At first glance, a cactus farm might not seem practical, but you can do a lot with it. Moreover, it is easy to build and can be integrated into any Minecraft world. Usually, cacti can only be found in the desert in a Minecraft world. However, if you harvest the blocks and take them home, you can build an automatic farm! We will show you exactly how it works and why you might want to build such a cactus farm. It is very useful, and not just for obtaining green dye.
Why Do I Need a Cactus Farm?
1. For Green Dye
If you smelt a cactus in a furnace, it will turn into green dye. This is also the only recipe you can make with cacti. Green dye is necessary to colour various blocks. There are surprisingly many items that are available in several colours. You can then use these as decoration.
Uses of Green Dye:
- Wool (or sheep)
- Carpets
- Beds
- Bundles
- Cyan Dye
- Lime Dye
- Candle
- Fireworks
- Glass and glass panes
- Terracotta/Ceramics
- Concrete
- Banner
- Dyeing collars (cats and dogs)
You can also trade 12 green dyes with a shepherd. This trade is available in both Java and Bedrock from the expert level. The villager will give you an emerald in exchange. With a large cactus farm, this trade can be very worthwhile, especially with a discount. For how to build a trading post with villagers, we also have the appropriate article (How to Build a Villager Trading Post: Obtain Valuable Items through Trading) for you!
2. For Experience Points
A by-product of smelting is that furnaces give you experience points. We have already talked about this in one of our articles (How to Build an XP Farm: Levelling Up Made Easy) . We want to introduce you to a corresponding automatic cactus farm in this article, but with a slightly different design. With a cactus farm, you can collect XP without having to fight monsters. This is extremely cool, especially on Peaceful mode!
3. For Camel Breeding
These large animals can be found in desert villages and can be tamed. For this, you need a saddle, a lead, and a cactus. So if you want to have many camels and breed them, an automatic cactus farm is just the thing for you!
4. For Compost
You can also compost the cacti and make bone meal from them. This saves you from fighting skeletons, building a mob trap, or taking a trip to the Soul Sand Valley in the Nether.
Building a Cactus Farm: Step-by-Step Guide
With this cactus farm, you can implement all the points mentioned above. It is best to catch the cacti with a hopper and direct them into a chest. From there, you can either take the cacti, build a smelter, or use a composter.
Build the farm a bit off the ground so you can build a furnace underneath later or at least store some chests. From the hopper, form a kind of star that extends 4 blocks in each direction. This ensures that the water flows correctly and directs the cacti into the hopper.
Build a wall around the catch basin, one block high. In each of the four corners, place a bucket of water. The water should flow exactly to the middle, but no further.
Next, it’s time to plant the cacti. For this, you need to build a block over the water basin in an alternating pattern. Cacti cannot grow next to each other, and we use this mechanic in the design. On the respective construction blocks, place a sand block or another block on which the cactus can grow. The cactus is then planted on it.
Now you just need to place fence posts a level above and between the cacti. Iron bars also work! These ensure that the cactus can grow, but the new block is immediately harvested. As mentioned, the cactus can’t grow properly if there’s a block next to it. The automatically harvested block then lands in the water and is directed into the hopper by the current.
In the end, it’s important to build a sort of wall around the automatic cactus farm. This ensures that no cacti fall out. Use glass to see through, but any other full block will also work!
Tip: You don’t have to limit this farm to just one level; you can build it infinitely high or wide. Just make sure the water flows all lead to one endpoint and flow correctly. But you can easily continue the pattern presented above.
Adding an Automatic Smelter
If you want to get experience points or green dye, you can also build an automatic smelter directly under the cactus farm. You need three hoppers and three chests for this.
A furnace works like this:
- The block to be smelted goes in at the top. In our case, that’s the cactus.
- The fuel goes in at the back. This can be anything from coal to lava.
- The smelted blocks are extracted from the bottom, which is the green dye in this farm.
Control the output with a lever on the furnace. If you activate it, the green dye will no longer be extracted. If you now take it out manually, you will receive the experience from all smelting processes! The XP is essentially stored in the furnace.
Adding for Compost
A composter works similarly to a furnace. The cacti go in at the top, where they are processed in the composter. The finished bone meal comes out at the bottom. Use hoppers and chests here as well to automate the process.
Conclusion
A cactus farm is a really simple farm that doesn’t require any redstone. It uses the natural growth of the plant to automatically harvest itself. In the end, the cacti are collected by water currents and then processed further. Cacti are excellent for XP farms, for example! A furnace stores the experience gained from smelting. You can also use cacti for green dye, as decoration, or to feed camels. Get a constant supply of cactus and more on your own server. Rent your Minecraft server and automate your farms for maximum efficiency!
