Not Enough Pets: New Cats, Dogs & Parrots in Minecraft
Vanilla Minecraft offers a surprisingly limited selection of animal companions. Players can tame three cat variants, a handful of wolf coats, and parrots introduced in update 1.12. For those who have spent hundreds of hours exploring the same biomes, the repetitive sight of identical felines and canines grows stale quickly. Not Enough Pets: New Cats, Dogs & Parrots in Minecraft shatters these boundaries by reintroducing dozens of unique textures, sounds, and behaviors that feel familiar to players of newer versions while remaining fully playable on older builds. This expansion breathes fresh life into the game's creature roster, turning a simple pet system into a rich catalog of breeds and personality quirks.
Core Mechanics and Features
The central innovation of this modification lies in its expanded skin system for cats, dogs, and parrots. When you tame a cat in the wild, the game no longer assigns a random coat color upon domestication. Instead, the animal retains the exact texture it spawned with, preserving its natural appearance throughout its life. Ocelots continue to spawn exclusively in jungle biomes, maintaining their wild, untamed look, while domestic cat variations appear in villages across the overworld. These village cats range from British Shorthairs to the sleek black Jelly variant, offering visual diversity that vanilla Minecraft simply cannot match.
Canine Breeds and Behavior
Dogs receive equally generous treatment. Beyond the standard gray wolf, players can now encounter beagles, pugs, huskies, Saint Bernards, and even a border collie modeled after Angelo from Final Fantasy VIII. Each breed carries its own distinct texture, making it easy to identify your companion from a distance. Stray dogs roam village streets, while wild wolf variants still inhabit forest biomes, preserving the natural progression of taming while adding new options for collectors.
Parrot Varieties and Backporting
Parrots deserve special attention. Not Enough Pets: New Cats, Dogs & Parrots in Minecraft does not merely add custom colorations such as the African grey parrot or the rosy-faced lovebird; it also backports the entire parrot system to versions preceding 1.12. This means that players running older clients, such as 1.7.10 or 1.10.2, can finally enjoy a feathered companion that perches on their shoulder and mimics nearby mob sounds. The modification bridges the gap between old and new content, ensuring no player misses out on the joy of a winged friend.
Detailed Feature List
- Texture preservation for cats after taming, eliminating random skin swaps.
- Over 20 cat breeds, including community-crafted skins named Willow, Blitzkrieg, Princess, and others.
- Stray dogs in villages and wild wolf variations in forested areas.
- Parrots available on versions 1.6.4 through 1.11, complete with the full range of color mutations.
- Dyeable collars for cats, allowing personalized color coordination.
- Fine-tuned audio settings: reduce meowing frequency, control pet teleportation distance, and disable following behavior.
- Adjustable shoulder-perch height for parrots and a selectable list of mobs they imitate, including creatures from other mods.
- Ocelots no longer fear water, and non-ocelot cats drop string upon death.
- A rare chance for brown-capped mushrooms to appear, a pleasant bonus for mushroom biome enthusiasts.
Compatibility and Installation
The modification targets Minecraft versions from 1.6.4 up to 1.12.2. The developer notes that the 1.6.4 build no longer receives updates due to issues with the Gradle build system, and custom skin submissions are temporarily paused. If you possess a worthy skin design, the author recommends visiting their Discord server for future opportunities. A critical compatibility note: Not Enough Pets: New Cats, Dogs & Parrots in Minecraft conflicts with the Doggy Talents mod. However, the configuration file allows you to disable the local wolf implementation by setting "Enable NEC version: Dog" to false, enabling both mods to function together in a single world.
Modern launchers simplify the installation process considerably. Through platforms like foxygame.net, you can download Not Enough Pets: New Cats, Dogs & Parrots in Minecraft directly from the launcher menu without manually editing folders or resolving dependencies. The launcher automatically selects a compatible game version and handles all necessary setup steps. This convenience proves invaluable when switching between multiple modpacks or testing the modification on an older 1.7.10 client.
How to Install
To install the mod manually, first ensure you have the appropriate version of Minecraft and the required mod loader, such as Forge, installed. Download the mod file matching your game version, then place it into the "mods" folder within your Minecraft directory. Launch the game once to generate the configuration files, then restart to apply all changes. For users of launchers with built-in mod support, the process reduces to selecting the mod from a list and confirming the installation. Regardless of method, always back up your world before adding new modifications.
Summoning Specific Breeds
Since version 1.4.0, the mod includes spawn eggs, but these do not control age or ownership. For precise control, the summon command offers greater flexibility:
/summon [entity_name] ~ ~ ~ {Owner:"[player_name]", CatType:[number], Age:[number]}
The entity name varies by game version: for 1.11–1.12, use notenoughpets:ocelot_nep; for 1.8–1.10, use notenoughpets.Ocelot_NEP. Replace CatType with DogType or Variant depending on the animal you wish to summon. The Age parameter determines maturity, where 0 indicates an adult and -24000 produces a newborn. This command structure allows server administrators and single-player enthusiasts alike to populate their worlds with precisely the breeds they desire.
Audio and Behavioral Enhancements
The author has replaced cat and ocelot sounds with the updated audio from Java Edition 1.14, including one previously unused variant. Parrots mimic mobs from a customizable list, enabling them to imitate creatures from other installed mods. Cats continue to repel creepers, and parrots remain seated on your shoulder when you mount a horse or enter a minecart. These refinements make interactions with pets feel more dynamic and predictable, enhancing the overall gameplay experience without disrupting the vanilla atmosphere.
Conclusion
Not Enough Pets: New Cats, Dogs & Parrots in Minecraft for Minecraft transforms the sparse animal roster of the base game into a comprehensive encyclopedia of breeds while preserving the familiar feel of vanilla gameplay. Players stuck on older versions will particularly appreciate the backported parrots and new cat colorations. The flexible configuration options allow you to tailor pet behavior to your playstyle, and the ability to mute annoying sounds proves invaluable during long building sessions. Whether you seek to enliven a solo world or add variety to a multiplayer server, this modification deserves serious consideration. The combination of visual diversity, behavioral depth, and broad version support makes it a standout addition to any modded setup.