How Woolly Desk works

Getting started

Woolly Desk is a menu bar app for macOS 14 Sonoma or later. It has no Dock icon and no big window. After you open it, the farm appears on your desktop wallpaper, behind all your app windows. Close or move a window to see your sheep.

1. Open Woolly Desk. A small cloud-and-sun icon appears in the menu bar at the top of the screen.
2. Your farm starts with a few sheep and one water trough.
3. Click a sheep to meet it. Click it again to pet it.
4. Wait for the wool to grow, shear the sheep, and sell the wool to buy things in the shop.
5. Every bag of wool you collect counts toward new items in the shop. The Farm Overview always shows your next goal.

The menu bar

Click the cloud-and-sun icon in the menu bar. The header of the menu shows the farm day, the season and the number of sheep.

On the desktop

The two round buttons

Two round buttons sit at the left edge of the screen: Home and Tools. Click a circle and its buttons slide out. Click anywhere else and they slide back in.

Drag a circle to any edge of the screen: it snaps there and stays. You can turn the buttons off in the menu or in Settings → Desktop.

Clicking things

• Click a sheep to open its card: age, stage, personality, mood, food, water, energy, health and wool. The card has the buttons Pet, Shear, Treat and Name.
• Click a building (trough, feeder, barn, trading post…) to open its card: Refill, Add hay, Trade, Move or Store.
• Click a gate to open or close it.
• An orange ! above a sheep means it needs help: it is very hungry, very thirsty or weak.
• All other clicks go through to Finder, so your files and icons work as usual.

Desktop folders

Woolly Desk can give the folders on your desktop watercolour icons in the colours of the farm. Turn on Farm-style icons on desktop folders in Settings → Desktop, then choose a Folder colour:

spring

summer

autumn

winter

barn red

lavender

• Changes with the season (default): two colours for each season, and the folders change by themselves.
• Mixed farm colours: each folder gets its own colour.
• Or one of 11 farm colours for all folders: meadow green, sage, sky blue, wool cream, cottage pink, lavender, hay yellow, pumpkin, barn red, kraft brown or snow grey.
• Folders with their own custom icon are never changed. Turn the setting off to get the normal icons back.

Your sheep

Needs

Each sheep has five needs: food, water, energy, happiness and health. Sheep look after themselves most of the time:

Health falls only after a need stays critical for 15 minutes, and then only slowly. It rises again with care. A Herbal Treat helps a weak sheep.

Personalities

Life stages

One farm day is one sheep month. Twelve farm days are one sheep year. With the default life pace, one sheep year takes 12 real hours.

Lamb · 0–4 months

Young · to 1 year

Adult · 1–8 years

Elderly · 8+ years

Play

Happy sheep run laps. Lambs and young sheep play most. A runner can invite a cheerful friend, and they play tag for a few laps. Sheep do not play at night, in bad weather, or when they are hungry or thirsty.

Wool and shearing

Wool grows back in about 6 farm days (half a sheep year). It grows faster in spring and slower in winter and on weak sheep. You can see the wool on each sheep:

sheared

short

medium

full

• Shear a sheep at medium or full wool: click it, then click Shear.
• One shearing gives 2–4 wool, plus 1 for a full fleece in summer.
• You never shear lambs.
• You start with shears, so you can shear from the first day.

Light and dark wool

White and cream sheep give light wool. Grey, brown and black sheep give dark wool, which is worth more.

Selling wool

Sell your wool to get new things in the shop. Dark wool is worth more than light wool, and a Trading Post gives you a better deal.

• Sell wool from Trade Wool… in the menu, or click your Trading Post.
• You can also pay for many shop items with wool.
• Your farm stores 12 wool at first. Each Wool Storage adds room for 40 more.
• Your hay store holds 20 hay. Each barn adds room for 30 more.

The shop

The shop has seven tabs. The holiday items are on the Holiday tab. Each item unlocks when your lifetime wool reaches its number.

BuildAnimalsCareToolsDecorationHoliday

Build

Shop · Build

Item	Unlocks at
Water TroughRain fills it. Click it to refill it. In winter it drains.	start
Hay FeederHolds 8 hay. Important in winter.	3 wool
Trading PostA better deal for your wool.	8 wool
BarnShelter for 4 sheep. Stores 30 more hay.	15 wool
Wool StorageRoom for 40 more wool.	20 wool
Picket Fence StyleWhite picket fences.	25 wool
Stone Wall StyleOld dry-stone walls.	40 wool

Animals

A young sheep from the neighbour's farm joins your flock (unlocks at 12 wool). Choose its colour, and choose a ewe, a ram or either.

Shop · Animals

Young sheep	Wool it gives
White	light
Cream	light
Grey	dark
Brown	dark
Black	dark

Care

Tools

You buy each tool once and keep it forever.

Shop · Tools

Tool	Unlocks at
ShearsYou have them from the start.	start
BroomSweeps leaves and a little snow.	start
ScytheMows tall grass into hay.	2 wool
Snow ShovelClears snow drifts in one pass.	3 wool

Decoration

Shop · Decoration

Item	Unlocks at
Flower BedSeasonal flowers.	5 wool
LanternGlows at night.	8 wool
Apple TreeCurious sheep love it.	30 wool
Garden ShedA cosy blue shed.	35 wool
Little White HouseWith a young tree beside it.	40 wool
Pink CottageScalloped roof, daisies at the door.	45 wool
Lavender CottageSlate roof, lavender by the walls.	50 wool
Wooden CabinRound window, red arched door, skis and lights.	55 wool
A-Frame CabinA big triangle window.	60 wool
Forest CottageSage-green walls, a black roof and firs.	65 wool
Red Door CottageRed door, dormer window, lamps at night.	70 wool

The houses are decoration: they make the village pretty and glow at night.

Tools

Open the build palette with ⌘B, or use the Tools circle on the desktop.

Buildings and fences

• Placing: after you buy an item, a preview follows your pointer. Click to place it. The preview turns red where the item does not fit.
• Rotating: right-click to turn troughs and feeders.
• Storing: click a building and choose Store to put it back into your inventory.
• Barn: 4 sheltered stalls. Sheep run to it in storms and like to sleep there.
• Water trough: rain fills it, and in winter it drains. Click it and choose Refill.
• Hay feeder: holds 8 hay. Click it and choose Add hay. Sheep eat from it when the grass is short.

Weather, seasons and night

Leaves and snow

In autumn, leaves fall and pile up next to trees, fences and buildings. While it snows, drifts form. Grass under leaves or snow does not grow, and sheep cannot eat it.

• Without sweeping, leaves can cover up to 60 % of the farm, and snow up to 30 %.
• Sheep in deep leaves get unhappy and slowly lose health, but never below half. The overview and the sheep card warn you.
• Snow melts when it gets warmer. Old leaves rot slowly.
• Nothing new piles up while your Mac is closed.
• In autumn, leaves can also land on your desktop icons and the Dock. Move the pointer over them to blow them away. You can turn this off in Settings.

Winter holidays

The Holiday tab of the shop has decorations for the cosiest time of the year. You can buy them in any season. All of them have small lights that glow at night.

Christmas tree

garland

door wreath

sweater

hanging star

Decorations

Place them like any other item. A preview follows your pointer; click to place it.

Shop · Holiday

Item	Unlocks at
Christmas TreeLights, baubles, a gold star and presents. 2×2 tiles.	6 wool
Warm Light GarlandWarm little lights on three posts. 4×1 tiles.	3 wool
Coloured Light GarlandRed, green, gold, blue and pink lights. 4×1 tiles.	3 wool
Fir GarlandFir branches, red bows and warm lights. 4×1 tiles.	8 wool
Stocking LineFour knitted stockings on a rope with small lights. 4×1 tiles.	6 wool
Hanging StarsStars on threads under the menu bar. You get them once.	10 wool

Light garlands and stockings

Garlands hang between three little posts and are 4 tiles long. Put them along a fence, between houses or around a pen. At night their lights glow.

warm lights

coloured lights

fir garland

stocking line

• Warm Light Garland: warm yellow lights.
• Coloured Light Garland: red, green, gold, blue and pink lights.
• Fir Garland: fir branches with red bows and warm lights.
• Stocking Line: four knitted stockings on a rope, with small lights.

Door wreaths

There are three wreaths: Fir, Eucalyptus and Orange. They unlock at 4 wool. A wreath goes on the door of a decorative house (Little White House, the cottages and the A-Frame Cabin).

Sweaters for your sheep

Six knitted colours: Red, Fir Green, Cream, Blue, Mustard and Pink. They unlock at 5 wool.

red

fir green

cream

blue

mustard

pink

• Click a sheep and press 🧶 Sweater. Press 🧶 Next to change the colour.
• Press Take off to put the sweater back into your inventory.
• The farm saves the sweater with the sheep, so it stays on after you restart your Mac.

Hanging stars

After you buy them, stars hang on threads just under the menu bar and sway a little. They decorate your whole desktop, not only the farm. At night they glow warmly.

• In Settings → Desktop, turn them on or off with Hanging stars under the menu bar.
• With Stars hang, choose On the desktop, behind windows (default) or Over all windows.

Pairs and lambs

• Two single adults, a ewe and a ram that are not related, can fall in love when they meet. They become a pair for life and stay close, with small hearts between them.
• Only a pair has lambs. A pregnancy takes 5 farm days, then the ewe rests for about a sheep year.
• An expecting ewe sometimes dreams of her lambs in a thought bubble.
• A birth gives 1–3 tiny lambs. Twins are common. Lambs mostly take a parent's colour and follow their mother.
• The farm holds up to 30 sheep by default. You can change the limit from 3 to 60, or turn births off, in Settings → Farm life.

Old age and Memories

Woolly Desk is gentle. A sheep can pass away only from old age (after about 10 sheep years) or after a very long time without care. It never happens suddenly, at random, or while your Mac is closed.

When its time comes, the sheep turns into a soft, sheep-shaped cloud that floats up over the farm. Its name stays in Memories (menu → Sheep ▸ Memories).

Prefer that no sheep ever leaves? Turn off Animals can pass away in Settings. Old or weak sheep then just rest more.

Settings

Open the menu and choose Settings…, or use the Home circle on the desktop.

Shortcuts

Still have a question? Look at the FAQ or write to us.