bees
bee_monitoring_workshops

1. The Theory + Reading List
2. The new BeeHives + ObservationBeehives
3. The Data Harvesting (Technology)
4. The Artworks and Projects
5. The HoneyComb

results of the bee monitoring workshop on 3 & 4 february 2011
diagrams by Jakub Hybler

http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9418
http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9569

http://www.soselectronic.com/?str=371&artnum=53103

http://www.sparkfun.com/products/8257

Logitech pro 9000: haced usb webcam to be placed in the beehive

Which sensors do we need for it? And Where do we have to integrate them?

    visual: webcams inside hive (infrared) or outside behind window
    heath sensitive camera to spot the 'heather bees'
    sound / vibrations (contactmicrophones - piezo’s, other small microphones)
    temperature inside / outside
    humidity inside / outside
    airpollution / Co2
    moving of the bee-blob/nucleus inside of the hive (very important in winter)
    number of bees flying in/out (summer)
    landing of the bees on the landing strip before the flighthole (theremin? Aluminiumfoil?)
    weight of the hive (filling up with honey)
    weight of the hive / colony growing from spring -> summer

Brood Chamber & Environmental Monitoring. Warming up and cooling down.
Temperature and humidity inside and outside the hive are important indicators of hive health. A design for an environmental monitoring system is proposed able to log temperature and humidity inside the hive brood nest and measure temperature, humidity, and solar activity outside the hive.

Mammals shiver to generate heat. Likewise, some worker bees have a role as ‘heater bees’ [TAUT2008] that can dislocate their wings from their flight muscles and flex those large flight muscles to generate heat. These heater bees are easily identified in images taken by heat sensitive cameras because the temperature of their thorax can reach over 109 degrees! This contrasts with the normal temperature of the brood nest of 92-98 degree Fahrenheit. Even when the temperature outside is below freezing, the center of a healthy hive can be 92 degrees.
If the outside temperature falls below 54 degrees F., bees cannot fly and they will be confined to the hive. If the bees either run out of honey or it is so cold that they cannot crawl from the edge of their warm cluster to the honey (below 50 degrees F, they cannot move), they will starve or freeze.
Cooling in the hot summer is just as important. Wax softens if the hive temperature exceeds 93.2 degrees Fahrenheit. Beside structural problems, this negatively impacts vibration-based communication between bees inside the dark hive[TAUTZ2008]. In the hot summer, mammals sweat and pant to cool off. Bees collect water, spread it over the comb, encourage evaporation by mechanically creating air currents inside their hive to cool it down. In both cases, the evaporation of water into vapor provides cooling.

Research [FERR08] suggests that temperature of the hive increases immediately before a swarm occurs and drops below ambient temperature at the time of the swarm itself.

Humidity inside the hive and outside can influence how quickly the water in nectar is evaporated and transformed into honey. It may also indicate environments that favor fungal (Chalkbrood) growths that can devastate hives.
http://www.beehacker.com/wp/?page_id=84

Do not completely seal the hive off. Always leave the varroa-drawer out. The bees produce moisture and CO2 and they will suffocate if there is not sufficient air circulation and ventilation.

The prediction of when flowers bloom (nectar flows) is more accurately estimated by counting the number of sun-days than by looking on a calendar. Solar activity also indicates how many days bees have available to forage for honey.

I’m an electronics engineer doing a similar project. My motivation is on automated species detection and detecting the early signs of swarming. I find it’s easier to do sound recordings and analyse them later on a PC using Audacity or Matlab. Alternatively I’m sure you’ll find an IPhone/Android app for spectrum analysis.
If you want to build a real-time spectrum device, I would consider an arrangement of analogue filter banks, comparators and LEDs. Quite doable for an amateur.
For your information, I have found, the dominant frequency is approximately 220-240Hz followed by the first harmonic at 440 – 480Hz. According to literature this corresponds to the wing-beat frequency which varies depending on whether the bee is flying or stationary. Moreover, accordingly to unconfirmed reports, a newly hatched bee will have a higher wing-beat frequency due to incomplete forming of the wings.
Queen piping is an interesting sound; I have recordings which place in the 400Hz – 4KHz range. Sounding much like a duck.
http://www.beehacker.com/wp/?p=240#comments

The purpose is to build a low cost scale for monitoring the weight of the increasing honey over the foraging season. In the meantime we can also monitor the growth of the colony.
A nice DIY example can be found here: http://www.beehacker.com/wp/?page_id=55 : the portable hive scale.

Some pictures of our 2011 observation beehive.
The live streams of the webcams can be reached via VLC and these links:
http://hive.okno.be:8090/?action=stream
http://hive.okno.be:8091/?action=stream

Regarding the bee colonies, two different areas of activity can be differentiated when considering observing a colony. All that is happening inside the hive and is usually hidden from the observer and activity of the flying bees outside, surrounding of the hive. The border area between the inside and outside of the hive could be defined as the take off/landing platform at the entrance of the beehive.

The activities of a colony vary with outside temperature, weather conditions and food availability, among other factors. Bees are very sensitive.
Bee traffic to and fro the hive is depending on these varied parameters and hence is subject to change. Traffic recordings at that gateway are therefore of interest and would yield a range of different information.
• Inter relation between season / weather conditions / temperature and traffic at the entrance
• change of traffic with food abundance
• growth (number of animals, size, weight, amount of produced honey) of the colony and hive with the proceeding season

inside the hive: camera, UV sensors, temperature sensor, Beagleboard computer, Balt's hand…

Andreas Wolf will also give an update on the research of the bee-instituts in Würzburg, Mayen and Oberursel concerning the technical possibilities for monitoring processes.
Andreas will also bring a standard (Herold Beute) beehive and a cardboard beehive with me. As well I can bring a kapaz-scale with me. This is a scale which is sending a report on the changing weight of the beehive via GPRS to a server every 5 minutes.

http://www.fingerweb.org

http://www.beewise.eu/
beewise monitoring diagram

A revolutionnary product to remote monitor hives by measuring their weight using SMS technology accessible from any mobile phone. At anytime, anywhere, beekeepers get the information directly on their mobile phone about the evolution of the honey production (weight increase) or about stock of honey in the hives (weight decrease) and many more…

Beewise is an “all in one” solution that includes :

• A precise and robust 4 sensors weight measurement system
• A GSM/CDMA module to communicate with the product using SMS
• A battery that can be connected to a solar photogenerator
• A microcontroller that drives and control the system

http://www.botjunkie.com/2009/10/20/harvard-developing-colony-of-robot-bees/
http://www.mulder-hardenberg.com/en/industrialautomation/data_loggers/sensors/index.html?gclid=CMbK2bLm66YCFYMRfAodV3ObFA
http://www.beegroup.de/
http://www.beehacker.com/wp/?page_id=84 - a cross-pollination of beekeeping and technology