Bone Meal

Bone Meal

Rarity color	Common
Renewable	Yes
Stackable	Yes (64)

Bone meal is a material that can be used as a fertilizer for most plants, as well as a crafting ingredient for dyes.

Obtaining

Crafting

Ingredients	Crafting recipe
Bone	3
Bone Block	9

Fish

All 4 fish mob variants (cod, salmon, tropical fish, and pufferfish) have a 5% chance to drop 1 bone meal upon death ‌^{[Java Edition only]}. In bedrock edition, they drop bones instead.

Composters

When a composter is completely filled, a single bone meal drops the next time the composter is used.

Trading

Wandering traders sell 3 bone meal for an emerald.‌^{[Bedrock Edition only]}

Usage

Crafting ingredient

Name	Ingredients	Crafting recipe	Description
Bone Block	Bone Meal
Gray Dye	Ink Sac or Black Dye + Bone Meal	2	‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]
Gunpowder	Coal or Charcoal + Sulfur + Bone Meal	3	‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]
Light Blue Dye	Lapis Lazuli or Blue Dye + Bone Meal	2	‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]
Lime Dye	Green Dye + Bone Meal	2	‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]
Magenta Dye	Lapis Lazuli or Blue Dye + Red Dye + Bone Meal	4	‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]
Pink Dye	Red Dye + Bone Meal	2	‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]
White Balloon	Latex + Bone Meal + Helium + Lead		‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]
White Bed	Any Bed + Bone Meal		‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]
White Concrete Powder	Bone Meal + Sand + Gravel	8	‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]
White Dye	Bone Meal
White Firework Star	Gunpowder + Bone Meal + Head or Gold Nugget or Feather or Fire Charge + Glowstone Dust + Diamond		‌[Bedrock and Education editions only] Up to eight dyes can be added. One head, gold nugget, feather, or fire charge can be added. Both the diamond and the glowstone dust can be added with any of the other ingredients.
White Firework Star	White Firework Star + Bone Meal		‌[Bedrock and Education editions only] Adds a "fade to color" effect to the firework star, overwriting any existing fades. Up to eight dyes can be added.
White Glow Stick	Polyethylene + Hydrogen Peroxide + Bone Meal + Luminol		‌[Bedrock and Education editions only] Light gray dye creates a glitched glow stick called item.glow_stick.silver.name.
White Shulker Box	Any Shulker Box + Bone Meal		‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]
White Stained Glass	Glass + Bone Meal	8	‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]
White Stained Glass Pane	Glass Pane + Bone Meal	8	‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]
White Terracotta	Terracotta + Bone Meal	8	‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]
White Wool	Any Wool + Bone Meal		‌[Bedrock and Education editions only]

In Bedrock Edition, bone meal can be also used in banner patterns:

Name	Ingredients	Crafting recipe
White Banner pattern	Bone Meal + Banner
White Banner image	Bone Meal + Banner + Vines or Bricks or Creeper Head or Wither Skeleton Skull or Oxeye Daisy or Enchanted Golden Apple

Loom ingredient

Name	Ingredients	Loom recipe	Description
White Banner pattern	White Banner + Bone Meal		Field masoned banner and bordure indented banner don't require banner patterns.‌[Java Edition only] Bone Meal can be used as a dye.‌[Bedrock Edition only] Note: The loom is using the Java Edition interface.
White Banner image	White Banner + Bone Meal + Banner Pattern		Exceptions: Globe banner pattern;‌[Java Edition only] Field masoned and bordure indented banner patterns.‌[Bedrock Edition only] Bone Meal can be used as a dye.‌[Bedrock Edition only] Note: The loom is using the Java Edition interface.

Dye

In Bedrock and Education editions, bone meal can be:

• Applied to sheep to dye their wool, which can then be sheared for 1–3 blocks of white wool.
• Applied to tamed wolves to dye their collars.
• Applied to tamed cats to dye their collars.
• Used to dye or stain leather armor, beds, glass, terracotta and shulker boxes.
• Combined with gunpowder to make a firework star.
• Combined with a firework star to create a fade-to-color effect.
• Used to add patterns to banners.
• Used to dye shulkers in Bedrock and Education editions.
• Used to dye water contained in cauldrons in Bedrock and Education editions.
• Combined with sand and gravel to craft concrete powder.
• Combined with compounds to craft balloons or glow sticks in Bedrock and Education editions.

Fertilizer

Bone meal can also be used on the following plants to have a chance to increase their growth stage:

Plant	Action
Wheat Carrots Potatoes	The plant matures 2–5 growth stages.
Beetroots	The plant has a 75% chance of growing to the next growth stage.
Bamboo	Grows the bamboo by 1-2 stems.
Melon seeds Pumpkin seeds	The planted stem matures 2–5 growth stages. Bone meal affects only the stem's growth; it does not cause melons or pumpkins to sprout from a mature stem.
Saplings	The sapling has a 45% chance of growing to the next growth stage, if possible. Saplings have two growth stages (with no visible difference between them) before growing into trees as the third stage. A tree cannot grow unless the sapling is planted in proper ground and sufficient space is available.
Sunflowers Lilacs Rose bushes Peonies	The corresponding item form drops, without destroying the original plant.
Tall grass Ferns Seagrass	A one-block-high tall grass, fern, or seagrass (that is on dirt, grass, or farmland) grows into a two-block-high tall grass or fern.
Mushrooms	Has a 40% chance of growing into a huge mushroom if on dirt, coarse dirt, grass, podzol or mycelium.
Cocoa	The cocoa plant matures 1 growth stage.
Sweet berry bush	Grows every stage.
Sea pickle	If the sea pickle is on a coral block and in water at least 2 blocks deep, the sea pickle colony grows, and additional sea pickles generate nearby.
Sugar cane‌[BE only]	The sugar cane grows to maximum height (three blocks tall). Bone meal does not affect this in Java Edition.
Kelp	The kelp plant grows by 1 block per bonemeal used, up to its maximum height.
Flower (excluding wither roses)‌[Bedrock Edition only]	One-block-high flowers make more flowers of the same type grow in the surrounding area. Bone meal doesn't affect this in Java Edition.
Fungus	Grows into huge fungi, but only if on the respective nylium.
Weeping Vines	Grows the weeping vine a few blocks downward.
Twisting Vines	Grows the twisting vine a few blocks upward.

Bone meal does not affect:

• Cactus
• Vines
• Nether wart
• Chorus plants, or other plants not listed above.

Wasting bone meal

Bone meal can be used on the following objects in the following situations, consuming it without any real effect:

• On a dark oak sapling that is not in a group of four.
• On a mushroom that is not on a block that allows it to grow into a huge mushroom.
• On a sea pickle that is already in a group of four and has no valid locations to expand to.
• On a sea pickle that is not on a coral block.
• On a fungus that is not on its respective nylium.

Creating new plants

If bone meal is used on a grass block, 0–8 tall grass, 8–24 grass and 0–8 flowers form on the targeted block and on randomly-selected adjacent grass blocks up to 7 blocks away (taxicab distance). The flowers that appear are dependent on the biome, meaning that in order to obtain specific flowers, the player must travel to biomes where the flowers are found naturally. See Flower § Flower biomes for more information.

Using bone meal on a non-transparent block that is underwater generates seagrass on that block and its surrounding blocks. Sometimes, coral is generated in its place instead, or if in a warm ocean biome, coral fans may have a chance to generate as well.‌^{[Java Edition only]} In order for this to work, there must be 2 water blocks above the block the bone meal is being used on, and the lower one must be non-flowing water.

Using bone meal upon a sea pickle on a coral block creates sea pickles. This generates sea pickles up to 3 blocks (of coral) away, so a 7( + ) X 7( + ) block (49+ blocks) of coral may be necessary, to return the most sea pickles per given bone meal attempt (more attempts grows them more numerously, exactly - including the range of it growing, like grass with heights on grass blocks - as coral and coral fans, though those others being non-solid blocks).

Using bonemeal on netherrack adjacent to nylium converts the netherrack into nylium of the same type. If both crimson and warped nylium are adjacent to the netherrack that was applied with bonemeal, there is a 50% chance that either type of nylium is created.

Using bone meal on nylium causes the corresponding roots and both types of fungi to appear on the nylium block and other nylium nearby, with the type of fungi matching the type of nylium being more common. In addition, using bonemeal on warped nylium creates nether sprouts and twisting vines.

Farmer villagers

Villagers with the farmer profession can collect bone meal from a full composter, with which they can make their crops grow faster.‌^{[Java Edition only]}

Data values

ID

Java Edition:

Name	Namespaced ID	Translation key
Bone Meal	bone_meal	item.minecraft.bone_meal

Bedrock Edition: ^{[until BE 1.16.100]}

Name	Namespaced ID	Numeric ID	Translation key
Bone Meal	dye	351	item.dye.white.name

‌^{[upcoming: BE 1.16.100]}

Name	Namespaced ID	Alias ID (BE)	Numeric ID	Translation key
Bone Meal	bone_meal	dye / 15	351	item.dye.white.name

Item data

In Bedrock Edition, bone meal has the ID name dye, with a data value of 15.

	DV	Description
	0	Ink Sac
	1	Red Dye
	2	Green Dye
	3	Cocoa Beans
	4	Lapis Lazuli
	5	Purple Dye
	6	Cyan Dye
	7	Light Gray Dye
	8	Gray Dye
	9	Pink Dye
	10	Lime Dye
	11	Yellow Dye
	12	Light Blue Dye
	13	Magenta Dye
	14	Orange Dye
	15	Bone Meal
	16	Black Dye
	17	Brown Dye
	18	Blue Dye
	19	White Dye

History

Java Edition Beta
1.2					Added bone meal.
1.6.6					Bone meal can now be applied on grass blocks.
1.8		Pre-release			Bone meal can now be used on mushrooms to make Huge Mushrooms, and the block the mushroom is on changes to dirt.
		Pre-release 2 ;)			Bone meal can now be applied on pumpkin and melon seed items.
Java Edition
1.3.1		12w19a			Bone meal can now be applied on cocoa beans.
		1.3			The texture of bone meal has been changed.
1.4.2		12w34a			Bone meal can now be used to dye leather armor and tamed wolf's collar.
1.4.6		12w49a			Bone meal can now be crafted with gunpowder to create a firework star.
1.5		13w04a			Bone meal has been significantly nerfed. Wheat, melon and pumpkin seeds, potatoes and carrots: one bone meal is now consumed for all seven stages of growth (melon and pumpkin seeds do not spawn right away). Saplings: one bone meal is now consumed for each of the two growth stages, then it grows into a tree. Cocoa pods: one bone meal is now consumed for each of the three stages of growth.
					Green particles are now displayed when bone meal is used.
					Bone meal can now be used from dispensers.
		13w05a			The balancing of bone meal has been adjusted. Growing a plant to its last state now takes on average 2-5 uses of bone meal (results vary from plant to plant).
1.10		16w20a			Bone meal can now be used to craft bone blocks.
1.13		17w47a			The different data values for the dye ID have been split up into their own IDs.
					Prior to The Flattening, this item's numeral ID was 351.
		18w07a			Bone meal can now be used underwater to create seagrass.
		18w14b			Bone meal can now be used for spreading sea pickles.
1.13.1		18w31a			Bone meal used in water of warm ocean biomes now has a chance of growing coral.
					Cod, salmon, tropical fish, and pufferfish now have a chance of dropping bone meal upon death.
		18w32a			Bone meal used in water of warm ocean biomes now has a chance of growing coral fans.
1.14		18w43a			Bone meal can now used to craft white dye.
					Bone meal can no longer be used as a dye.
					The texture of bone meal has been changed.
		19w03a			Bone meal can now be obtained from composters.
1.16		20w06a			Bone meal can now be used to grow fungi into huge fungi.
					Bone meal can now be used to spread nylium onto netherrack.
		20w09a			Using bone meal to grow fungi now works only on the respective nylium.
		20w11a			Bone meal can now grow kelp, weeping vines, and twisting vines.
		20w12a			Bone meal can now be used to grow roots, fungi, and nether sprouts on nylium.
		20w13a			Farmers can now use bone meal to grow the crops.
Pocket Edition Alpha
0.3.3					Added bone meal.
0.8.0		build 2			The texture of bone meal has been changed.
					Bone meal no longer instantly grows crops to full size.
		build 5			Pumpkin and melon stems now grow by only one stage when bone meal is used.
					Some flowers now spawn certain other flowers when bone meal is used on them.
					Bone meal can now grow ferns and tall grass in survival and creative.
					Bone meal can now grow sugar canes to maximum height.
0.9.0		build 11			Bone meal can now be used to dye tamed wolf collars.
0.14.0		build 1			Bone meal can now be used from dispensers.
					Bone meal can now be used to dye water in cauldrons.
Pocket Edition
1.0.0		alpha 0.17.0.1			Bone meal can now be used to dye shulkers.
1.1.0		alpha 1.1.0.0			Bone meal can now be used to craft white concrete powder, white beds and white shulker boxes.
1.1.3		alpha 1.1.3.0			Bone meal can now be used to craft bone blocks.
Bedrock Edition
1.2.0		beta 1.2.0.2			Bone meal can now be used to craft white stained glass.
					Bone meal can now be used to craft firework stars.
					Bone meal can now be used to create banner patterns.
1.4.0		beta 1.2.14.2			Bone meal can now be used underwater for growing seagrass and coral.
		beta 1.2.20.1			Bone meal can now be used for spreading sea pickles.
					Bone meal can now be used to craft white balloons and white glow sticks.
1.8.0		beta 1.8.0.8			Bone meal can now be used to grow bamboo.
		beta 1.8.0.10			Bone meal can now be used to craft white dye.
1.10.0		beta 1.10.0.3			Bone meal are now sold by wandering traders.
					The texture of bone meal has been changed.
1.11.0		beta 1.11.0.1			Bone meal can now be obtained from composters.
1.16.0		beta 1.16.0.51			Bone meal can now grow fungi into huge fungi.
					Bone meal can now be used to turn netherrack into nylium.
					Bone meal can now be used to grow roots, fungi, and nether sprouts on nylium.
Legacy Console Edition
TU1	CU1	1.00	Patch 1	1.0.1	Added bone meal.
TU19	CU7	1.12			Bone meal no longer instantly grows crops to full size.
		1.90			The texture of bone meal has been changed.
New Nintendo 3DS Edition
0.1.0					Added bone meal.

Issues

Issues relating to "Bone Meal" are maintained on the bug tracker. Report issues there.

Trivia

• Bone meal can be used on the sides or bottom of a grass block, as well as on a grass block with plants already on top of it.
• Regardless of if it succeeds in fertilizing, bone meal makes green sparkles. However, like smoke from a torch, the sparkles appear only if the player has particles set All or Decreased.
• In real life, bone meal is used as a fertilizer to provide nitrogen and phosphorus to plants.

Gallery

• 

  Bone meal used on grass blocks.

See also

• Farming

References

Items

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