Minecraft – Help with slime farm – mobs not spawning (confirmed slime chunk)

minecraft-java-edition

Can anyone help me troubleshoot why slimes aren't spawning in my slime farm?

Here is my seed @ Chunkbase: 7246271457164700537

I just started this farm today, and have a couple hours into clearing rock. However, I am starting to have second thoughts as I've yet to see a slime in this chunk. Although, at some point my trap did kill one. Found a slimeball in my chest.

Since I have been mining in this area for hours, I would have expected more than -one- slime…. No other mobs have ever spawned here since I have been clearing rock. The place is very well lit.

I am running v1.8.9.

Thanks
/dj

In-game screen with coords
Coords confirmed with Amidst AND Chunkbase

Best Answer

This is probably a combination of 2 things:

1. You are simply too close

From the wiki page on spawning:

Spawn conditions

Each individual spawn attempt succeeds only if all of the following conditions are met:

  • There must be no players and no player spawn points within a 24 block distance (spherical) of the spawning block
  • [...]

While mining out a chunk, you are typically not more than 24 blocks away from any spawnable surfaces, meaning that no slime was allowed to spawn.

2. The mob cap was filled by other mobs

There is a fixed limit for the number of hostile mobs that can exist in the game at any one time (70 for single player). It is possible that these 70 mobs spawned in caves surrounding your slime chunks. Unless you leave the area, mobs don't respawn all at once, and it's possible to cap the mobs almost all the time, making it hard for a poor Slime to fill one of the free slots.

The wiki has a helpful image regarding spawning and despawning rules:

spawning radii

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