Naturalist is a fantastic mod that adds a bunch of new animals to woodland and deserted dryland biomes. There are some incredibly well done animals added with this mod that have been missing from the Minecraft world and each one has unique animations and behaviors to further immerse the player in the wild world around them. There are several new birds added with beautifully precise flying animations and visual accuracy to the real life birds they are modeled after. They have unique chirps and may even be loyal to you if you feed them!

Along with birds you will likely come across other flying creatures scattered about the forests and grassy biomes like fireflies. These will be best admired at night since they will light up the areas they inhabit much the same as they do in real life. They are truly a great addition to night exploration and really set the scene with their illuminated splendor.

You may also come across butterflies fluttering around pollinating flowers and crops but this mod goes a step further by including the full lifecycle of these wonderful creatures. There are caterpillars crawling around that you can spawn by breeding butterflies. They will look for any nearby trees to settle down and form a chrysalis on. You can even observe the entire cycle as it grows through a few stages before emerging as a butterfly!

Snakes can also be found on the forest floors and there are three varieties added with this mod: a standard snake breed, a coral snake, and a rattlesnake. Each one is brilliantly accurate while slithering around and up trees as well as the iconic sound you hear from rattlesnakes. They will feed on smaller animals almost instantly if they are nearby so be careful if you plan on keeping any close by your chicken coops!

And of course no forest would be complete without bears and deer. This mod adds grizzly bears that act very similarly to those in real life, as in they won’t necessarily harm you unless you get too close to them or their cubs. They also almost exclusively hunt deer, which can be pretty elusive prey due to their ability to walk silently and carefully through the forest. That might be a good indicator to do the same if you notice them behaving much more cautiously as they may know when bears are close by.

Perhaps this feature is a bit on the morbid side but you can also skin the fur from bears and make teddy bears with them. Makes for a sweet gift but the source might be upsetting.

And the desert drylands now have many new and exotic animals to enjoy seeing but at a cost of needing to be extra wary in case of an unexpected attack. Lions can be found in full prides with many of them working closely together to survive. They rule over the Savanna biomes and will typically hunt mobs at night, which is a great pro but the con is that you may also be on their list of prey to attack on sight.

And the exotic animals extends to elephants and giraffes, which are mostly docile and gentle. Elephants will fight when they are attacked and that fight likely won’t end well given their massive size. And giraffes can be ridden for 30 seconds at a time when you feed them golden apples!

You will also likely run into boars and rhinos as well that can be easily provoked if you get too close to their young. The rhinos in this mod are also expertly animated with the titular foot scrape on the ground before they start charging after an enemy.

And zebras can be found in the savanna too. They can be tamed just the same as horses but are much more difficult to do so but they are faster than horses while in water.

Each animal also has their own unique sleep cycles and subsequent animations to accompany them. The developer really spent a lot of time and effort into the quality of these animals and their movements and behaviors are incredibly realistic. This mod truly immerses the player with a great selection of new animals that fit very well into the Minecraft aesthetic and themes. Give this mod a try and add some new creatures to admire. There was clearly a lot of care put into the accuracy of these animals and it really shows here.