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No. At night the camera lights the coop with near-infrared light, which hens cannot see. A hen sees more colours than we do, near-ultraviolet included, but not the infrared beyond red. Camera infrared lamps shine at around 850–940 nanometres, well outside what hens can see. Their daily rhythm and sleep are set by light sensors in the eyes, in the pineal gland and deep in the brain, and none of these responds to that wavelength either, so the infrared light does not disturb their melatonin production or their night’s rest. For the hens, the coop stays just as dark as it would without a camera.

No. A healthy, fully feathered adult hen is comfortable down to about minus 5 °C (23 °F): the air trapped between her fluffed-up feathers insulates well, at night the hens huddle together on the perch, and in the cold they eat more, which makes more body heat. In winter the bottleneck is not cold but moisture. Hens give off a lot of moisture through breathing and droppings, and in an over-insulated, closed coop it has nowhere to go: the litter turns damp, ammonia builds up and irritates their airways and eyes, and in clammy air their combs get frostbite more easily. That is why fresh air matters more than a perfectly insulated coop. For their health, draught-free ventilation, dry litter and low ammonia count for far more than the temperature.

No. The cap is the lid of a small case and carries the hen’s serial number; the case is where her step-counter chip goes. Even with the chip it all weighs only about 10 grams. On a 2 kg (4.4 lb) hen that is half a percent of her body weight, while the rule of thumb in bird research is that a tag should stay under 3 percent. A stretchy figure-eight harness holds the case, and it does not get in the way of walking, scratching or dust bathing. This is an established scientific method: small chips go into leg rings, larger tags onto the bird’s back. Researchers follow homing pigeons and the migration of wild birds such as storks the same way, often with much heavier solar-powered GPS tags that stay on the bird all year round, even for years.

A cap is more than decoration: a hen wears it among her flockmates. That is why welfare comes first when we choose colours, too. We favour muted combinations that fit the colours of plumage and the surroundings, while keeping the hen’s number easy to read.

We avoid red, pink, magenta and reddish shades: they may attract pecking by flockmates, which could injure the hen wearing the cap.

We avoid large areas of bright yellow and orange: they can resemble food and invite pecking.

We avoid neon and fluorescent colours: hens see colours differently from us and can also see near-ultraviolet light. These materials may look particularly conspicuous to them.

We do not use glow-in-the-dark materials: we do not want to put a glowing surface on a hen resting at night.

Five palettes are currently available: Eggshell (white, dark brown and beige); Lavender (misty blue, black and translucent lilac); Mocha (dark brown, beige and pine green); Pinewood (pine green, white and black); and Gold (galaxy black, gold and emerald green).

Clear details are also available with every palette. Neutral, earthy, blue and green shades therefore make up most of the selection, with gold complementing the dark colours. We do not offer the whole rainbow: the wellbeing of the hen wearing the cap matters more than a unique look.

No, and we do not heat it. Some groups spend the winter in a single-layer polytunnel on deep litter. The deep litter is the tunnel’s own heating: the bottom of the thick bedding slowly composts, which gives off gentle warmth from below while the surface stays dry and soft. By day the film lets in the winter sun and warms up, and the hens insulate themselves with their feathers and huddle together just as they do in the coop. The tunnel’s main job is to keep out wind, rain and snow, because for a hen being wet or in a draught is far worse than the cold itself. Heating would do more harm than good: heat lamps are a common cause of coop fires, warm air inside against cold air outside means more condensation, and hens kept warm never adapt to the cold, so a power cut would hit them hard. Here too what matters is ventilation, so moisture does not condense on the film, and dry deep litter topped up with fresh bedding.

Sadly, yes: it is a natural part of a hen’s life. Today’s laying hens lay about 300 eggs a year, so their bodies work hard all their lives. Problems of the oviduct and around egg-laying are among the most common reasons laying hens are lost, even with the best care.

In numbers: even in closed, climate-controlled cage systems the industry plans for 4-6% mortality over a laying cycle. In free-range systems, where hens live outdoors on pasture, the average is around 9-10%, and in organic keeping it is higher still. Rearing alone, the chick and pullet months before laying, also loses around 10% of birds.

A hen is a prey animal: by instinct she hides that she feels unwell, so she does not look weak to predators or to her flockmates. That is why an illness often shows only in her last days, or not at all, even when she is watched carefully every day.

Losing one hen does not mean something is wrong with the flock. We watch the hens every day; if anything might affect the others, a suspected contagious illness for example, we call the vet and tell their patrons too.

Transparency matters to us. That is why we write about this openly, and why we let you know every time a hen is gone.