🌽 Polyculture & Biodiversity Growth Bonuses

In vanilla Minecraft, players build vast monoculture fields (hundreds of identical Wheat blocks) because there is no biological penalty for doing so. Agrarian Reform introduces Polyculture Biodiversity, rewarding diverse crop planting layouts with faster growth rates.

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📊 Mechanics Infobox

Parameter	Value
Feature Class	net.instantgratification.agrarianreform.util.GrowthHelper
Growth Speed Boost	$+0.10$ (+10% base probability bonus)
Detection Method	4-cardinal direction neighbor check (North, South, East, West)
Target Tag	minecraft:crops
GameRule Toggle	agrarian_reform:growth_biodiversity_bonus (Default: true)

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🧪 How Polyculture Bonuses Work

When a crop receives a growth tick or catch-up calculation, the engine inspects its cardinal neighbors:

                           [ Wheat ]
                               │
            [ Carrot ] ─── [ Crop ] ─── [ Potato ]
                               │
                          [ Beetroot ]

If at least one cardinal neighbor contains a crop block belonging to a different crop species (e.g. Wheat adjacent to Carrots or Potatoes), the crop's base growth speed float $S$ is increased by +0.10:

$$S_{\text{effective}} = S_{\text{vanilla}} + 0.10$$

Ideal Polyculture Farm Layouts

• Alternating Strips: Planting alternating rows (Row 1: Wheat, Row 2: Carrot, Row 3: Potato) ensures 100% of crops receive the +10% biodiversity bonus.
• Checkerboard Patchwork: Interspersing crops in a 2x2 grid maximizes visual variety while securing maximum growth probability.

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⚙️ Disabling Biodiversity Bonus

If admins prefer traditional monoculture mechanics, disable the bonus via GameRules:

/gamerule agrarian_reform:growth_biodiversity_bonus false

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See also: The Continuum (Offline Growth) and Plant Registry & Crop Types.