How to Tame, Feed and Breed a Reaper in ARK: Survival Evolved

Taming, breeding, and feeding creatures in ARK: Survival Evolved is a relatively simple process, but a handful of species require some particular circumstances. For example, the Reaper species may be one of the most intimidating within the title, but players have been keen to adopt one into their own game. However, the process is a little different than you may be used to. Read on to find out how you can breed, tame, and feed a Reaper of your own.

How to Breed a Reaper in ARK: Survival Evolved

Breeding a Reaper in ARK is unlike any other breeding process for its expansive collection of critters. Rather than needing a female and male counterpart and an open enclosure, breeding a Reaper of your own is an interesting process. First, players must trap a Queen Reaper and wait for a specific attack in which the Reaper will impregnate the player with a Reaper Baby.

This attack tends to land after the Reaper Queen’s life value drops below 2000, and you can see a red, glowing cloud emanating from the creature. To ensure the impregnation takes place, the Queen must be left unaffected by chargelight. During the attack, she will grab the player with her tail and impale them. The victim will be left with a single HP and a Reaper embryo.

After twelve hours, the Reaper King will be ‘born.’ It takes around eight hours of consistent feeding to ensure you won’t be on the menu for the new Reaper, but the constant attention pays off once you have scored a new mount.

How to Tame and Feed a Reaper in ARK: Survival Evolved

When the baby Reaper is born, you’ll receive the opportunity to tame a king of your own. Therefore, it’s integral to fill its inventory with meat to feed it and begin the process of taming the baby. Due to the aggressive nature of the Reaper species, there is a high possibility that the baby will attack and potentially kill the player, so you need to work fast and keep your distance while taming it.

Killing existing Reapers will drop Pheromone Glands, which the player can consume to calm the baby before its birth and make it significantly easier to feed. Additionally, these Pheromone Glands dropped by existing Reapers are the only way to imprint on a baby and tame it.

Since Reapers are carnivorous, their dietary requirements are straightforward to satisfy. Any raw meat will do the job, given you are filling the baby Reaper’s inventory with meat for the first 8 hours of its life. Unlike a lot of other creatures, Reapers do not eat kibble. Once past the baby stage, the juvenile Reaper will respond to whistle commands, and the Reaper King can be used as a mount.

ARK: Survival Evolved is available on Playstation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC.