Help with water entity not swimming

I am making a catfish mob for my Minecraft mod. i have it set as a water entity, and i have a very simple ai with it being able to swim randomly, being able to look around, and being able to follow the same type of entity. However with all of this, my entity simply just sits in the water and does nothing but look around. I'm sure the answer is hiding in plain sight but i cannot figure it out for the life of me. help would be greatly appreciated