Mother Hen™ is a smart monitoring system that watches your chicken coop — the automatic chicken door you already own, every human access door, and the coop’s temperature and humidity — and alerts you instantly if anything goes wrong.
Designed and built by Smith Varmint Works LLC in Tennessee. Read why we built it.
Key Design Principles
Monitor-only. Mother Hen watches the vertically-opening automatic chicken door you already own. It never opens or closes your door. We do not sell a door, motor, limit switch, or door plate, and never have.
Coop monitor, not just a door monitor. Add Coop Climate Sensors and Door Monitors to any door, window, nest box lid, hatch, or run gate. Each sensor also reports coop temperature and humidity at its location — so you catch frostbite, heat stress, and unhealthy humidity buildup alongside open-opening problems.
Cloud-powered intelligence. Amazon Web Services (AWS) handles sunrise/sunset math, alert orchestration, and event history.
Triple Redundancy Alerts
Local: coop-side indicator
Remote: The Egg flashes red and squawks indoors
SMS: alerts to your recipient list
Smart Timing. Uses your coop’s location to calculate sunrise and sunset with a 30-minute grace window.
Cellular-only at launch. The Coop Controller ships with built-in cellular. No home Wi-Fi is required at the coop.
110V in the coop. One outlet at the coop is all you need — grid, solar with an inverter, or generator.
Extreme climate ready. Rated for -20°C to +45°C at the coop.
Core System Components
Coop Controller
A cellular-connected unit that lives in the coop. It reads the position of your existing automatic chicken door and every paired Coop Climate Sensor and Door Monitor, and reports to the cloud.
Coop Climate Sensor and Door Monitor
Magnetic open/close sensor that mounts on any opening — doors, windows, nest box lids, hatches, or run gates — and reports coop temperature and humidity at that location. Can also be used in temperature/humidity-only mode on an interior wall, near a roost, or inside a brooder. Included in the base kit (1×). Add more for $35 each as your coop grows.
The Egg (Indoor Status Indicator)
An indoor beacon for your home:
Green = daytime, all clear
Blue = nighttime, all clear
Flashing red + squawk = problem (door open, temp issue, etc.)
Multiple Eggs supported — put one in any room you want covered
Customer Portal
Web-based — works in any modern browser, no app to install
Real-time status dashboard
Alert customization (which doors alert, temperature thresholds)
SMS recipient management
Event history
SMS is the primary notification channel; the portal is for setup and review
Installation
Plug the Controller into a 110V outlet in the coop. Mount the chicken-door position sensor on the door you already own. Mount the Coop Climate Sensor and Door Monitor on your human door. Plug The Egg into a household outlet. The Controller self-provisions over cellular — no BLE pairing, no Wi-Fi setup at the coop. See the setup FAQ for details.
Currently running as a prototype across two live beta coops — one in Tennessee and one in Colorado.
