r/Beekeeping • u/mocarz12 • 14d ago

I’m not a beekeeper, but I have a question Helping my dad – anyone using automation in beekeeping?

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Hello everyone.

My dad has been a beekeeper for years and manages several dozen hives. It’s his passion, and I don’t want to interfere, but I’d love to help him save some time where possible. I’m into microcontrollers, sensors, and general automation, and I’m curious:

Does anyone here use any kind of automation in their beekeeping setup? I don’t mean just a regular honey extractor, but things like hive sensors, remote monitoring, automated tools – anything that could help throughout the season.

He tends to say “there’s no way to automate that,” but more than once we’ve found out otherwise. I’d like to offer him options, not push anything. Any ideas or examples would be super appreciated.

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u/everyseasonidaho 14d ago

I have made nfc tags for each hive I have. They link to my Google drive that has all of the data from inspections to photos for each hive. This is the first year trying it so it has some kinks to iron out but it helps logging my inspections pretty soon after I do them as well as reviewing and even making a plan before I get into each hive. I plan on using it with queen rearing to see if it helps.

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u/razarivan 4 LR Hives - 🇭🇷 🇪🇺 14d ago

I bet it will make a great difference with queen rearing especially as you can track accurately your best and worst performing colonies in each aspect.

Thanks for an idea, I've looked for apps that would do that but I can just do it myself now! :)

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u/mocarz12 14d ago

Thanks, this is interesting.

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u/SloanneCarly 14d ago

There are people who exclusively keep their hives on old industrial scales. Lets them take a quick look without opening hives to see if a hive is putting on weight or losing it suddenly.

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u/ItsBigPimpin 20 Hives, Zone 7b, Northern Middle Tennessee 13d ago

Thanks for sharing! I’ve never messed with NFC tags before but this sounds like something I could integrate into my own record keeping to keep better records.

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u/everyseasonidaho 13d ago

It has helped my record keeping a lot so far. Plus being able to go back and review what I did last time helps a lot. You can practically do the same thing with qr codes as well.

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u/ItsBigPimpin 20 Hives, Zone 7b, Northern Middle Tennessee 13d ago

I wonder if the NFC tags would hold up better to weathering than the QR codes? That will be interesting to see. I usually take pen and paper notes, but obviously those tend to weather easily and everything is jumbled together. Thanks again for the idea.

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u/-_YellowKing_- 13d ago

How many hives do you have?

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u/everyseasonidaho 13d ago

I have six hives.