The first Minecraft Java update of 2025 has arrived with version 1.21.5, titled "Spring to Life." Released on March 25, 2025, this nature-focused update brings biome-specific animal variants, fallen trees, and various new decorative blocks to enhance the Overworld's visual diversity and immersion.
Biome-Dependent Animal Variants Transform the Landscape
Farm animals now come in three distinct variants based on their biome: cold, temperate (default), and warm. Pigs, cows, and chickens will spawn with unique appearances depending on whether they're in snowy regions, moderate climates, or hot biomes like deserts and badlands.
When bred, baby animals randomly inherit one of their parents' variants, adding a new layer of farming strategy. Cold chickens now lay blue eggs while warm chickens produce brown ones, giving players new collectible items.
Sheep have received a significant overhaul with their wool colors now biome-dependent. White wool dominates temperate biomes, black wool is common in cold regions, and brown wool prevails in warm areas. All biomes still maintain a rare chance for the coveted pink sheep to appear.
Wolf Personalities Come to Life
Wolves now have seven distinct sound variants: Classic, Big, Cute, Puglin, Angry, Grumpy, and Sad. Each wolf is randomly assigned one of these sound profiles at spawn, giving them unique personalities through different ambient, hurt, death, growl, whine, and pant sounds.
These audio changes complement the existing wolf texture variants, though the two features aren't directly linked. This means your tundra wolf might have the "Cute" sound profile while your spotted wolf could sound "Grumpy."
What new blocks are in the update?
The update introduces several nature-themed blocks to enhance world generation:
- Fallen Trees: Oak, Birch, Jungle, and Spruce variants that generate naturally, sometimes decorated with mushrooms or vines
- Firefly Bush: Emits glowing particles at night when placed near water in swamps and other biomes
- Leaf Litter: Decorative ground cover found in forests that can be crafted by smelting leaves
- Wildflowers: Colorful additions to Birch Forests and Meadows
- Bush: Small decorative shrubs for various forest and plains biomes
- Short/Tall Dry Grass: Desert and Badlands vegetation that can be used for composting
- Cactus Flower: Pink blooms that can grow on cacti and be used for pink dye
Visual and Gameplay Improvements
Spawn eggs have been completely redesigned with unique visuals that better represent each mob's personality and size. This overhaul improves readability and accessibility for players.
The update also brings subtle ambient enhancements like falling leaf particles from all leaves blocks and new ambient sounds in desert and badlands biomes. Beacon beams now render beyond 16 chunks, extending to the client's full render distance.
Other gameplay changes include a rebalanced Cartographer and Wandering Trader system, Lodestone crafting recipe updates, and improved mob spawning in various biomes. Minecraft's Game Tests system has also been made accessible through data packs with the new test command.
The "Spring to Life" update is available now through the Minecraft Launcher, with the server jar available for download from the official website.