Show season is upon us

I am starting a extending me research across the country. Over the last five years I have been trying to track the progress of how hives have been doing across the country, however the data even when well-meaning has been unreliable not really usable and with tight data protection laws very difficult to track.

So I will now be starting a sponsored hive research program. Company’s, The firm you work for can sponsor a honeybee nest box beehive. For a small monthly cost we will install a Honeybee nest box in your area or in our research target area this will be fitted with the box you can see to the rite. 

I will now be able to investigate a number of critical aspects that can only be done on a very large scale and with reliable data.

If you think your firm would like to take part in this worthwhile project please email.

At the very least we will be putting more honeybee nest box beehive into the environment.

Note: just for your interest, the box has been designed and printed by myself. It is to house a number of items as well as be expandable over the life of the project.

To start with and what you see here is the first set up. Arduino microprocessor, with GPRS board and chip. Memory board and card. Blue tooth board. Battery's and holders. Scale load cells. Lure and a servo to spray lure. All code is written using chat gdp.

you can copy and past this into word to print out:

Hello

I will be installing sponsored Honeybee nest boxes around this industrial site.

We would very much like to have you as one of the sponsors. 

The contribution is £50.00 / monthfor the research period of 3 years, we would very much like to have you along as a valued contributor.

What? :

We are looking to install NEST BOX BEEHIVE on every industrial site and

in every science and business park across Europe and the UK.

Why?:

Honeybees are in decline, even though there are more beekeepers now than there ever have been beekeepers. But I am not proposing more beekeeping, I am proposing the installation and monitoring of Honeybee nest boxes.

ECO-BEEHIVE’s are installed unoccupied, this gives honeybees more options, as to where they can nest. 

More nest boxes then needed, will be installed and the bees will self-regulate their number to be in balance with that specific environment.

Where?

On every building that would like to participate.

This is not beekeeping but working with honeybees for their best interest, so each nest box must be separated by distance or by a geographical feature, just as in nature.

How?

I will do a site risk assessment, and then install a hive on the roof or in the carpark, working with the site management, and building tenants.

How much?

£50.00/ month / building / nest box. This will cover:

· Site survey, and risk assessment.

· The cost of the hive and installation

· Cost of lure and bio-bed

· Any special mountings to secure hive

· Electronic monitoring and data collecting device and upkeep of this

· 6 monthly physical onsite inspection

· Keep up to date with government guidelines as well as bee-base and BBKA

· Do all servicing and inspecting as needed once hive is occupied

· Dealing with any problems that may arise.

· Annual report of how your bees are doing in your immediate area.

This is how you can help:

Agree to sponsor a hive at only £50.00/month for the next three years. That is all.

I will then arrange to site the nest box, this will be numbered and will be unique to your company. There after you will receive a bi annual report as how the bees in your area are doing, and how the research is proceeding, overall. 

What I have not mentioned here is the wealth of information (data) that we will be able to glean from this project.

The data will be unique as this experiment has, to my knowledge never been done.

Or done on the scale I envisage and for the scope of data I would like to collect.

This unlike most graduate work done on honeybees, That is only done over a year or two, this will take about 10 years before we have a database of useful data that we can analyse.

The sooner we can get started the sooner we can see the real affect climate change and urbanisation is having on honeybees and other insects in the semi urban environment.

At this time I cannot even conceive how useful and interesting this will be. But it will definitely be. So I intend to collect as much as I can with the technology today.

Initial data to collect:

We will take internal and external environment into account as well as the immediate environment.

Temp, internal /external

Wind speed

Humidity internal/ external

Rain

Traffic (bees moving in and out the hive)

Sound

Light intensity

Sun exposure

Photo of area X3

Mass of hive

Battery life

Vandal monitor 

This is with an Arduino, also incorporating a GPRS board, solar charger, blue tooth and memory card.

This device also has a built in lure dispenser. 

Additional information

Data we are hoping to get some insight to:

Honeybees are not isolated pockets of bees living in beehives, but rather live as a network or colonies / beehives over and entire continent or in our case island.

We would like to investigate how this network is:

Breaking down

How it interacts with itself

How it copes with pests, Diseases and other transmittables 

As these are inadvertently introduced by commercial beekeepers, how this then reverberates though the network and how the network then copes with these.

From this we will learn how we can help, how we can help rectify the network.

We will also learn how colony’s self-regulating their population densities according to geographical areas other pollinators and forage available.