Bear Taming – Tame, Breed & Ride

A focused Valheim mod by nick008 that makes the vanilla Bear / Bjorn tameable, breedable and ridable.

Features

• Vanilla Bears can be tamed.
• Tamed Bears can use Valheim's normal Follow / Stay behaviour.
• Tamed Bears can breed and produce bear cubs.
• Bear cubs grow into adults and are protected from the Butcher knife while young.
• Star levels are supported.
• Bears use their own craftable Bear Saddle.
• The Bear Saddle uses the vanilla Lox Saddle model / texture and riding behaviour as its visual and technical base, but it is a separate item made specifically for Bears.
• Mounted Bears can use two of Bjorn's normal attacks.
• A special riding workaround keeps 2-star Bears moving correctly while mounted.
• No Jotunn dependency is required.

Bear Saddle

The mod does not require the player to unlock the normal Lox Saddle first.

The mod adds a dedicated Bear Saddle. Its appearance is based on Valheim's vanilla Lox Saddle, but it is registered as a separate item for Bears and does not replace the normal Lox Saddle.

The Bear Saddle recipe unlocks after the player has discovered all three required materials:

• Bronze Nails
• Bear Hide
• Fine Wood

These materials are obtainable during Meadows / Black Forest progression, so Bear riding can be accessed much earlier than the normal Plains Lox Saddle progression.

Bear Saddle recipe

Craft at a Workbench:

• 20x Bronze Nails
• 5x Bear Hide
• 10x Fine Wood

Controls while riding

• Mount: Left Alt + E
• Move / steer: normal Valheim movement controls
• Attack 1: Left Mouse Button
• Attack 2: Middle Mouse Button / press the mouse wheel

Normal E remains available for the usual pet / Follow-Stay interaction.

Food

Bears can eat:

• Blueberries
• Honey
• Raw Meat
• Deer Meat

Default timings

• Taming: 25 minutes
• Fed duration: 5 minutes
• Bear cub growth: 33 minutes 20 seconds
• Pregnancy duration: 90 seconds
• Pregnancy chance: 66%
• Nearby bear breeding limit: 5

Riding notes / known visual limitation

The Bear riding setup is adapted from Valheim's vanilla Lox saddle/riding system. Version 1.0.1 improves the rider anchor so the player follows the saddle much more closely, especially while sprinting.

Because Bjorn was not originally designed as a mount and uses different animations and body proportions than a Lox, the player or saddle may still show minor visual movement or clipping during some animations. This is visual only and does not affect riding functionality.

Valheim scales a 2-star Bear to approximately 1.50x size. At that scale the mounted Bear can become stuck in place while its running animation continues. This mod therefore temporarily caps a mounted 2-star Bear to a known-working 1.25x riding scale. Its original size is restored automatically after dismounting.

Performance

Version 1.0.1 removes repeated global creature scans that could cause periodic micro-stutters while moving through the world. The Bear setup is now handled without continuously scanning all loaded tameable creatures and MonsterAI objects.

Installation

If you used the previous tameable_and_breadable_and_ridable_bear package, uninstall it before installing Bear Taming to avoid loading two copies of the mod.

Install with a Thunderstore-compatible mod manager, or manually copy:

nick008-Bear_Taming.dll

into your:

Valheim/BepInEx/plugins/

folder.

Requirements

• BepInExPack Valheim
• Valheim with the vanilla Bear / Bjorn creature
• No vanilla Lox Saddle unlock is required; craft the dedicated Bear Saddle instead.

Changelog

1.0.3 - 2026-09-30

Fixed

• Fixed 1-star and 2-star Bear cubs spawning visually at adult/star-scaled size immediately after birth.
• Starred Bear cubs now remain at the intended cub scale while growing, then switch to the correct adult star size when growth completes.
• This also makes it visually clear that a starred Bear is still a cub and cannot use the Bear Saddle until it has actually grown into an adult.

Notes

• Gameplay timings remain unchanged: 25 minute taming and 33 minute 20 second cub growth.

1.0.2

• Changed the Thunderstore package image/icon only.
• No gameplay, balance, configuration, or code changes.

1.0.1

Fixed

• Fixed periodic micro-stutters caused by repeated global scans of loaded MonsterAI and Tameable objects.
• Fixed the Bear Saddle visual so it is shown correctly after equipping and restored after reloading a world.
• Fixed the rider anchor so the player follows the saddle instead of moving excessively from side to side during sprinting.
• Refined Bear Saddle and rider positioning for a more natural riding pose.

Notes

• Bear riding still uses an adapted version of Valheim's vanilla Lox saddle/riding system. Minor visual movement or clipping can still occur because Bjorn was not originally designed as a mount.
• Gameplay timings remain unchanged: 25 minute taming and 33 minute 20 second cub growth.

1.0.0

• Initial Bear Taming release under the Bear_Taming package name.
• Added Bear taming, breeding, persistent cubs, star support, dedicated Bear Saddle, riding and mounted attacks.