can be configured.

Hunting Behavior

• alwaysHunting Zombies will always attempt to hunt animals. (Still respect hunting cooldown and other limits)

• berserkerHunting Enables a special mode that bypasses normal hunting limits.

• huntCooldownTicks Cooldown between successful hunts.

• huntCapForADay Maximum hunts per zombie within one Minecraft day.

• huntCapForADayTotal Maximum hunts by all zombies in the same level per day.

• huntFollowDistanceFactor Multiplier applied to zombie follow range when searching for animals.

Eating Behavior

• enableEatFoodItems Whether zombies can eat dropped food items.

• recoveryPerNutrition Health restored from eating food.

• maxHealthBoostCap Maximum health increase zombies can gain from feeding.

• maxHealthBoostCapHardModeAddition Additional health cap applied in Hard difficulty.

• eatCooldownTicks Cooldown between eating actions.

• rottenFleshGiveResistance Rotten flesh may grant a temporary resistance effect.

Datapack Support

The mod uses a tag-based system to determine which foods zombies can eat.

Zombie Food Tag

zombieseatanimals:zombie_food

Items inside this tag are considered edible by zombies.

Example datapack path:

data/zombieseatanimals/tags/items/zombie_food.json

Example:

{
  "replace": false,
  "values": [
    "minecraft:beef",
    "minecraft:cooked_beef",
    "minecraft:porkchop",
    "minecraft:cooked_porkchop"
  ]
}

Any item added to this tag will be treated as food that zombies can eat.

Entity Target Control

The mod also provides entity type tags to control which creatures zombies will hunt.

These tags allow modpack authors to override the automatic detection system.

Force Hunting Targets

zombieseatanimals:zombie_target_animal

Entities in this tag will always be considered valid hunting targets, regardless of their loot tables.

Example datapack path:

data/zombieseatanimals/tags/entity_types/zombie_target_animal.json

Example:

{
  "replace": false,
  "values": [
    "minecraft:horse",
    "minecraft:donkey"
  ]
}

Prevent Hunting

zombieseatanimals:not_zombie_target_animal

Entities in this tag will never be hunted by zombies, even if they drop edible food.

Example datapack path:

data/zombieseatanimals/tags/entity_types/not_zombie_target_animal.json

Example:

{
  "replace": false,
  "values": [
    "minecraft:cat"
  ]
}

Target Selection Priority

When deciding whether a creature should be hunted, the mod applies the following rules:

1. If the creature is in not_zombie_target_animal, it will never be hunted.
2. If the creature is in zombie_target_animal, it will always be hunted.
3. Otherwise, the mod checks whether the creature's loot table can drop an item contained in the zombie_food tag.

This design allows the system to work automatically for most creatures while still giving modpack authors full control.

Modpack Integration

The mod is designed to work well in modded environments.

In most cases, modpack authors only need to add edible items to the zombie_food tag. Creatures that drop those foods will automatically become potential prey.

Entity tags are optional and only needed when explicit control is desired.

Related Projects:

Zombies Do Not Eat Zombie Horses