How Can Tracking Honeybee Hive Activity Help?

Dallas Investor Hope to Help Honeybees with New Technology

A businessman in Dallas, TX, is hoping new technology used to track activity in honeybee hives will help to increase the insect’s struggling population. Oren Salomon wants to begin development on technology that can unveil what happens in a honeybee hive and his true passions lie with saving the honeybees. "The job of the beekeepers in basically make sure nothing goes wrong and that [the honeybee’s] environment is hospitable to them." Salomon hopes this new invention will do just that.

Honeybees across the globe have been seeing declining numbers, something that is concerning to both beekeepers and government officials. When the role that honeybees play is considered – the pollinators of a large percentage of the crops we harvest every day – it is no surprise that a larger overall focus is being put on trying to save them. Many countries have already been putting measures in place to help, including banning certain pesticides and even planting bee-friendly gardens to help them thrive.

The new technology being proposed is called Project Pollinate and Salomon has already installed the hive tracker. "We're creating sensors that allow us to passively observe what's happening in the hive instead of actively disturbing the bees to find out for ourselves," he said. The tracker he has currently installed is showing records that confirm his hive is currently thriving. "Each of these is a bee sized gate, like that one that just went in, only one can get in at a time and basically there's a light sensor […].”

Salomon’s device is literally tracking the activity of the bees going in and out of the hive and, even though there are 40,000 bees in this particular hive, he feels a connection and attachment to each and every one. "Bees are doing great. We've checked up on the equipment, the equipment is doing good," he said. Ideally, this new technology will be able to alert beekeepers to when something is going wrong, in hopes that they can make adjustments to save the hive and keep the bees alive.

Additionally, this technology may be able to help identify some factors that could be associated with Colony Collapse Disorder, a mysterious condition that has been occurring to beehives across the world for a number of years. Since honeybees are so precious to so many country’s agricultural economy, keeping them alive, healthy and working is very important for both beekeepers and the government.