With colony collapse disorder continuing to decimate honeybee populations worldwide, it’s more important than ever for beekeepers to monitor hive conditions. The Irish-designed ApisProtect system is made to automate the process, potentially catching problems earlier.
Although most beekeepers already perform manual inspections of their hives, doing so can be disturbing and stressful for the bees, plus it’s one more time-consuming task to carry out. Additionally, if problems occur between inspections, keepers may be unaware of the situation until it’s too late.
That’s where ApisProtect is designed to come in. Hardware-wise, the system consists of two parts – there are battery-powered sensor devices that are installed on the underside of the roof of each hive, along with a centrally located base station.
The sensor devices continuously monitor the temperature, humidity, bee movement and bee sound levels inside their respective hives. That data is wirelessly transmitted to the base station, which in turn transmits it to a cloud-based server. There, it’s analyzed utilizing machine learning-based algorithms – these were trained on data gathered from hundreds of hives located in three continents, over a three-year period.
Utilizing an online dashboard, beekeepers can check on their processed hive data at any time, anywhere there’s internet access. Additionally, if the system determines that problems such as disease or pest infestations may be occurring in one or more of the hives, users are notified immediately via a smartphone alert.
ApisProtect is initially being offered to US-based beekeepers, who can inquire about pricing information via the source link below. Prospective buyers may also want to check out the successfully Kickstarted BEEP base, which offers some of the same features.